In the days following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Tom Murphy, a newly minted army lawyer, finds himself in the middle of the governmentas security program to remove all ethnic Japaneseaincluding children, the aged and infirm, and American citizensafrom their homes on the West Coast to internment camps around the country. A tiny minority of citizens and a small number of federal officials attempt to resist the nativist pressure even as racist tension poisons the air. Murphy and his colleagues wrestle with the legal, ethical and moral questions as the federal government is torn apart by the conflict between justice and national security. Friends find themselves on opposite sides of the issue, and Tomas transformation from a young fast-track attorney to a champion of the internees is brought about at great personal cost.