Japanese American internment refers to the forcible relocation and
internmentInternment is the imprisonment or confinement of people, commonly in large groups, without trial. The Oxford English Dictionary gives the meaning as: "The action of ‘interning’; confinement within the limits of a country or place"...
in 1942 of approximately 120,000
Japanese Americanare Americans of Japanese heritage, either born in Japan or their descendents. Japanese Americans have historically been among the three largest Asian American communities, but in recent decades have become the sixth largest group at roughly 1,204,205, including those of mixed-race or...
s and
JapaneseThe are the predominant ethnic group of Japan. Worldwide, approximately 130 million people are of Japanese descent; of these, approximately 127 million are residents of Japan. People of Japanese ancestry who live in other countries are referred to as...
residing in the United States to housing facilities called "War Relocation Camps," in the wake of Imperial Japan's attack on
Pearl HarborPearl Harbor is a harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...
. The internment of Japanese Americans was applied unequally throughout the United States. Japanese Americans residing on the
West Coast of the United StatesThe "West Coast", "Western Seaboard", or "Pacific Coastline" are terms for the westernmost coastal states of the United States. It most often comprises California, Oregon and Washington...
were all interned, whereas in
HawaiiHawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states, and is the only state made up entirely of islands. It is located on an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of Australia. The state was admitted to the Union on August...
, where more than 150,000 Japanese Americans composed nearly a third of that
territoryThe Territory of Hawaii was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from July 7, 1898, until August 21, 1959, when it was admitted to the Union as the State of Hawaii....
's population, only 1,200 to 1,800 Japanese Americans were interned. Of those interned, 62 percent were
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
citizens.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt authorized the internment with
Executive Order 9066United States Executive Order 9066 was a presidential executive order issued during World War II by U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt on February 19, 1942 to send Japanese Americans to internment camps....
on February 19, 1942, which allowed local military commanders to designate "military areas" as "exclusion zones," from which "any or all persons may be excluded." This power was used to declare that all people of Japanese ancestry were excluded from the entire Pacific coast, including all of California and most of Oregon and Washington, except for those in internment camps. In 1944, the
Supreme CourtThe Supreme Court of the United States is the highest judicial body in the United States, and leads the federal judiciary. It consists of the Chief Justice of the United States and eight Associate Justices, who are nominated by the President and confirmed with the "advice and consent" of the Senate...
upheld the constitutionality of the exclusion orders, while noting that the provisions that singled out people of Japanese ancestry were a separate issue outside the scope of the proceedings.
In 1988,
CongressThe United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States of America, consisting of two houses, the Senate and the House of Representatives. Both senators and representatives are chosen through direct election....
passed and
PresidentThe President of the United States is the head of state and head of government of the United States and is the highest political official in the United States by influence and recognition...
Ronald ReaganRonald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States and the 33rd Governor of California .Born in Tampico, Illinois, Reagan moved to Los Angeles, California in the 1930s...
signed legislation which apologized for the internment on behalf of the U.S. government. The legislation stated that government actions were based on "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership". About $1.6 billion in
reparationsIn jurisprudence, reparation is replenishment of a previously inflicted loss by the criminal to the victim. Monetary restitution is a common form of reparation...
were later disbursed by the U.S. government to every surviving internee.
Historical context
In the first half of the 20th century,
CaliforniaCalifornia is the most populous state in the United States, and the third largest by area. California is the second most populous sub-national entity in the Americas, behind only São Paulo, Brazil...
experienced a wave of anti-Japanese prejudice, in part because of the concentration there of new immigrants. This was distinct from the
Japanese Americanare Americans of Japanese heritage, either born in Japan or their descendents. Japanese Americans have historically been among the three largest Asian American communities, but in recent decades have become the sixth largest group at roughly 1,204,205, including those of mixed-race or...
experience in the broader United States. Over 90% of Japanese immigrants to the USA settled in California, where labor and farm competition fed into general anti-Japanese sentiment. In 1905, California's anti-
miscegenationMiscegenation is the mixing of different racial groups, that is, marrying, cohabiting, having sexual relations and having children with a partner from outside one's racially or ethnically defined group....
law was amended to prohibit marriages between
CaucasiansThe term Caucasian race has been used to denote the general physical type of some or all of the indigenous populations of Europe, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, West Asia, Central Asia, and South Asia...
and "
MongoliansThe term "Mongoloid" is an historical racial category used to describe people of East Asia and Southeast Asian origin. Its use originated from a variation of the word "Mongol", a people who are considered one of the main proto-populations for the race...
" (an umbrella term which, at the time, was used in reference to the Japanese, among other ethnicities of East Asian ancestry). In October 1906, the San Francisco Board of Education voted to segregate their schools based on race. It ordered ninety-three Japanese students in the district to a segregated school in Chinatown. Twenty-five of the students were American citizens. That anti-Japanese sentiment was maintained beyond this period is evidenced by the 1924 "Oriental Exclusion Law," which blocked Japanese immigrants from attaining citizenship.
In the years 1939–1941, the FBI compiled the
Custodial Detention IndexThe Custodial Detention Index was based on a massive list of U.S. residents compiled by the FBI during 1939-1941, in the frame of a program called variously "Custodial Detention" and/or "Alien Enemy Control"....
("CDI") on citizens, enemy aliens and foreign nationals, based principally on census records, in the interest of national security. On June 28, 1940, the
Alien Registration ActThe Alien Registration Act or Smith Act of 1940 is a United States federal statute that makes it a criminal offense for anyone toIt also required all non-citizen adult residents to register with the government; within four months, 4,741,971 aliens had registered under the Act's provisions.The Act...
was passed. Among many other loyalty regulations, Section 31 required the registration and fingerprinting of all aliens above the age of 14, and Section 35 required aliens to report any change of address within 5 days. In the subsequent months, nearly five million foreign nationals registered at post offices around the country.
About 127,000 Japanese Americans lived on the West Coast of the continental United States at the time of the Pearl Harbor attack. About 80,000 were
nisei (Japanese born in the United States and holding American citizenship) and
sanseiSansei is a Japanese language term used in countries in South America,North America and Australia to specify the children of children born to Japanese people in the new country. The Nisei are considered the second generation, grandchildren of the Japanese-born immigrants called Sansei and the...
(the sons or daughters of
niseiDuring the early years of World War II, Japanese Americans were forcibly relocated from their homes in the Pacific coast states because military leaders and public opinion combined to fan unproven fears of sabotage...
). The rest were
isseiIssei is a Japanese language term used in countries in North America, South America and Australia to specify the Japanese people first to immigrate. Their children born in the new country are referred to as Nisei , and their grandchildren are Sansei...
(immigrants born in Japan who were ineligible for U.S. citizenship).
After Pearl Harbor
The
attack on Pearl HarborThe attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Japanese navy against the United States' naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of Sunday, December 7, 1941 , later resulting in the United...
on December 7, 1941 led some to suspect that Imperial Japan was preparing a full-scale attack on the West Coast of the United States. Japan's rapid military conquest of a large portion of Asia and the Pacific between 1936 and 1942 made its military forces seem unstoppable to some Americans.
Shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Lieutenant General
John L. DeWittJohn Lesesne DeWitt was an American Army general, best known for his role in the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. In the course of carrying out policy, he issued military proclamations that applied to American men, women and children who happened to have Japanese ancestry,...
, head of the Western Command, sought approval to conduct search and seizure operations aimed at preventing alien Japanese from making radio transmissions to Japanese ships. The Justice Department declined, however, stating that there was no
probable causeIn United States criminal law, probable cause refers to the standard by which a police officer has the right to make an arrest, conduct a personal or property search, or to obtain a warrant for arrest. It is also used to refer to the standard to which a grand jury believes that a crime has been...
to support DeWitt's assertion, as the FBI concluded that there was no security threat. On January 2, the Joint Immigration Committee of the California Legislature sent a manifesto to California newspapers which attacked "the ethnic Japanese," whom it alleged were "totally unassimilable." This manifesto further argued that all people of Japanese heritage were loyal subjects of the
Emperor of JapanThe of Japan is the symbol of the state and of the unity of the Japanese people. He is the head of the Japanese Imperial Family. He is also the highest authority of the Shinto religion...
; Japanese language schools, furthermore, according to the manifesto, were bastions of racism which advanced doctrines of Japanese racial superiority.
The manifesto was backed by the Native Sons and Daughters of the Golden West and the California Department of the
American LegionThe American Legion is a congressionally chartered mutual-aid veterans organization of the United States armed forces founded to benefit those veterans who served during a wartime period as defined by the U.S. Congress. The American Legion was founded in 1919 by veterans returning from Europe after...
, which in January demanded that all Japanese with dual citizenship be placed in concentration camps. Internment was not limited to those who had been to Japan, but included a small number of German and Italian enemy aliens. By February,
Earl WarrenEarl Warren was the 14th Chief Justice of the United States and is to date the only person elected Governor of California three times. Prior to holding these positions, Warren served as a district attorney for Alameda County, California and Attorney General of California.His tenure as California...
, the Attorney General of California, had begun his efforts to pursuade the federal government to remove all people of Japanese heritage from the West Coast.
