The Supreme Court ruled against Yamataya, allowing deportation to proceed. However, in the fine print, Yamataya v. Fisher ruled that deportation of immigrants ought not to proceed summarily but must allow for due process -- in other words, a hearing of some kind must take place. It was this provision that was referenced in blocking the federal government from immediately deporting Moslems who had already arrived at U.S. ports.
The origin of this photo, which appeared in an article in the Seattle Daily Times, is unknown. It appears to be a studio portrait from Japan.
Lost in Translation
But who was Yamataya? The identity of the appellant in this landmark case is often overlooked.It seems that Kaoru Yamataya was a young girl brought to Seattle on a Japanese passenger ship in July 1901. Between that date and her eventual deportation in 1906, Kaoru's sad story encompasses pregnancy, separation from her family, the death of her child, a manhunt, incarceration, and, possibly, sexual exploitation. Through it all, she was subjected to public scrutiny and hounded by immigration officials.
Even the transliteration of the names Kaoru, Yamataya, and Masataro are subject to wide fluctuations in the records. In the Writ of Habeas Corpus issued on behalf of Kaoru, she is referred to with a male pronoun.
What we know
On July 11, 1901, Kaoru disembarked from the ship SS Kaga Maru at Smith's Cove in Seattle. She was accompanied by a Japanese man, or perhaps by two. The immigration inspector listed her age as 15, her race and nationality as "Jap." In the space on the landing card designated for "Destination and Name and Address of Relative or Friend to Join There," was noted "None" and "Settler." Few other fields on the form were filled out.
The original passenger manifest for the SS Kaga Maru, including the names of Kaoru and Masataro Yamataya. (NARA)
Kaoru was allowed to land and leave the customs shed. However, some four days later she was arrested along with her fellow traveler, Masataro Yamataya. The immigration authorities held a brief hearing (Board of Special Inquiry) and then asked for an order of deportation from the office of the Secretary of the Treasury for Kaoru. By July 23 the order was in hand.
The immigration service had decided that the girl met the criteria for deportation outlined in both the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the Immigration Act of 1891: she was a pauper and likely to become a public charge.
Ad for the Tokiwa Boarding House from a Japanese newspaper, preserved in the files of the National Archives and Records Administration, Seattle, as part of Masataro Yamataya's federal court case.
Kaoru and Masataro had been tracked down to a boarding house on Jackson Street in Nihonmachi (Japantown) called Tokiwa House by Immigrant and Chinese Inspector Thomas M. Fisher. Masataro was thrown in jail on suspicion of promoting prostitution; Kaoru was sent to a charity due to her "delicate condition." Apparently, Kaoru was in an advanced state of pregnancy. She was initially sent to the House of the Good Shepherd, at that time on Seattle's First Hill, but by the time she gave birth she was at the Florence Crittenton Home in the Dunlap neighborhood of the Rainier Valley.
Masataro Yamataya had been in the United States for some years before returning to Japan about 1900. He offered a number of stories for bringing Kaoru to this country -- or perhaps stories were made up for him:
- Kaoru was his adopted daughter and was coming to live with him.
- Kaoru was being sent to the States for education and he was her uncle.
- Kaoru was brought to the States to work in a brothel run by his wife on "Japanese Alley" in Spokane.
- Kaoru was sent to the States by her aristocratic parents in Japan due to her indiscretion and to spare them the dishonor of a pregnant single daughter.
- Kaoru was sent to the States to separate her from her secret lover.
With help from the Japanese community, a firm of American attorneys was retained and a petition for a writ of habeas corpus filed with the U.S. District Court in Seattle. The petition protested the girl's confinement, echoing the words of standing immigration law:
"Your petitioner further alleges that the said imprisonment of the said Kaoru Yamataya by the said Fisher is unlawful; that the said Kaoru Yamataya is not an idiot or an insane person; that she is not a pauper, and is not likely to become a public charge; that she is not suffering from any loathsome disease or any disease, or any dangerous or contageous [sic] disease ; that she has not been convicted of a felony or other infamous crime or misdemeanor involving moral turpitude; that she did not come to the United States in violation of the contract labor laws passed by Congress, or in violation of any law of the United States relative to the exclusion of aliens, and that the said Kaoru Yamataya is lawfully within the United States and is entitled to remain therein."
The Writ of Habeas Corpus issued on behalf of Kaoru. (NARA)
Upon their initial arrest by Inspector Fisher, Koaru and Masataro had provided statements. The signed accounts were highly personal and incriminating and, of course, were used against them in a court of law.
Masataro confessed to having a wife in Spokane who "did immoral business," to having no home of his own in the United States, and that neither he nor Kaoru had much in the way of money. Perhaps most damning, he admitted that he and Kaoru had shared a bunk on the ship coming over and had continued to share a bed in the boarding house where they were found:
"We had one room, one bed in the room. I and the girl occupied the same bed four nights, in the same room where Inspector Fisher found me this morning. When found I was in my Japanese dressing clothes, the girl was in the same [room? condition?], undressed and in her night clothes. I know that she is in the family way...I put my hands under her clothes this morning and assisted her to dress." (Statement of Masataro Yamataya to Custom House, Port of Seattle, July 15, 1901)
Masataro goes on to state that he had planned to place Kaoru with the Japanese YMCA in Seattle.
