Japanese Internment of World War IIUS History & Government

Pearl Harbor

• Pearl Harbor, Hawaii was attacked on December 7, 1941.

• Hawaii was still a US territory

Ramifications on Japanese

• On the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, an Oakland, CA, grocery store bore a “Sold” sign as well as one proclaiming the patriotism of its owner. The Japanese American shop owner, a University of California graduate was later sent to an internment camp..

Executive Order 9066• As a result of the attack on Pearl

Harbor, on 2/19/1942 FDR issued this order which defined “Military Area No.1” as the area from which "any or all persons may be excluded" – It was basically the entire West Coast– Hawaii was placed under Martial Law

• The order stated that people of "Foreign Enemy Ancestry" were to be “excluded” from this area– The government was to provide for

the transportation and relocation of the “excluded” people

• Approximately 120,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans sent to internment camps– 62% were citizens of the US

American Distrust• The government ordered “all

persons of Japanese ancestry” to register with the government

• They were given 6 days to get their affairs in order before being sent to an “Assembly Center” to live temporarily

• These were located at race tracks, fairgrounds and other large public meeting places across the Western US– There were 17 of these centers– The Puyallup Fairgrounds was one

• A good fiction book to read: Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford

Going to the Camps

• Here, local Seattle Japanese-Americans board a bus headed toward Camp Harmony

By military jeep & by train

Being Sent to the Camps• At the time, government called

the camps “Relocation Centers” or “Concentration Camps”

• Today, we refer to them as “Internment Camps” though that was the official term used for the camps for those suspected of actual crimes or those with “enemy sympathies”

• There were 10 camps in AR, AZ, CA, CO, ID, UT & WY– The most well-known for us are

Manzanar and Minidoka

• A good non-fiction book to read:

Farewell to Manzanar by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston

Life in the Camps• Internees were housed in "tar paper-covered barracks of simple frame

construction without plumbing or cooking facilities of any kind" in their own homes—the camps had public bathrooms & mess-halls

• The camps were guarded by armed border patrol agents, were surrounded by tall fences and barbed wire, and had enforced curfews

• Over time, there was relatively free movement outside the marked boundaries of the camps where internees grew their own gardens or livestock.

• Some got jobs or went to college outside the camps; schools for elementary & high school students were set up within the camps

Camp Life

Camp Life• As normal as they

tried to make it, there was always the reminder that they were being held against their will

• Pair/share Internment Experiences

Internees’ Reactions• Japanese-Americans tended to comply

with the US government to prove themselves loyal…and where else could they have gone?– The term “shitkata ga nai” or “it cannot be

helped” summarizes their resigned attitude• 5,600 Japanese-Americans renounced

their citizenship when asked to sign a loyalty oath to the US (of these 1300 moved back to Japan)

• 6% of military-aged males volunteered to serve in the US army– The 442nd Regimental Combat team is the most

decorated unit from WWII– They fought in Europe, not the Pacific

Pledging Allegiance at school (before internment)

A Japanese-American soldier on furlough at a internment camp

  

Supreme Court Challenges• In Yasui vs. US (1943) & Hirabayashi vs. US (1943) the Court

upheld the constitutionality of curfews based on ancestry when the nation was at war with the country from which that group originated.

• In Ex parte Endo (1944) the court ruled that after the war the government could not continue to detain a citizen that the government itself conceded was loyal. This helped lead to the re-opening of the West Coast for resettlement by Japanese-American citizens after World War II

• In Korematsu vs. US (1944) ruled that the exclusion order (33) was constitutional and that people could be interned based on their ancestry

Getting Out

• It was often hard to find jobs, or a place to live, after the war

Reparations• In 1948 the Japanese American Claims Act

disbursed over $38 million to 26,000 families for their losses

• In 1976 President Gerald Ford publically admitted that the internment was wrong

• In 1988 President Reagan signed the American Civil Liberties Act. Approximately $1.6 billion was set aside for the 80,000 survivors

• In 1990 the survivors each received a $20,000 check and a letter of formal apology signed by President George HW Bush

Monument at Manzanar, now a National Historic Site

Minidoka is a National Monument today