Civilian and military officials had concerns about the loyalty of the ethnic Japanese, although these concerns seemed to stem more from racial prejudice than actual risk. Major
Karl BendetsenKarl Robin Bendetsen was born in Aberdeen, Washington. His parents, Albert M. and Anna Bendetson, were first-generation American citizens, and his grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe...
and Lieutenant General John L. DeWitt each questioned Japanese American loyalty. DeWitt, who administered the internment program, repeatedly told newspapers that "A Jap's a Jap" and testified to Congress,
Those that were as little as 1/16th Japanese could be placed in internment camps. There is some evidence supporting the argument that the measures were racially motivated, rather than a military necessity. For example, orphaned infants with "one drop of Japanese blood" (as explained in a letter by one official) were included in the program.
Upon the bombing of Pearl Harbor and pursuant to the
Alien Enemies ActThe Alien and Sedition Acts were four bills passed in 1798 by the Federalists in the 5th United States Congress, who were waging an undeclared naval war with France, later known as the Quasi-War. They were signed into law by President John Adams...
, Presidential Proclamations 2525, 2526 and 2527 were issued designating Japanese, German and Italian nationals as enemy aliens. Information from the CDI was used to locate and incarcerate foreign nationals from Japan, Germany and Italy (although Germany or Italy did not declare war on the U.S. until December 11).
Presidential Proclamation 2537 was issued on January 14, 1942, requiring aliens to report any change of address, employment or name to the
FBIThe Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency. The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
. Enemy aliens were not allowed to enter restricted areas. Violators of these regulations were subject to "arrest, detention and internment for the duration of the war."
Executive Order 9066 and related actions
Executive Order 9066, signed by Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, allowed authorized military commanders to designate "military areas" at their discretion, "from which any or all persons may be excluded." These "exclusion zones," unlike the "alien enemy" roundups, were applicable to anyone that an authorized military commander might choose, whether citizen or non-citizen. Eventually such zones would include parts of both the East and West Coasts, totaling about 1/3 of the country by area. Unlike the subsequent detainment and internment programs that would come to be applied to large numbers of Japanese Americans, detentions and restrictions directly under this Individual Exclusion Program were placed primarily on individuals of German or Italian ancestry, including American citizens.
- March 2, 1942: General John L. DeWitt
John Lesesne DeWitt was an American Army general, best known for his role in the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. In the course of carrying out policy, he issued military proclamations that applied to American men, women and children who happened to have Japanese ancestry,...
issued Public Proclamation No. 1, declaring that "such person or classes of persons as the situation may require" would, at some later point, be subject to exclusion orders from "Military Area No. 1" (essentially, the entire Pacific coast to about inland), and requiring anyone who had "enemy" ancestry to file a Change of Residence Notice if they planned to move. A second exclusion zone was designated several months later, which included the areas chosen by most of the Japanese Americans who had managed to leave the first zone.
- March 11, 1942: Executive Order 9095 created the Office of the Alien Property Custodian, and gave it discretionary, plenary authority over all alien property interests. Many assets were frozen, creating immediate financial difficulty for the affected aliens, preventing most from moving out of the exclusion zones.
- March 24, 1942: Public Proclamation No. 3 declares an 8:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. curfew for "all enemy aliens and all persons of Japanese ancestry" within the military areas.
- March 24, 1942: General DeWitt began to issue Civilian Exclusion Orders for specific areas within "Military Area No. 1."
- March 27, 1942: General DeWitt's Proclamation No. 4 prohibited all those of Japanese ancestry from leaving "Military Area No. 1" for "any purpose until and to the extent that a future proclamation or order of this headquarters shall so permit or direct."
- May 3, 1942: General DeWitt issued Civilian Exclusion Order No. 34, ordering all people of Japanese ancestry, whether citizens or non-citizens, who were still living in "Military Area No. 1" to report to assembly centers, where they would live until being moved to permanent "Relocation Centers."
These edicts included persons of part-Japanese ancestry as well. Anyone with at least one-eighth Japanese ancestry was eligible. Korean-Americans, considered to have Japanese nationality (since Korea was occupied by Japan during WWII), were also included.
Non-military advocates for exclusion, removal, and detention
Internment was popular among many white farmers who resented the Japanese American farmers. "White American farmers admitted that their self-interest required removal of the Japanese." These individuals saw internment as a convenient means of uprooting their Japanese American competitors. Austin E. Anson, managing secretary of the Salinas Vegetable Grower-Shipper Association, told the
Saturday Evening Post in 1942:
The Roberts Commission Report, prepared at President Franklin D. Roosevelt's request, has been cited as an example of the fear and prejudice informing the thinking behind the internment program. The Report sought to link Japanese Americans with espionage activity, and to associate them with the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Columnist Henry McLemore reflected growing public sentiment fueled by this report:
Other California newspapers also embraced this view. According to
The Los Angeles Times:
State politicians joined the bandwagon embraced by Leland Ford of Los Angeles, who demanded that "all Japanese, whether citizens or not, be placed in [inland] concentration camps." Internment of Japanese Americans, who provided critical agricultural labor on the West Coast, created a labor shortage, which was exacerbated by the induction of many American laborers into the Armed Forces. This vacuum precipitated a mass immigration of Mexican workers into the United States to fill these jobs, largely under the banner of what became known as the
Bracero ProgramThe Bracero Program was a series of laws and diplomatic agreements, initiated by an August 1942 exchange of diplomatic notes between the United States and Mexico, for the importation of temporary contract laborers from Mexico to the United States...
. Many Japanese internees were even temporarily released from their camps, for instance, to harvest Western beet crops, to address this wartime labor shortage.
Japan's wartime spy program
The case of
Velvalee DickinsonVelvalee Dickinson , was convicted of espionage against the United States on behalf of Japan during World War II. Known as the "Doll Woman", she used her business in New York City to send information on U.S...
, a nonethnic Japanese woman who was involved in a Japanese spy ring, contributed to heightening American apprehensions. The most widely reported examples of espionage and treason were those of the Tachibana spy ring and the
Niihau IncidentThe Niihau Incident occurred on December 7, 1941, when a Japanese Zero pilot crash-landed on the Hawaiian island of Niihau after participating in the attack on Pearl Harbor....
. The Tachibana spy ring was a group of Japanese nationals who were arrested shortly
before the Pearl Harbor attack and were deported. The Niihau Incident occurred just after the Pearl Harbor attack, when two Japanese Americans on
NiihauNiihau or Niihau is the smallest of the inhabited Hawaiian Islands in the US state of Hawaii, having an area of . Known as the "Forbidden Isle," Niihau lies across the Kaulakahi Channel, southwest of Kauai. The United States Census Bureau defines Niihau as Census Tract 410 of Kauai County,...
freed a captured Japanese pilot and assisted him in his attack on
Native HawaiiansNative Hawaiians refers to the indigenous Polynesian people of the Hawaiian Islands or their descendants...
there. Despite this incident taking place in Hawaii, the Territorial Governor rejected calls for wholesale internment of Japanese Americans there.
Magic
In
Magic: The Untold Story of US Intelligence and the Evacuation of Japanese Residents From the West Coast During World War II,
David LowmanDavid Daniel Lowman was the National Security Agency executive responsible for the declassification of the Magic intercepts and the author of the posthumously published book Magic: The Untold Story of U.S. Intelligence and the Evacuation of Japanese Residents from the West Coast during WWII.Lowman...
, a Former Special Assistant to the Director of the
National Security AgencyThe National Security Agency/Central Security Service is a cryptologic intelligence agency of the United States government, administered as part of the United States Department of Defense. Created on November 4, 1952 by President Harry S...
, argues that Roosevelt was persuaded to authorize the internment by "the frightening specter of massive espionage nets," which he believed were evidenced in
Magic interceptsMagic was an Allied cryptanalysis project during World War II. Magic's efforts were directed at breaking Japan's diplomatic cryptographic codes, allowing Allied policy-makers to read Japan's diplomatic messages....
("Magic" was the code-name for American code-breaking efforts). Lowman also contended that internment served to ensure the secrecy of US code-breaking efforts: successful prosecution of Japanese Americans would force the government to release information revealing their knowledge of Japanese ciphers. If US code-breaking technology was revealed in the context of trials of individual spies, the Japanese Imperial Navy would change its codes, thus undermining US strategic wartime advantage. Many of the controversial conclusions drawn by Lowman were picked up and defended by pundit
Michelle MalkinMichelle Malkin is an American conservative commentator, blogger and author. Her weekly, syndicated column appears in a number of newspapers and websites nationwide. She has been a guest on MSNBC, Fox News Channel, C-SPAN, and national radio programs...
in her book,
In Defense of InternmentIn Defense of Internment: The Case for 'Racial Profiling' in World War II and the War on Terror is a 2004 book written by conservative American political commentator Michelle Malkin...
.
Lowman's critics point out that, once the role of code-breakers became known, after the war, there would have been nothing to prevent prosecution of Japanese-American spies or saboteurs whose activities had been exposed by reading messages to or from them and their Japanese controllers. That no such prosecutions took place is final evidence that no such spy activity ever took place, according to critics. Critics further note the arrests and prosecution of German spies during the war, as a result of breaking German messages (including some protected by one of the Enigma variants), and consider it unlikely that any Japanese American spies would have been ignored. Still other critics have noted that some German or Italian Americans openly sympathizing with fascist forces were not interned, whereas even Japanese children were interned, demonstrating a racist factor which renders untenable Lowman's claim that wartime strategic interests alone account for Japanese internment.
