Masaoka v. People

245 P.2d 1062, 39 Cal. 2d 883, 1952 Cal. LEXIS 315

Opinions

THE COURT.

Five brothers, American citizens of Japanese ancestry, agreed among themselves to build a home for their widowed mother, a Japanese alien ineligible to citizenship, who had no property or income other than a small pension. One brother and his wife purchased a residential lot in Pasadena and executed a deed giving the mother a life estate in the property with remainder to the five brothers. The mother, together with her sons and daughter-in-law, then brought this action to determine whether the property had escheated to the state by operation of the Alien Land Law. (I Deering’s Gen. Laws, Act 261.) The trial court quieted title in the mother and sons, holding that the Alien Land Law is unconstitutional because it violates the Fourteenth Amendment to the federal Constitution.

Our decision in Sei Fujii v. State of California, 38 Cal.2d 718 [242 P.2d 617], is controlling and for the reasons there stated the judgment must be affirmed.

Judgment affirmed.