SALT LAKE CITY — SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - A man who challenged the
World War II internment of Japanese-Americans will be honored in
Utah under a declaration signed by Gov. Gary Herbert. The
declaration signed Friday establishes Jan. 30, 2013, as Fred
Korematsu Day of Civil Liberties and the Constitution.
Korematsu, who died in 2005, was arrested in Oakland, Calif., in
1942 after refusing to enter an internment camp. His case led
the U.S. Supreme Court to examine the internment order's
legality. The Topaz Internment Camp about 16 miles northwest of
Delta processed about 11,000 Japanese Americans from 1942 to
1945. Thousands of Japanese Americans living in the San
Francisco Bay area were sent by train to the remote Utah camp
after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.