Rebuttals of charges of espionage, disloyalty and anti-American activity
Critics of the internment argue that the military justification was unfounded, citing the absence of any subsequent convictions of
Japanese Americanare Americans of Japanese heritage, either born in Japan or their descendents. Japanese Americans have historically been among the three largest Asian American communities, but in recent decades have become the sixth largest group at roughly 1,204,205, including those of mixed-race or...
s for espionage or sabotage.
Architects of the internment, including DeWitt and Army Major
Karl BendetsenKarl Robin Bendetsen was born in Aberdeen, Washington. His parents, Albert M. and Anna Bendetson, were first-generation American citizens, and his grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe...
, cited the complete lack of sabotage as "a disturbing and confirming indication that such action will be taken" (Memorandum to Secretary of War, 13 FEB 1942).
Critics of the internment also note that it seems unlikely that Japanese Americans in Japan had any choice other than to be conscripted into the Japanese army, given (1) that it was near-impossible for them to return to the U.S. from Japan, and (2) that the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
had already classified all people of Japanese ancestry as "enemy aliens."
An additional reason to question the necessity of internment was an official report by Lieutenant Commander Kenneth Ringle, a naval intelligence officer tasked with evaluating the loyalty of the Japanese American population. LCDR Ringle estimated in a 1941 report to his superiors that "more than 90% of the
NiseiDuring the early years of World War II, Japanese Americans were forcibly relocated from their homes in the Pacific coast states because military leaders and public opinion combined to fan unproven fears of sabotage...
(second generation) and 75% of the original immigrants were completely loyal to the United States." A 1941 report prepared on President Roosevelt's orders by Curtis B. Munson, special representative of the State Department, concluded that most Japanese nationals and "90 to 98%" of Japanese American citizens were loyal. He wrote: "There is no Japanese 'problem' on the Coast… There is far more danger from Communists and people of the
BridgesHarry Bridges was an influential Australian-American union leader, in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union , a longshore and warehouse workers' union on the West Coast, Hawai'i and Alaska which he helped form and led for over 40 years...
type on the Coast than there is from Japanese."
FBI director
J. Edgar HooverJohn Edgar Hoover was the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States. Appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation — predecessor to the FBI — in 1924, he was instrumental in founding the FBI in 1935, where he remained director until his death in 1972...
also opposed the internment of Japanese Americans. Refuting General DeWitt's reports of disloyalty on the part of Japanese Americans, Hoover sent a memo to Attorney General
Francis BiddleFrancis Beverley Biddle was an American lawyer and judge who was Attorney General of the United States during World War II and who served as the primary American judge during the postwar Nuremberg trials....
in which he wrote about Japanese American disloyalty, "Every complaint in this regard has been investigated, but in no case has any information been obtained which would substantiate the allegation." Hoover was not privy to MAGIC intercepts, although he was sometimes sent sanitized synopses.
General DeWitt and Colonel Bendetsen kept this information out of
Final Report: Japanese Evacuation from the West Coast - 1942, which was written in April 1943 — a time when DeWitt was fighting against an order that Nisei soldiers (members of the
442nd Regimental Combat TeamThe 442nd Infantry, formerly the 442nd Regimental Combat Team of the United States Army, was an Asian American unit composed of mostly Japanese Americans who fought in Europe during the Second World War. The families of many of its soldiers were subject to internment...
and the Military Intelligence Service) were to be considered "loyal" and permitted into the Exclusion Zones while on leave. DeWitt and Bendetsen initially issued 10 copies of the report, then hastily recalled them to rewrite passages which showed racist bases for the exclusion. Among other justifications, the report stated flatly that, because of their race, it was impossible to determine the loyalty of Japanese Americans. The original version was so offensive — even in the atmosphere of the wartime 1940s — that Bendetsen ordered all copies to be destroyed. Not a single piece of paper was to be left giving any evidence that an earlier version had existed.
United States District Court opinions
In 1980, a copy of the original
Final Report was found in the National Archives, along with notes showing the numerous differences between the two versions. This earlier, racist and inflammatory version, as well as the
FBIThe Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency. The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
and
ONIThe Office of Naval Intelligence was established in the United States Navy in 1882. ONI was established to "seek out and report" on the advancements in other nations' navies. Its headquarters are at the National Maritime Intelligence Center in Suitland, Maryland...
reports, led to the
coram nobisCoram nobis, or coram vobis is a legal writ issued by a court, acting in its capacity as a Court of Equity, to correct a previous error "of the most fundamental character" to "achieve justice" where "no other remedy" is...
retrials which overturned the convictions of
Fred KorematsuToyosaburo Fred Korematsu was one of the many Japanese-American citizens living on the West Coast during World War II. Shortly after the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D...
,
Gordon HirabayashiGordon Kiyoshi Hirabayashi is an American sociologist , best known for his principled resistance to the Japanese American internment during World War II, and the court case which bears his name, Hirabayashi v. United States.-Biography:Hirabayashi was born in Seattle to a Christian family who were...
and
Minoru YasuiMinoru "Min" Yasui was a Japanese-American lawyer from Oregon. Born in Hood River, Oregon, he earned both an undergraduate degree and his law degree at the University of Oregon. He was one of the few Japanese Americans after the bombing of Pearl Harbor who fought laws that directly targeted...
on all charges related to their refusal to submit to exclusion and internment.
The courts found that the government had intentionally withheld these reports and other critical evidence, at trials all the way up to the Supreme Court, which would have proved that there was no military necessity for the exclusion and internment of Japanese Americans. In the words of
Department of JusticeThe United States Department of Justice is a Cabinet department in the United States government designed to enforce the law and defend the interests of the United States according to the law and to ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans...
officials writing during the war, the justifications were based on "willful historical inaccuracies and intentional falsehoods."
Facilities
While this event is most commonly called the
internment of Japanese Americans, in fact there were several different types of camps involved. The best known facilities were the
Assembly Centers run by the Wartime Civil Control Administration (WCCA), and the
Relocation Centers run by the
War Relocation AuthorityThe War Relocation Authority was the U.S. civilian agency responsible for the relocation and internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. President Franklin D...
(WRA), which are generally (but unofficially) referred to as "internment camps." The
Department of JusticeThe United States Department of Justice is a Cabinet department in the United States government designed to enforce the law and defend the interests of the United States according to the law and to ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans...
(DOJ) operated camps officially called
Internment Camps, which were used to detain those suspected of actual crimes or "enemy sympathies."
German American internmentGerman American Internment refers to the detention of people of German ancestry in the United States during World War II. Many of the detainees were American citizens.-World War II:...
and
Italian American internmentItalian American internment refers to the internment of Italian Americans in the United States during World War II.-Terms:The term "Italian American" does not have a legal definition...
camps also existed, sometimes sharing facilities with the Japanese Americans. The WCCA and WRA facilities were the largest and the most public. The WCCA Assembly Centers were temporary facilities that were first set up in horse racing tracks, fairgrounds and other large public meeting places to assemble and organize internees before they were transported to WRA Relocation Centers by truck, bus or train. The WRA Relocation Centers were camps that housed persons removed from the exclusion zone after March 1942, or until they were able to relocate elsewhere in America outside the exclusion zone.
DOJ Internment Camps
During World War II, over 7,000 Japanese Americans and Japanese from
Latin AmericaLatin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish, Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,501 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
were held in internment camps run by the
Immigration and Naturalization ServiceThe United States Immigration and Naturalization Service was a part of the United States Department of Justice and handled legal and illegal immigration and naturalization. It ceased to exist on March 1, 2003....
, part of the Department of Justice. In this period, Latin Americans of Japanese ancestry were rounded up and transported to American internment camps run by the U.S. Justice Department. These Latin American internees were eventually, through the efforts of civil rights attorney
Wayne M. CollinsWayne M. Collins was a civil rights attorney who worked on cases related to the Japanese American evacuation and internment.-Biography:Collins was born in Sacramento, California and was raised and educated in San Francisco....
, offered "
paroleParole may have different meanings depending on the field and judiciary system. All of the meanings originated from the French parole, meaning " word". Following its use in late-medieval Anglo-French chivalric practice, the term became associated with the release of prisoners based on prisoners...
" relocation to the labor-starved farming community in
Seabrook, New JerseySeabrook is an unincorporated area within Upper Deerfield Township in Cumberland County, New Jersey, United States. The area is served as United States Postal Service ZIP code 08302....
. Many became naturalized American citizens or Japanese Americans after the war.
There were twenty-seven U.S. Department of Justice Camps, eight of which (in
TexasTexas is the second-largest U.S. state in both area and population, and the largest state in the contiguous United States.The name had wide usage among native Americans, meaning "friends" or "allies"...
,
IdahoIdaho is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States of America. The state's largest city and capital is Boise. Residents are called "Idahoans." Idaho was admitted to the Union on 3 July 1890 as the 43rd state....
,
North DakotaNorth Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States of America; on the Canadian border halfway between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. North Dakota is the 19th largest state by area in the U.S.; it is the 3
rd least populous, with just over 641,481 residents as...
,
New MexicoNew Mexico is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. Inhabited by Native American populations for many centuries, it has also been part of the Imperial Spanish viceroyalty of New Spain, part of Mexico, and a U.S. territory. Among U.S...
, and
MontanaMontana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of the state contains numerous mountain ranges; other 'island' ranges are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...