Kaoru's statement echoes that of the man she calls her uncle, adding that she shared the ship's bunk with both him and another "relation." She goes on to state:
"I have no money. I had none when I came here. A Japanese man got me in the family way in Nagasaki, Japan." (Statement of Kaoru Yamataya to Custom House, Port of Seattle, July 15, 1901)
The statements agree that Masataro paid Kaoru's passage to the United States, a key element for a charge of human trafficking.
Kaoru's statement is signed with Japanese characters. What appears to be the signature of another Japanese individual (Chary Nasake?) may be that of the translator. Masataro appears to have signed his own statement in English transliteration. Both statements are clearly written in the hand of Inspector Fisher, as deduced by his own signatures on the documents.
Kaoru's signature on her statement to Immigration Inspector Fisher. (NARA)
Little Boy Lost
The Case against Masataro Yamataya.
Efforts to deport Kaoru unfolded parallel to the criminal case against her male companion, Masataro, who stood accused of what would today be called human trafficking. While the case against Kaoru was based on the argument that she was a pauper and likely to become a public charge, the authorities were quite clear that, in charging Masataro, they were looking for prostitution. In this they may have had some justification: according to historian David A. Takami, at the turn of the century Japanese women were frequently smuggled into the country to work in houses of prostitution in the international district of Seattle. Not all of them came willingly.On June 13, 1902, Masataro Yamataya was put on trial in Federal Court in Seattle for bringing a woman into the country for immoral purposes. His attorneys presented depositions from Kaoru's family in Nagasaki. These interrogatories had been carried out in the presence of the United States consul for Japan, Charles B. Harris. The sworn, and somewhat rehearsed, statements testified that Kaoru had traveled to America with her uncle at the request of her family, that her father had given her money for the trip, and that he had sent additional funds to her in the States. The stated purpose of the trip: to learn English and sewing.
The answers of Kikotaro Tanaka, Kaoru's brother, are typical:
"He was asked to take her to America by my parents and to arrange for her to learn English and sewing. My family talked the matter over. I also asked Masataro Yamataya to take her to America for these purposes. I know that she was secretly meeting a lover before she left Nagasaki, and I believe she was with child when she left Nagasaki."
The statements of the family members agreed that Masataro had adopted Kaoru, with their permission, to make it easier for them to travel together. For this reason, she bore his name, although her father's name was Hirye Hamada.
"I was with them the whole time on the steamer, and I absolutely know they did not occupy the same bunk...After we arrived at Seattle we all three stopped at the Hotel Tokiwa, Masataro Yamataya occupying one room and Kaoru occupying another."
The covering letter for the six interrogatories obtained in Nagasaki, Japan. The letter is signed by the Consul of the United States, Charles B. Harris, dated February 7, 1902, and sealed with wax and silk ribbons. (NARA)
This grainy photo from the Seattle Star newspaper purports to show Kaoru in western dress. This historian is skeptical that it is actually she. Seattle Star, April 11, 1903.
The Case against Kaoru Yamataya
In 1903 the case, Yamataya v. Fisher went before the Supreme Court of the United States. The decision by the justices was bad news for Kaoru -- she was to be deported -- but also contained a grain of hope for future immigrant cases.
This grainy photo from the Seattle Star newspaper purports to show Kaoru in western dress. This historian is skeptical that it is actually she. Seattle Star, April 11, 1903.
Beginning with the writ of habeas corpus, requested by Masataro and initially approved by the presiding federal judge, the Japanese Immigrant Case took off. A slew of legal actions flew back and forth between the opposing sides.
Early in 1903 the case came up for review by the United States Supreme Court. The appeal rested on three arguments:
- The Immigration Act of 1891 applied only to aliens who had not yet "effected entry" into the country.
- The Immigration Act of 1891 was unconstitutional since it did not provide for due process of law.
- Kaoru was deprived of her liberty without due process of law, in violation of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution.
As in the petition for the writ of habeas corpus, Kaoru's attorneys pointed to the fact that she did not speak or understand English and had been isolated from those who could advise her:
"Appellant does not understand the English language. She had no notice whatever of the investigation made by appellee, and was not represented and had no opportunity to be heard thereat. After her arrest and imprisonment by appellee appellant was not permitted to see her attorneys or her relatives and she was ignorant of the fact that any investigation had been made or would be made, or that any decision of the inspection officers had been made until a few hours prior to the sailing of the vessel upon which appellee intended to deport her. The evidence upon which appellee and the other inspection officers made their findings, and upon which the warrant of deportation was issued, was garbled, incomplete, misleading and in many respects untrue, in that appellant was made to answer Yes and No to questions which she did not comprehend, and answers conveying a meaning not intended were in consequence given, and only such evidence as when unexplained tended to support the finding of appellee was considered by him."
