February 13, 2014: SEATTLE – South Seattle Community College announced today the school will hold their Japanese American Day of Remembrance event on Feb. 20 with a screening of filmmaker Frank Abe’s “Conscience and the Constitution” at 11 AM in the Jerry Brockey Student Center. A discussion of the film will immediately follow. The event is free and open to all.

Abe’s film tells the true World War II-era story of a group of young Japanese Americans who refused to be drafted into the war from their Wyoming internment camp unless their rights as U.S. citizens were restored and their families were released. The U.S. government ordered the internment of over 110,000 people of Japanese heritage in the aftermath of the Pearl Harbor attack in 1941.

“The film shows the price one pays for taking a principled stand,” Abe said. “It’s also about two responses to injustice: collaboration or resistance. The resisters broke the law to clarify the rights of all Japanese Americans in camp, yet they not only served two years in prison, they spent 50 years as pariahs in our own community.”

Abe worked for two decades to recover the story of these men, known as the Heart Mountain resisters, and has helped produce several “Day of Remembrance” media events. He worked as an award-winning reporter for KIRO Newsradio for many years, and is currently Director of Communications for the King County Executive.

Quick Facts:

Thursday, Feb. 20, 2014 at 11 AM

Jerry Brockey Student Center, Room A, South Seattle Community College

6000 16th Ave. S.W., Seattle, WA 98106

Free and open to the public