) held Japanese Americans. The camps were guarded by Border Patrol agents rather than military police and were intended for non-citizens including Buddhist ministers, Japanese language instructors, newspaper workers, and other community leaders.
In addition 2,264 persons of Japanese ancestry taken from 12 Latin American countries by the U.S. State and Justice Departments were held at the Department of Justice Camps. Approximately two-thirds of these persons were Japanese Peruvians. There has been some speculation that the United States intended to use them in hostage exchanges with Japan, a plot in part facilitated by local prejudice against Japanese communities in various South American countries. After the war, Peru refused to accept the return of the Japanese Peruvians they had acquiesced to interning in American camps; of this group, some were transferred to Japan, some were granted American citizenship, and a small minority of approximately 100 managed to achieve repatriation into Peru by asserting special circumstances, such as marriage to a non-Japanese Peruvian. Three hundred of the Japanese Peruvians who fought deportation in the courts were allowed to settle in the United States, and were granted American citizenship in 1953.
WCCA Assembly Centers
Executive Order 9066 authorized the evacuation of all persons of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast; it was signed when there was no place for the Japanese Americans to go. When voluntary evacuation proved impractical, the military took over full responsibility for the evacuation; on April 9, 1942, the Wartime Civilian Control Agency (WCCA) was established by the military to coordinate the evacuation to inland relocation centers. However, the relocation centers were far from ready for large influxes of people. For some, there was still contention over the location, but for most, their placement in isolated undeveloped areas of the country exacerbated problems of building infrastructure and housing. Since the Japanese Americans living in the restricted zone were considered too dangerous to freely conduct their daily business, the military decided it was necessary to find temporary "assembly centers" to house the evacuees until the relocation centers were completed.
WRA Relocation Centers
| Name |
State |
Opened |
Max. Pop'n |
ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
|
California |
March 1942 |
10,046 |
Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
|
California |
May 1942 |
18,789 |
PostonThe Poston War Relocation Center, located in Yuma County of Arizona, was the largest of the ten American internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II....
|
Arizona |
May 1942 |
17,814 |
| Gila River The Gila River War Relocation Center was an internment camp built by the War Relocation Authority for internment of Japanese Americans during the Second World War. It was located about southeast of Phoenix, Arizona....
|
Arizona |
July 1942 |
13,348 |
GranadaThe Granada War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeast Colorado about a mile west of the small farming community of Granada, south of US 50....
|
Colorado |
August 1942 |
7,318 |
Heart MountainThe Heart Mountain Relocation Center, named after nearby Heart Mountain Butte, was one of ten internment camps used to incarcerate Japanese Americans excluded from the West Coast during World War II under the provisions of Executive Order 9066 signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt...
|
Wyoming |
August 1942 |
10,767 |
| Minidoka |
Idaho |
August 1942 |
9,397 |
| Topaz |
Utah |
September 1942 |
8,130 |
| Rohwer The Rohwer War Relocation Center was a World War II Japanese American internment camp located in rural southeastern Arkansas, in Desha County. It was in operation from September 18, 1942 until November 30, 1944, and held as many as 8,475 Japanese Americans forcibly evacuated from California...
|
Arkansas |
September 1942 |
8,475 |
JeromeThe Jerome War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeastern Arkansas near the tiny town of Jerome. Open from October 1942 until June 1944, it was the last relocation camp to open and the first to close; at one point it contained as many as 8,497 inhabitants.,...
|
Arkansas |
October 1942 |
8,497 |
WRA Relocation Camps
The
War Relocation AuthorityThe War Relocation Authority was the U.S. civilian agency responsible for the relocation and internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. President Franklin D...
(WRA) was the U.S. civilian agency responsible for the relocation and detention. The WRA was created by President Roosevelt on March 18, 1942 with
Executive Order 9102Executive Order 9102 created the War Relocation Authority which was the U.S. civilian agency responsible for the relocation and penetration of Japanese-Americans during World War II. This executive order was signed by President Roosevelt on March 18, 1942 and officially expired on June 30,...
and officially ceased to exist June 30, 1946.
Milton S. EisenhowerMilton Stover Eisenhower, D.H.L. served as president of three major American universities: Kansas State University, the Pennsylvania State University, and the Johns Hopkins University. He was the younger brother of U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Edgar N. Eisenhower, and Earl D...
, then an official of the Department of Agriculture, was chosen to head the WRA. Dillon S. Myer replaced Milton Eisenhower on June 17, 1942, three months after Milton took control. Myer served as Director of the WRA until the centers were closed. Within nine months, the WRA had opened ten facilities in seven states, and transferred over 100,000 people from the WCCA facilities.
The WRA camp at
Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
, though initially like the other camps, eventually became a detention center for people believed to pose a security risk. Tule Lake also served as a "segregation center" for individuals and families who were deemed "disloyal" and for those who were to be deported to Japan.
List of camps
There were three types of camps.
Civilian Assembly Centers were temporary camps, frequently located at horse tracks, where the Nissei were sent as they were removed from their communities. Eventually, most were sent to
Relocation Centers, also known as
internment camps. Detention camps housed Nikkei considered to be disruptive or of special interest to the government.
Civilian Assembly Centers
- Arcadia, California
Arcadia is a U.S. city in Los Angeles County, California that is located about northeast of downtown Los Angeles in the San Gabriel Valley, at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains. It is the site of the Santa Anita Park racetrack and home to the Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden. ...
(Santa Anita Racetrack, stables)
- Fresno, California
Fresno is a city in California, USA, the county seat of Fresno County. As of February 27, 2009, the population was estimated at 500,017, making it the fifth largest city in California and the 36th largest in the nation...
(Big Fresno FairgroundsThe Big Fresno Fairgrounds, located in Fresno, California, is the site of the annual Big Fresno Fair. It is also used as a convention center, with nine facilities including the Paul Theatre, a livestock pavilion and the following buildings:...
, racetrack, stables)
- Marysville
Marysville is the county seat of Yuba County, California, United States. The population was 12,268 at the 2000 census...
/ Arboga, CaliforniaArboga is an unincorporated community in Yuba County, California. It is located south of Olivehurst on the Sacramento Northern Railroad, at an elevation of 56 feet . It was named in in 1911 by the pastor of the Mission Covenant Church of Sweden for his hometown of Arboga, Sweden...
(migrant workers' camp)
- Mayer, Arizona
Mayer is a census-designated place in Yavapai County, Arizona, United States. The population was 1,408 at the 2000 census. Mayer includes three sites listed on the National Register of Historic Places: Mayer Apartments, Mayer Business Block, and Mayer Red Brick Schoolhouse.The 1993-1994 CBS...
(Civilian Conservation CorpsThe Civilian Conservation Corps was a public work relief program for unemployed men, providing vocational training through the performance of useful work related to conservation and development of natural resources in the United States from 1933 to 1942. As part of the New Deal legislation...
camp)
- Merced, California
Merced [mɚ'sɛd], is the county seat of Merced County, California in the San Joaquin Valley of Central California. As of 2007, the city had a total population of 80,608. Incorporated in 1889, Merced is a charter city that operates under a council-manager government...
(county fairgrounds)
- Owens Valley, California
- Parker Dam, Arizona
- Pinedale, California (Pinedale Assembly Center, warehouses)
- Pomona, California
Pomona is the fifth largest city in Los Angeles County, California . As of the 2000 census, the city population was 149,473. In 2005, its population was estimated as 160,815....
(Los Angeles County FairgroundsFairplex, formerly known as the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds, has been since 1922 the home of the L.A. County Fair. It is located in the city of Pomona. The L.A...
, racetrack, stables)
- Portland, Oregon
Portland is a city located in the Northwestern United States, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the state of Oregon. As of July 2008, it has an estimated population of 575,930, making it the 29th most populous in the United States. It has been referred to as the most...
(Pacific International Livestock ExpositionThe Portland Metropolitan Exposition Center, usually referred to as the Expo Center, is a convention center located in the Kenton neighborhood of Portland, Oregon. It was originally built in the early 1920s as the Pacific International Exposition Center. It was at one time home to 3,500...
, including 3,800 housed in the main pavilion building)
- Puyallup, Washington (fairgrounds racetrack stables, Informally known as "Camp Harmony
Camp Harmony was the unofficial name of the Puyallup Assembly Center, a temporary facility within the system of internment camps set up for Japanese Americans during World War II...
")
- Sacramento
Sacramento is the capital of the U.S. state of California, and the county seat of Sacramento County. Located along the Sacramento River and just south of the American River's confluence in California's expansive Central Valley. With a 2007 estimated population of 460,242, it is the seventh-largest...
/ Walerga, California (migrant workers' camp)
- Salinas, California
Salinas is the county seat and the largest municipality of Monterey County, California. Salinas is located east-southeast of the mouth of the Salinas River, at an elevation of about 52 feet above sea level. The most current estimate from the California Department of Finance sets the 2006...
(fairgroundsSalinas is a major stop on the professional rodeo circuit. The Salinas rodeo began in 1911 as a Wild West Show on the site of the old race track ground, now the Salinas Sports Complex.-Origins:...
, racetrack, stables)
- San Bruno, California
San Bruno is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States. The population was 40,165 at the 2000 census.The city is adjacent to, but does not include San Francisco International Airport and Golden Gate National Cemetery .-Geography:San Bruno is located at...