In response, the government argued that Inspector Fisher had done nothing wrong; that he had the right to order expulsion of an alien deemed to be a pauper up to one year following arrival; and that the "roving, experimental, and general allegations" against him were an assault on the authority of executive officers of the government. Many examples of case law were presented to back these claims, most of them involving Chinese nationals. Further, neither Kaoru nor Masataro had used the only protest method open to them -- that of appealing directly to the Secretary of the Treasury at the time of their arrest.
On April 6, 1903, the decision of the court was handed down upholding the arguments of Inspector Fisher and the government's legal team. Deportation decisions were the province of the executive officers (e.g. immigration officers). The jurists stated that the law against paupers, such as Kaoru was deemed to be, was "designed to protect the general public against contact with dangerous or improper persons." As for the language barrier: "If the appellant's want of knowledge of the English language put her at some disadvantage...that was her misfortune."
The vote of the court was seven to two in favor of the government's case, with famed jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. siding with the majority.
As mentioned above, Yamataya v. Fisher did provide a consolation prize for immigrant advocates. The court affirmed the right to due process -- in a way:
"This court has never held, nor must we now be understood as holding, that administrative officers, when executing the provisions of a statute involving the liberty of persons, may disregard the fundamental principles that inhere in 'due process of law' as understood at the time of the adoption of the Constitution."
This is the sentence cited in State of Washington; State of Minnesota v. Donald J. Trump (et al), filed February 9, 2017 in response to Trump's first Muslim ban.
For Kaoru it was too late; the court adjudged that she had been granted due process in her initial hearing before the immigration tribunal in Seattle.
Little Girl Lost
Shortly after the announcement of the court's decision, and before she could be picked up by authorities, Kaoru disappeared from the Crittenton Home. The Seattle Daily News wrote of her having been "spirited away." This may not have been the first time she disappeared. According to another newspaper account, upon being released from the House of the Good Shepherd in August 1901, she left town and was tracked down in Salt Lake City.Her second attempt to leave town was more successful; she was gone more than three years before being located at a boarding house in Portland, Oregon. Her whereabouts and activities during that time are a mystery. One local paper offered a highly colorized version of the story which included a lover from the lower classes who had followed her over from Japan, a planned elopement, cruel parents, and a hard-hearted uncle. The newspaper gushed over Kaoru in language that is painful to read:
"She is an aristocrat from the top of her little black head to the tips of her tiny toes, and is more than passing fair. She is possessed of the kind of a complexion that one reads about in Japanese romances." (Seattle Star, 4/11/1903)
On October 16, 1906, the Seattle Daily Times reported that she was back in county jail in Seattle. Two weeks later she was deported back to Japan on the Shimano Maru.
We do not know what became of Masataro Yamataya during those years. He had been allowed to reclaim his passport shortly after his acquittal at trial in 1902. He might, therefore, have returned to Japan. However, the 1920 U.S. Census shows him, at age 50, residing on 9th Avenue in Seattle, the manager of a boarding house.
Reasons Lost
The biggest question this researcher has is Why? Why did the immigration authorities pursue Kaoru for five years? In hindsight it seems like the effort to bring one teenage girl to heel amounted to a personal obsession on the part of the arresting officer. And why did the Japanese community commit the considerable resources necessary to take her case all the way to the Supreme Court? Perhaps there were precedents in play on both sides. Perhaps there were matters of personal honor at stake. Perhaps Kaoru was a victim of this country's ever-changing immigration policies and practices
A more diligent historian might make an effort to research the Japanese language newspapers of the day to gain insights into the community's response to the case. And a thorough review of immigration law as it applied to Asians at the turn of the century might help us understand the case and how it relates to this country's immigration practices today.
Sources for this essay include the immigration and federal court records on Kaoro Yamataya and Masataro Yamataya at the National Archives and Records Administration, Seattle; the court proceedings in the case Yamataya v. Fisher retrieved via Google Books; the Seattle Daily News; the Seattle Star, Ancestry.com, and David A. Takami, Divided Destiny: A History of Japanese Americans in Seattle (1998). Special thanks to Nancy Dulaney of the Rainier Valley Historical Society for calling this case to my attention.
A more diligent historian might make an effort to research the Japanese language newspapers of the day to gain insights into the community's response to the case. And a thorough review of immigration law as it applied to Asians at the turn of the century might help us understand the case and how it relates to this country's immigration practices today.
Sources for this essay include the immigration and federal court records on Kaoro Yamataya and Masataro Yamataya at the National Archives and Records Administration, Seattle; the court proceedings in the case Yamataya v. Fisher retrieved via Google Books; the Seattle Daily News; the Seattle Star, Ancestry.com, and David A. Takami, Divided Destiny: A History of Japanese Americans in Seattle (1998). Special thanks to Nancy Dulaney of the Rainier Valley Historical Society for calling this case to my attention.
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