Suit on WWII Slave Labor in Japan
Voided
Court:
Ruling upholds argument that the U.S. peace treaty settled all claims. Lawyers
call it a blow to reparations movement.
In
a major defeat for the World War II reparations movement, a federal judge in San
Francisco on Thursday tossed out a lawsuit seeking restitution from huge
Japanese corporations that forced American prisoners to work as slave
laborers.
U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker,
siding with a long-held Japanese government position, ruled that a 1951 peace
agreement between the United States and Japan prohibited further claims by
former soldiers of the nation's wartime
opponents.
The judge ruled on a lawsuit that
had consolidated seven federal suits on behalf of 25,000 families across the
nation.
Attorneys for the
corporations--Mitsubishi Corp., Mitsui, Nippon Steel Corp., Nippon Sharyo Ltd.,
Japan Energy Corp., Ishihara Sangyo Kaisha Ltd. and others--agreed with Walker's
ruling that the treaty essentially settled any American disputes with
Japan.
"It's definitely a correct ruling.
That's what the treaty said," said Margaret Pfeiffer, a Washington, D.C.,
attorney for Nippon Steel.
But David Casey Jr.,
one of the lawyers for the former soldiers, called Walker's move "a major blow
to these wonderful heroes."
"Originally, there
were 25,000 prisoners in the company camps; 16,000 returned from Japan, and
6,000 are still alive today," Casey said. "While 1% of the American POWs in
Germany during the war died in camps there, 37% died because of abuses in
Japan's company camps.
"So it's outrageous that
these companies, which profited from slave labor, are celebrating in their board
rooms," he said.
Mitsui and Mitsubishi, he
said, "are the third and fourth largest corporations on Earth. . . . Yet they've
never reached out to apologize or take
steps."
In his ruling, Walker said such
lawsuits potentially could "unsettle half a century of diplomacy" between the
two powers that signed the Treaty of Peace in
1951.
"History has vindicated the wisdom of
that bargain," the judge said. "And while full compensation for plaintiffs'
hardships, in the purely economic sense, has been denied these former prisoners
and countless other survivors of the war, the immeasurable bounty of life for
themselves and their posterity in a free society and in a more peaceful world
services the debt."
The former prisoners'
attorneys demanded a rehearing, which Walker granted and scheduled for Dec. 13.
But rarely do judges reverse their own
opinions.
The State Department also weighed in
on the case, urging Walker to dismiss the suits. The U.S. government said the
treaty waived all claims against Japan by the government and its nationals.
Allowing the suits to proceed would undermine the peace accord, the government
said.
Sheldon Harris, history professor
emeritus at Cal State Northridge, described Walker's ruling as "disgraceful. The
Nazi corporations caved in, but the Japanese firms are holding
tight."
"As for the 1951 treaty, it can be read
a dozen different ways," he said. "The shameful thing is that the U.S.
government continues to support the Japanese position. But then, American
companies are buying significant minority shares in all of these Japanese firms.
They're all in it together."
Harris, who has
written extensively on the subject, said, "I know these POWs. They are a tragic
bunch, in their 70s and 80s who suffered horribly in coal and iron mines under
terrible living conditions. And when they got out, the U.S. government gave them
$1 for every day they were imprisoned. That was their reward for serving their
country."
But Michael Bazyler, a professor of
international law at Whittier Law School, said he was not surprised by Walker's
ruling.
"A federal judge, who is sitting alone,
when told by the State Department to interpret a particular treaty involving
foreign nations in a certain way, is going to take that recommendation very
strongly," he said. "But that doesn't mean it is a correct
interpretation."
Lester Tenney, who spent three
years in a slave labor camp working in a dangerous coal mine he says was owned
by a large Japanese company, was dismayed by the
ruling.
"I want them to say to me that we did
you wrong," Tenney said. The 80-year-old San Diego Army veteran said all he
wanted was an apology, not money.