(Tanforan racetrack, stables)
- Stockton, California
Stockton, the county seat of San Joaquin County, is currently the 13th largest city in the U.S. state of California in terms of population and one of the largest in terms of area in the Central Valley. Stockton is located in Northern California south of Sacramento and north of Modesto...
(San Joaquin County Fairgrounds, racetrack, stables)
- Tulare, California
Tulare is a city in Tulare County, California, United States. The population was 43,994 at the 2000 census. As of 2007 it is estimated that 55,935 live within the city limits. Just eight miles south of Visalia, it is considered part of the Census Bureau's designation of the Visalia Metropolitan...
(fairgrounds, racetrack, stables)
- Turlock, California
Turlock is a city in Stanislaus County, California, United States. As of the 2000 Census, the city had a total population of 55,810, the second-largest city in Stanislaus County...
(Stanislaus County Fairgrounds)
- Woodland, California
Woodland is the county seat of Yolo County, California, located approximately northwest of Sacramento, and is a part of the Sacramento - Arden-Arcade - Roseville Metropolitan Statistical Area...
List of internment camps
- Gila River War Relocation Center
The Gila River War Relocation Center was an internment camp built by the War Relocation Authority for internment of Japanese Americans during the Second World War. It was located about southeast of Phoenix, Arizona....
, Arizona
- Granada War Relocation Center
The Granada War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeast Colorado about a mile west of the small farming community of Granada, south of US 50....
, Colorado (AKA "Amache")
- Heart Mountain War Relocation Center
The Heart Mountain Relocation Center, named after nearby Heart Mountain Butte, was one of ten internment camps used to incarcerate Japanese Americans excluded from the West Coast during World War II under the provisions of Executive Order 9066 signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt...
, Wyoming
- Jerome War Relocation Center
The Jerome War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeastern Arkansas near the tiny town of Jerome. Open from October 1942 until June 1944, it was the last relocation camp to open and the first to close; at one point it contained as many as 8,497 inhabitants.,...
, Arkansas
- Manzanar War Relocation Center, California
- Minidoka War Relocation Center, Idaho
- Poston War Relocation Center
The Poston War Relocation Center, located in Yuma County of Arizona, was the largest of the ten American internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II....
, Arizona
- Rohwer War Relocation Center
The Rohwer War Relocation Center was a World War II Japanese American internment camp located in rural southeastern Arkansas, in Desha County. It was in operation from September 18, 1942 until November 30, 1944, and held as many as 8,475 Japanese Americans forcibly evacuated from California...
, Arkansas
- Topaz War Relocation Center, Utah
- Tule Lake War Relocation Center
Tule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
California
Justice Department detention camps
These camps often held German and Italian detainees in addition to Japanese Americans:
- Crystal City, Texas
Crystal City is a city in and the county seat of Zavala County, Texas, United States. The population was 7,190 at the 2000 census. The mascot of Crystal City High School is the Javelina.-History:-Farming and ranching:...
- Fort Lincoln, North Dakota
Fort Lincoln was a military post and detention center located south of Bismarck, North Dakota on the east side of the Missouri River.It was first established as a military post in 1895 to replace Fort Yates, following the closure of the original Fort Abraham Lincoln on the west side of the Missouri...
- Fort Missoula
Fort Missoula Internment Camp was an internment camp operated by the United States Department of Justice during the World War II. Japanese Americans and Italian Americans were imprisoned here during this war....
, MontanaMontana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of the state contains numerous mountain ranges; other 'island' ranges are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...
- Fort Stanton, New Mexico
- Kenedy, Texas
Kenedy is a city in Karnes County, Texas, United States, named for Mifflin Kenedy, who bought acres and wanted to develop a new town that would carry his name. The population was 3,487 at the 2000 census.-History:...
- Kooskia, Idaho
Kooskia is a city in Idaho County, Idaho, United States. The population was 675 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Kooskia is located at ....
- Santa Fe, New Mexico
Santa Fe is the capital of the state of New Mexico. It is the fourth-largest city in the state and is the seat of . Santa Fe had a population of 62,203 at the April 1, 2000 census; the estimate for July 1, 2006, is 72,056...
- Seagoville, Texas
Seagoville is a city in Dallas County, Texas, United States. A small portion of Seagoville extends into Kaufman County. The population was 10,823 as of the 2000 census. The city is located along U.S. Highway 175 and the Southern Pacific Railroad ten miles from Downtown Mesquite.- History :The town...
Citizen Isolation Centers
The Citizen Isolation Centers were for those considered to be problem inmates.
- Leupp, Arizona
Leupp is a census-designated place in Coconino County, Arizona, United States. The population was 970 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Leupp is located at ....
- Moab, Utah
Moab is a city in Grand County, in eastern Utah, in the western United States. It is 233 miles southeast of Salt Lake City and 354 miles west of Denver, Colorado, about 30 miles South of Interstate 70 at the intersection of U.S. Route 191 and State Route 128. The population was 4,779 at the...
(AKA Dalton Wells)
- Old Raton Ranch/Fort Stanton, New Mexico
Federal Bureau of Prisons
Detainees convicted of crimes, usually draft resistance, were sent to these camps:
- Catalina, Arizona
Catalina is a census-designated place in Pima County, Arizona, United States. The population was 7,025 at the 2000 census. Catalina continues to experience increasing population growth, while attempting to maintain its rural character...
- Fort Leavenworth, Kansas
- McNeill Island, Washington
US Army facilities
These camps often held German and Italian detainees in addition to Japanese Americans:
- Angel Island, California
Angel Island is an island in San Francisco Bay that offers expansive views of the San Francisco skyline, the Marin County Headlands and Mount Tamalpais. The entire island is included within Angel Island State Park, and is administered by California State Parks. It has been used for a variety of...
/Fort McDowell
- Camp Blanding, Florida
- Camp Forrest
Camp Forrest, located near Tullahoma, Tennessee, was one of the U.S. Army's largest training bases during World War II. It was an active Army post between 1941 and 1946....
- Camp Livingston
-History:Camp Livingston was a U.S. Army military camp during World War II located on the Rapides Parish and Grant Parish line in north Louisiana. north of Pineville, Louisiana....
, Louisiana
- Camp Lordsburg, New Mexico
- Camp McCoy, Wisconsin
- Florence, Arizona
Florence is a town in and the county seat of Pinal County, Arizona, United States. The population was 17,054 at the 2000 census; according to 2005 Census Bureau estimates, the population of the town remained unchanged....
- Fort Bliss
Fort Bliss is a United States Army post in the U.S. states of New Mexico and Texas. With an area of about , it is the Army's second-largest installation behind the adjacent White Sands Missile Range. It is TRADOC's largest installation, and has the Army's largest Maneuver Area behind the National...
- Fort Howard
Fort Howard was a 19th century fortification of the U.S. Army located in Green Bay, Wisconsin's first white settlement and an important center of the Fur Trade...
- Fort Lewis
Fort Lewis is a census-designated place and United States Army post in Pierce County and Thurston County, Washington, United States. The territory of Fort Lewis is not conterminous with the CDP, and is in fact much larger. As of the 2000 census, the CDP, which includes the most densely populated...
- Fort Meade, Maryland
Fort Meade is a census-designated place in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, United States. The population was 9,882 at the 2000 census. It is the home to the National Security Agency, which is located on the US Army base Fort George G...
- Fort Richardson
Fort Richardson is a United States Army installation in the U.S. state of Alaska, adjacent to the city of Anchorage.- History :Fort Richardson was named for the military pioneer explorer, Brig. Gen. Wilds P. Richardson, who served three tours of duty in the rugged Alaska territory between 1897 and...
- Fort Sam Houston
Fort Sam Houston is a U.S. Army post in San Antonio, Texas.Known colloquially as "Fort Sam," it is named for the first President of the Republic of Texas, Sam Houston....
- Fort Sill, Oklahoma
- Griffith Park
Griffith Park is a large municipal park at the eastern end of the Santa Monica Mountains in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The park covers of land, making it one of the largest urban parks in North America. It is the second-largest city park in California, after Mission...
- Honolulu, Hawaii
Honolulu is the capital of and the most populous census-designated place in the U.S. state of Hawaii. Although Honolulu refers to the urban area on the southeastern shore of the island of Oahu, the city and the county are consolidated, known as the City and County of Honolulu, and the city and...
- Sand Island, Hawaii
- Stringtown, Oklahoma
Stringtown is a town in Atoka County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 396 at the 2000 census. It is the second largest town in Atoka County.-Geography:Stringtown is located at ....
Exclusion, removal, and detention
Somewhere between 110,000 and 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were subject to this mass exclusion program, of whom approximately two-thirds were U.S. citizens. The remaining one-third were non-citizens subject to internment under the Alien Enemies Act; many of these "resident aliens" had long been inhabitants of the United States, but had been deprived the opportunity to attain citizenship by laws that blocked Asian-born nationals from ever achieving citizenship.
Internees of Japanese descent were first sent to one of 17 temporary "Civilian Assembly Centers," where most awaited transfer to more permanent relocation centers being constructed by the newly-formed
War Relocation AuthorityThe War Relocation Authority was the U.S. civilian agency responsible for the relocation and internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. President Franklin D...
