Test Case

In 1942, PFC Gene Takei was stationed at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri, having enlisted shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. 

His parents, Morizo (Harry) and Nami Takei, were swept up in the mass forced removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast and had to liquidate all their possessions and the inventory of their store on San Pablo Avenue in Oakland at a tremendous loss—$180 for the store’s entire inventory plus the furniture and appliances from their home.

Having nowhere to store anything, they had to throw away or give all of Gene’s possessions to the Salvation Army. They were incarcerated in Tanforan, and later, Topaz Relocation Center in the Utah desert.

Shortly after his parents were “settled” in Topaz, Gene applied for furlough so he could visit them. He must have been the first person serving in the U.S. military to visit parents who were incarcerated behind barbed wire, because the guards did not know how to proceed.

He was denied entry at the gate and was kept waiting while Charles Ernst, the Topaz Director, contacted Washington DC to ask for guidance. Ernst was instructed not to let any military personnel inside. Gene was also told that he was not allowed to stay in the area. That afternoon, without having seen his parents, he was escorted by an FBI agent to Salt Lake City, where he boarded a train for Omaha, Nebraska. He knew no one in Omaha or the Midwest in general, so after two nights in a hotel, he returned to Fort Leonard Wood with ten days of his furlough unused.

Gene later heard from friends in Topaz that Ernst was notified the day after Gene’s attempted visit that all military servicemen who had relatives in a camp would be allowed to enter and stay with their families. So Gene was the test case—and although the government initially failed the test, the error was quickly corrected—just not quickly enough for Gene and his parents.