(WRA). Some of those who did report to the civilian assembly centers were not sent to relocation centers, but were released under the condition that they remain outside the prohibited zone until the military orders were modified or lifted. Almost 120,000 Japanese Americans and resident Japanese aliens would eventually be removed from their homes in
CaliforniaCalifornia is the most populous state in the United States, and the third largest by area. California is the second most populous sub-national entity in the Americas, behind only São Paulo, Brazil...
, the western halves of
OregonOregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
and
WashingtonWashington is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Washington was carved out of the western part of Washington Territory which had been ceded by Britain in 1846 by the Oregon Treaty as settlement of the Oregon Boundary Dispute. It was admitted to the Union as the...
and southern
ArizonaThe State of Arizona is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. The capital and largest city is Phoenix. The second largest city is Tucson, followed in size by the four Phoenix metropolitan area cities of Mesa, Glendale, Chandler, and Scottsdale.Arizona was the 48th and...
as part of the single largest forced relocation in
U.S. historyThe first known inhabitants of what is now the United States are believed to have arrived over a period of several thousand years beginning sometime prior to 15,000–50,000 years ago by crossing Beringia into Alaska...
.
Most of these camps/residences, gardens, and stock areas were placed on Native American reservations, for which the Native Americans were formally compensated. The Native American councils disputed the amounts negotiated in absentia by US government authorities and later sued finding relief and additional compensation for some items of dispute.
Under the National Student Council Relocation Program (supported primarily by the
American Friends Service CommitteeThe American Friends Service Committee is a Religious Society of Friends affiliated organization which provides humanitarian relief and works for social justice, peace and reconciliation, human rights, and abolition of the death penalty...
), students of college age were permitted to leave the camps in order to attend institutions which were willing to accept students of Japanese ancestry. Although the program initially granted leave permits to only a very small number of students, this eventually grew to 2,263 students by December 31, 1943.
Curfew and exclusion
The exclusion from Military Area No. 1 initially occurred through a voluntary relocation policy. Under the voluntary relocation policy, the Japanese Americans were free to go anywhere outside of the exclusion zone; however the arrangements and costs of relocation were borne by the individuals. The night-time curfew, initiated on 27 March 1942, was the first mass-action restricting the Japanese Americans.
Conditions in the camps
According to a 1943
War Relocation AuthorityThe War Relocation Authority was the U.S. civilian agency responsible for the relocation and internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. President Franklin D...
report, internees were housed in "tar paper-covered barracks of simple frame construction without plumbing or cooking facilities of any kind." The spartan facilities met international laws, but still left much to be desired. Many camps were built quickly by civilian contractors during the summer of 1942 based on designs for military barracks, making the buildings poorly equipped for cramped family living.
To describe the conditions in more detail, the
Heart Mountain War Relocation CenterThe Heart Mountain Relocation Center, named after nearby Heart Mountain Butte, was one of ten internment camps used to incarcerate Japanese Americans excluded from the West Coast during World War II under the provisions of Executive Order 9066 signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt...
in northwestern
WyomingWyoming is a state in the Western United States. The majority of the state is dominated by the mountain ranges and rangelands of the Rocky Mountain West, while the easternmost section of the state includes part of a high elevation prairie region known as the High Plains. While the tenth largest...
was a barbed-wire-surrounded enclave with unpartitioned toilets, cots for beds, and a budget of 45 cents daily per capita for food rations. Because most internees were evacuated from their West Coast homes on short notice and not told of their assigned destinations, many failed to pack appropriate clothing for Wyoming winters which often reached temperatures below zero Fahrenheit. Many families were forced to simply take the "clothes on their backs."
Armed guards were posted at the camps, which were all in remote, desolate areas far from population centers. Internees were typically allowed to stay with their families, and were treated well unless they violated the rules. There are documented instances of guards shooting internees who reportedly attempted to walk outside the fences. One such shooting, that of James Wakasa at Topaz, led to a re-evaluation of the security measures in the camps. Some camp administrations eventually allowed relatively free movement outside the marked boundaries of the camps. Nearly a quarter of the internees left the camps to live and work elsewhere in the United States, outside the exclusion zone. Eventually, some were authorized to return to their hometowns in the exclusion zone under supervision of a sponsoring American family or agency whose loyalty had been assured.
The phrase "
shikata ga naiis a Japanese language phrase meaning "it can't be helped" or "nothing can be done about it". is an alternative.-Cultural associations:The phrase has been used by many western writers to describe the ability of the Japanese people to maintain dignity in the face of an unavoidable tragedy or...
" (loosely translated as "it cannot be helped") was commonly used to summarize the interned families' resignation to their helplessness throughout these conditions. This was even noticed by the children, as mentioned in the well-known memoir
Farewell to ManzanarFarewell to Manzanar is a memoir published in 1972 by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston. It was adapted in the form of a television movie in 1976 starring Yuki Shimoda, Nobu McCarthy, Pat Morita, and Mako.- Plot/main characters :...
. Although that may be the view to outsiders, the Japanese people tended to comply with the U.S. government to prove themselves loyal citizens. This perceived loyalty to the United States can be attributed to the collective mentality of Japanese culture, where citizens are more concerned with the overall good of the group as opposed to focusing on individual wants and needs.
Loyalty questions and segregation
Some Japanese Americans did question the American government, after finding themselves in internment camps. Several pro-Japan groups formed inside the camps, particularly at the Tule Lake location. When the government passed a law that made it possible for an internee to renounce her or his U.S. citizenship, 5,589 internees opted to do so; 5,461 of these were at Tule Lake. Of those who renounced their citizenship, 1,327 were repatriated to Japan. Many of these individuals would later face stigmatization in the Japanese-American community, after the war, for having made that choice, although even at the time they were not certain what their futures held were they to remain American, and remain interned.
These renunciations of American citizenship have been highly controversial, for a number of reasons. Some apologists for internment have cited the renunciations as evidence that "disloyalty" or
anti-AmericanismAnti-Americanism, often anti-American sentiment, is opposition or hostility to the people or the government policies of the United States. In practice, a broad range of attitudes and actions critical of or opposed to the United States have been labeled anti-Americanism...
was well-represented among the interned peoples, thereby justifying the internment. Many historians have dismissed the latter argument, for its failure to consider that the small number of individuals in question were in the midst of persecution by their own government at the time of the "renunciation":
[T]he renunciations had little to do with "loyalty" or "disloyalty" to the United States, but were instead the result of a series of complex conditions and factors that were beyond the control of those involved. Prior to discarding citizenship, most or all of the renunciants had experienced the following misfortunes: forced removal from homes; loss of jobs; government and public assumption of disloyalty to the land of their birth based on race alone; and incarceration in a "segregation center" for "disloyal" ISSEI or NISEI...
Minoru Kiyota, who was among those who renounced his citizenship and swiftly came to regret the decision, has stated that he wanted only "to express my fury toward the government of the United States," for his internment and for the mental and physical duress, as well as the intimidation, he was made to face.
[M]y renunciation had been an expression of momentary emotional defiance in reaction to years of persecution suffered by myself and other Japanese Americans and, in particular, to the degrading interrogation by the FBI agent at Topaz and being terrorized by the guards and gangs at Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
.
Civil rights attorney
Wayne M. CollinsWayne M. Collins was a civil rights attorney who worked on cases related to the Japanese American evacuation and internment.-Biography:Collins was born in Sacramento, California and was raised and educated in San Francisco....
successfully challenged most of these renunciations as invalid, owing to the conditions of duress and intimidation under which the government obtained them. Many of the deportees were
IsseiIssei is a Japanese language term used in countries in North America, South America and Australia to specify the Japanese people first to immigrate. Their children born in the new country are referred to as Nisei , and their grandchildren are Sansei...
(first generation Japanese immigrants) who often had difficulty with English and often did not understand the questions they were asked. Even among those
Issei who had a clear understanding, Question 28 posed an awkward dilemma: Japanese immigrants were denied US citizenship at the time, so when asked to renounce their Japanese citizenship, answering "Yes" would have made them stateless persons.
When the government circulated a questionnaire seeking army volunteers from among the internees, 6% of military-aged male respondents volunteered to serve in the U.S. Armed Forces. Most of those who refused, however, tempered that refusal with statements of willingness to fight if they were restored their rights as American citizens. 20,000 Japanese American men and many Japanese American women served in the U.S. Army during World War II.
The famed
442nd Regimental Combat TeamThe 442nd Infantry, formerly the 442nd Regimental Combat Team of the United States Army, was an Asian American unit composed of mostly Japanese Americans who fought in Europe during the Second World War. The families of many of its soldiers were subject to internment...
, which
fought in EuropeThe European Theatre of World War II was a huge area of heavy fighting across Europe from Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939 until the end of the war with the German unconditional surrender on May 8, 1945...
, was formed from those Japanese Americans who did agree to serve. This unit was the most highly decorated US military unit of its size and duration. Most notably, the 442nd was known for saving the
141st (or the "lost battalion")"The Lost Battalion" refers to the 1st Battalion, 141st Infantry , which was surrounded by German forces in the Vosges Mountains on 24 October 1944....
from the Germans. The 1951 film
Go For Broke!Go for Broke! is a war film released in 1951. It was directed by Robert Pirosh, produced by Dore Schary and starred Van Johnson, several veterans of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, and Henry Nakamura....
was a fairly accurate portrayal of the 442nd, and starred several of the RCT's veterans.
Other detention camps
As early as 1939, when war broke out in Europe and while armed conflict began to rage in East Asia, the FBI and branches of the Department of Justice and the armed forces began to collect information and surveillance on influential members of the Japanese community in the United States. These data were included in the
Custodial Detention indexThe Custodial Detention Index was based on a massive list of U.S. residents compiled by the FBI during 1939-1941, in the frame of a program called variously "Custodial Detention" and/or "Alien Enemy Control"....
("CDI"). Agents in the Department of Justice's Special Defense Unit classified the subjects into three groups: A, B and C, with A being "most dangerous," and C being "possibly dangerous."
After the Pearl Harbor attacks, Roosevelt authorized his attorney general to put into motion a plan for the arrest of individuals on the potential enemy alien lists. Armed with a blanket arrest warrant, the FBI seized these men on the eve of December 8, 1941. These men were held in municipal jails and prisons until they were moved to Department of Justice detention camps, separate from those of the Wartime Relocation Authority (WRA). These camps operated under far more stringent conditions and were subject to heightened criminal-style guard, despite the absence of criminal proceedings.
Crystal City, TexasCrystal City is a city in and the county seat of Zavala County, Texas, United States. The population was 7,190 at the 2000 census. The mascot of Crystal City High School is the Javelina.-History:-Farming and ranching:...
, was one such camp where Japanese Americans, German Americans, Italian Americans, and a large number of US-seized, Axis-descended nationals from several Latin-American countries were interned.
Canadian citizens with Japanese ancestry were also interned by the Canadian government during World War II (see
Japanese Canadian internmentJapanese Canadian internment refers to the confinement of Japanese Canadians in British Columbia during World War II. The internment began in December 1941, following the attack by the Japanese air force on the American base at Pearl Harbour, Hawaii and was justified on grounds of national security...
). Japanese people from various parts of
Latin AmericaLatin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish, Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,501 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
were brought to the United States for internment, or interned in their countries of residence.
Hawaii
Although there was a strong push from mainland Congressmen (
HawaiiHawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states, and is the only state made up entirely of islands. It is located on an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of Australia. The state was admitted to the Union on August...
was only a US territory at the time, and did not have a voting representative or senator in Congress) to remove and intern all Japanese Americans and Japanese immigrants in Hawaii, it never happened. 1,200 to 1,800 Japanese nationals and Japanese Americans from Hawaii were interned, either in two camps on Oahu or in one of the mainland internment camps.
The vast majority of Japanese Americans and their immigrant parents in Hawaii were not interned because the government had already declared martial law in Hawaii and this allowed it to significantly reduce the supposed risk of espionage and sabotage by residents of Japanese ancestry. Also, Japanese Americans comprised over 35% of the territory's population, with approximately 150,000 inhabitants; detaining so many people would have been enormously challenging in terms of logistics. Also, the whole of Hawaiian society was dependent on their productivity.
There were two internment camps in Hawaii, referred to as "Hawaiian Island Detention Camps". The Hawaiian camps primarily utilized tents and other temporary structures and few permanent structures. One camp was located at
Sand IslandSand Island is a small island within the city of Honolulu, Hawaii, United States. The island lies at the entrance to Honolulu Harbor. It was known as Quarantine Island during the nineteenth century when it was used to quarantine ships believed to hold contagious diseases...
, which is located in the middle of Honolulu Harbor. This camp was prepared in advance of the war's outbreak. All prisoners held here were "detained under military custody... because of the imposition of martial law throughout the Islands". The other Hawaiian camp was called Honouliuli, near Ewa, on the southwestern shore of Oahu. This camp is not as well-known as the Sand Island camp, and it was closed before the Sand Island camp in 1944.
Internment ends
In December 1944 (
Ex parte EndoEx parte Endo, or Ex parte Mitsuye Endo, 323 U.S. 283 , was a United States Supreme Court decision, handed down on December 18, 1944, the same day as their decision in Korematsu v. United States...
), the Supreme Court ruled the detainment of loyal citizens unconstitutional, though a decision handed down the same day (
Korematsu v. United StatesKorematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 , was a landmark United States Supreme Court case concerning the constitutionality of Executive Order 9066....
) held that the exclusion process as a whole was constitutional.
On January 2, 1945, the exclusion order was rescinded entirely. The internees then began to leave the camps to rebuild their lives at home, although the relocation camps remained open for residents who were not ready to make the move back. The freed internees were given $25 and a train ticket to their former homes. While the majority returned to their former lives, some of the Japanese Americans emigrated to Japan. The fact that this occurred long before the
Japanese surrenderThe surrender of Japan in August 1945 brought World War II to a close. By August 1945, the Imperial Japanese Navy effectively ceased to exist, and an Allied invasion of Japan was imminent...
, while the war was arguably at its most vicious, weighs against the claim that the relocation was a security measure. However, it is also true that the Japanese were clearly losing the war by that time, and were not on the offensive. The last internment camp was not closed until 1946; Japanese taken by the U.S. from Peru that were still being held in the camp in Santa Fe took legal action in April 1946 in an attempt to avoid deportation to Japan.
One of the WRA camps, Manzanar, was designated a
National Historic SiteA national historic site is a designation that an area possesses national historical significance. It may confer protected area status on the site, but not necessarily. Such sites can range in size from small to complex, and may include physical evidence of the subject related to the history being...
in 1992 to "provide for the protection and interpretation of historic, cultural, and natural resources associated with the relocation of Japanese Americans during World War II" (Public Law 102-248). In 2001, the site of the Minidoka War Relocation Center in Idaho was designated the Minidoka National Historic Site.
Hardship and material loss
Many internees lost irreplaceable personal property due to the restrictions on what could be taken into the camps. These losses were compounded by theft and destruction of items placed in governmental storage. A number of persons died or suffered for lack of medical care, and several were killed by sentries; James Wakasa, for instance, was killed at Topaz War Relocation Center, near the perimeter wire.
NikkeiNikkei can refer to:* The , abbreviated 日経**The Stock market index, published by Nihon Keizai Shimbun, often simply Nikkei, refers to emigrants of Japanese ancestry or their descendants....
were prohibited from leaving the Military Zones during the last few weeks before internment, and only able to leave the camps by permission of the camp administrators.
Psychological injury was observed by Dillon S. Myer, director of the WRA camps. In June 1945, Myer described how the Japanese Americans had grown increasingly depressed, and overcome with feelings of helplessness and personal insecurity.
Some Japanese-American farmers were able to find families willing to tend their farms for the duration of their internment. In other cases, however, Japanese-American farmers had to sell their property in a matter of days, usually at great financial loss. In these cases, the land speculators who bought the land made huge profits. California's
Alien Land LawsThe California Alien Land Law of 1913 prohibits "aliens ineligible for citizenship" from owning land or property, but permits three year leases. It affected the Chinese, Indian, Japanese, and Korean immigrant farmers in California...
of the 1910s, which prohibited most non-citizens from owning property in that state, contributed to Japanese-American property losses. Because they were barred from owning land, many older Japanese-American farmers were
tenant farmerA tenant farmer is one who resides on and farms land owned by a landlord. Tenant farming is an agricultural production system in which landowners contribute their land and often a measure of operating capital and management; while tenant farmers contribute their labour along with at times varying...
s and therefore lost their rights to those farm lands.
To compensate former internees for their property losses, the US Congress, on July 2, 1948, passed the "American Japanese Claims Act," allowing Japanese Americans to apply for compensation for property losses which occurred as "a reasonable and natural consequence of the evacuation or exclusion." By the time the Act was passed, however, the
IRSThe Internal Revenue Service is the United States federal government agency that collects taxes and enforces the internal revenue laws. It is an agency within the U.S. Department of the Treasury and is responsible for interpretation and application of Federal tax law. The official U.S...
had already destroyed most of the 1939-42 tax records of the internees, and, due to the time pressure and the strict limits on how much they could take to the assembly centers and then the internment camps, few of the internees themselves had been able to preserve detailed tax and financial records during the evacuation process. Thus, it was extremely difficult for claimants to establish that their claims were valid. Under the Act, Japanese-American families filed 26,568 claims totaling $148 million in requests; approximately $37 million was approved and disbursed.
Reparations and redress
During World War II,
ColoradoColorado is a U.S. state located in the Rocky Mountain region of the United States of America. It may also be considered to be part of the Western and Southwestern regions of the United States. Colorado entered statehood in 1876 and was nicknamed the “Centennial State”...
governor
Ralph Lawrence CarrRalph Lawrence Carr was Governor of Colorado from 1939 to 1943. Born in Rosita in Custer County, he grew up in Cripple Creek in Teller County and graduated from Cripple Creek High School in 1905. A Republican, Carr was committed to fiscal restraint in state government and opposed the New Deal...
was the only elected official to publicly apologize for the internment of American citizens. The act cost him reelection, but gained him the gratitude of the Japanese American community, such that a statue of him was erected in Sakura Square in Denver's Japantown.
Beginning in the 1960s, a younger generation of Japanese Americans who were inspired by the
Civil Rights movementThe Civil Rights Movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. It was accompanied by much civil unrest and popular rebellion. The process was long and tenuous in many countries, and most of these movements did not achieve or...
began what is known as the "Redress Movement," an effort to obtain an official apology and reparations from the federal government for interning their parents and grandparents during the war, focusing not on documented property losses but on the broader injustice of the internment. The movement's first success was in 1976, when President
Gerald FordGerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...
proclaimed that the internment was "wrong," and a "national mistake" which "shall never again be repeated".
The campaign for redress was launched by Japanese Americans in 1978. The
Japanese American Citizens LeagueThe Japanese American Citizens League was formed in 1929 to protect the rights of Japanese Americans from the state and federal governments. It fought for civil rights for Japanese Americans, assisted those in internment camps during World War II, and led a successful campaign for redress for...
(JACL) asked for three measures to be taken as redress: $25,000 to be awarded to each person who was detained, an apology from Congress acknowledging publicly that the U.S. government had been wrong, and the release of funds to set up an educational foundation for the children of Japanese American families.
In 1980, Congress established the
Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of CiviliansThe Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians was a group of people appointed by the U.S. Congress to conduct an official governmental study of Executive Order 9066, related wartime orders and their impact on Japanese Americans in the West and Alaska Natives in the Pribilof...
(CWRIC) to study the matter. On February 24, 1983, the commission issued a report entitled
Personal Justice Denied, condemning the internment as "unjust and motivated by racism rather than real military necessity". The Commission recommended that $20,000 in reparations be paid to those Japanese Americans who had been victims of internment.
In 1988, U.S. President (and former California governor)
Ronald ReaganRonald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States and the 33rd Governor of California .Born in Tampico, Illinois, Reagan moved to Los Angeles, California in the 1930s...
signed the
Civil Liberties Act of 1988The Civil Liberties Act of 1988 is a United States federal law that granted reparations to Japanese-Americans who had been interned by the United States government during World War II. The act was sponsored by California's Democratic Congressman Norman Mineta, an internee as a child, and Wyoming's...
, which had been sponsored by Representative
Norman MinetaNorman Yoshio Mineta, is a United States politician of the Democratic Party. Mineta most recently served in the Presidential Cabinet of George W. Bush as the United States Secretary of Transportation, the only Democratic Cabinet Secretary in the Republican George W. Bush Administration...
and Senator
Alan K. SimpsonAlan Kooi Simpson is a Republican politician who served from 1979 to 1997 as a United States senator from Wyoming. His father, Milward L. Simpson, was also a member of the U.S...
— the two had met while Mineta was interned at a camp in
WyomingWyoming is a state in the Western United States. The majority of the state is dominated by the mountain ranges and rangelands of the Rocky Mountain West, while the easternmost section of the state includes part of a high elevation prairie region known as the High Plains. While the tenth largest...
— which provided redress of $20,000 for each surviving detainee, totaling $1.2 billion dollars. The question of to whom reparations should be given, how much, and even whether monetary reparations were appropriate were subjects of sometimes contentious debate.
On September 27, 1992, the Civil Liberties Act Amendments of 1992, appropriating an additional $400 million in order to ensure that all remaining internees received their $20,000 redress payments, was signed into law by President
George H. W. BushGeorge Herbert Walker Bush was the 41st President of the United States . He was also Ronald Reagan's Vice President , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence....
, who also issued another formal apology from the U.S. government.
Some Japanese and Japanese Americans who were relocated during WWII received compensation for property losses, according to a 1948 law. Congress appropriated $38 million to meet $131 million of claims from among 23,000 claimants. These payments were dispersed very slowly, the final dispersal occurring in 1965. In 1988, following lobbying efforts by Japanese Americans, $20,000 per internee was paid out to individuals who had been interned or relocated, including those who chose to return to Japan. These payments were awarded to 82,210 Japanese Americans or their heirs at a cost of $1.6 billion; the program's final disbursement occurred in 1999.
Under the 2001 budget of the United States, it was also decreed that the ten sites on which the detainee camps were set up are to be preserved as historical landmarks: “places like Manzanar, Tule Lake, Heart Mountain, Topaz, Amache, Jerome, and Rohwer will forever stand as reminders that this nation failed in its most sacred duty to protect its citizens against prejudice, greed, and political expediency”.
Civil rights violations
Article IArticle One of the United States Constitution describes the powers of the legislative branch of the federal government - the Congress.The Article provides that Congress consists of a House of Representatives and the Senate, establishes the manner of election and qualifications of members of each...
, Section 9 of the U.S. Constitution states "The privilege of the writ of
habeas corpusHabeas corpus is a legal action, or writ, through which a person can seek relief from the unlawful detention of him or herself, or of another person. It protects the individual from harming him or herself, or from being harmed by the judicial system...
shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it." but the clause's location implies this authority is vested in Congress, rather than the President.
President
Abraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through its greatest internal crisis, the American Civil War, preserving the Union and ending slavery...
suspended habeas corpus during the
Civil WarThe American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several other names, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America...
. On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt followed in his footsteps by signing Executive Order 9066, permitting exclusion of persons from wartime military zones.
Following the reluctance or inability of the vast majority of ethnic Japanese to establish new residences beyond the coastal regions of California, Oregon, and Washington, the U.S. government interned, in family groups, as many as 122,000 ethnic Japanese residing in what became the Red War Zone. A significant number of Japanese living outside of the coastal areas requested and were granted the opportunity of joining friends or family in the relocation centers.
Former
Supreme CourtThe Supreme Court of the United States is the highest judicial body in the United States, and leads the federal judiciary. It consists of the Chief Justice of the United States and eight Associate Justices, who are nominated by the President and confirmed with the "advice and consent" of the Senate...
Justice
Tom C. ClarkThomas Campbell Clark was United States Attorney General from 1945 to 1949 and an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States ....
, who represented the US Department of Justice in the "relocation," writes in the epilogue to the 1992 book
Executive Order 9066: The Internment of 110,000 Japanese Americans:
To this day, some believe that the legality of the internment has been firmly established as exactly the type of scenario spelled out in the
Alien and Sedition ActsThe Alien and Sedition Acts were four bills passed in 1798 by the Federalists in the 5th United States Congress, who were waging an undeclared naval war with France, later known as the Quasi-War. They were signed into law by President John Adams...
of 1798. Among other things, the Alien Enemies Act (which was one of four laws included in the Alien and Sedition Acts) allowed for the United States government, during time of war, to apprehend and detain indefinitely foreign nationals, first-generation citizens, or any others deemed a threat by the government. As no expiration date was set, and the law has never been overruled, it was still in effect during World War II, and still is to this day. Therefore, some continue to claim that the civil rights violations were, in fact, not violations at all, having been deemed acceptable as a national security measure during time of war by Congress, signed into law by President
John AdamsJohn Adams was an American politician and the second President of the United States , after being the first Vice President for two terms. He is regarded as one of the most influential Founding Fathers of the United States.Adams came to prominence in the early stages of the American Revolution...
, and upheld by the Supreme Court. However, the majority of the detainees were American-born, thus exempt under law from the Alien and Sedition Acts except if found to directly be a threat due to their actions or associations. This exemption was the basis for drafting Nisei to fight in Europe, as the Laws of Land Warfare prohibit signatory nations (including the United States) from compelling persons to act against their homelands or the allies of their homelands in time of war.
Legal legacy
Several significant legal decisions arose out of Japanese-American internment, relating to the powers of the government to detain citizens in wartime. Among the cases which reached the Supreme Court were
Yasui v. United StatesYasui v. United States, 320 U.S. 115 was a United States Supreme Court case regarding the constitutionality of curfews used during World War II when they were applied to citizens of the United States. The case arose out of the implementation of Executive Order 9066 by the U.S...
(1943),
Hirabayashi v. United StatesHirabayashi v. United States, 320 U.S. 81 , was a case in which the United States Supreme Court held that the application of curfews against members of a minority group were constitutional when the nation was at war with the country from which that group originated. Yasui v...
(1943),
ex parte EndoEx parte Endo, or Ex parte Mitsuye Endo, 323 U.S. 283 , was a United States Supreme Court decision, handed down on December 18, 1944, the same day as their decision in Korematsu v. United States...
(1944), and
Korematsu v. United StatesKorematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 , was a landmark United States Supreme Court case concerning the constitutionality of Executive Order 9066....
(1944). In
Yasui and
Hirabayashi the court upheld the constitutionality of curfews based on Japanese ancestry; in
Korematsu the court upheld the constitutionality of the exclusion order. In
Endo, the court accepted a petition for a writ of habeas corpus and ruled that the WRA had no authority to subject a citizen whose loyalty was acknowledged to its procedures.
Korematsu's and Hirabayashi's convictions were vacated in a series of
coram nobisCoram nobis, or coram vobis is a legal writ issued by a court, acting in its capacity as a Court of Equity, to correct a previous error "of the most fundamental character" to "achieve justice" where "no other remedy" is...
cases in the early 1980s. In the
coram nobis cases, federal district and appellate courts ruled that newly uncovered evidence revealed the existence of a huge unfairness which, had it been known at the time, would likely have changed the
Supreme Court'sThe Supreme Court of the United States is the highest judicial body in the United States, and leads the federal judiciary. It consists of the Chief Justice of the United States and eight Associate Justices, who are nominated by the President and confirmed with the "advice and consent" of the Senate...
decisions in the Yasui, Hirabayashi, and Korematsu cases. These new court decisions rested on a series of documents recovered from the
National ArchivesThe United States National Archives and Records Administration is an independent agency of the United States government charged with preserving and documenting government and historical records and with increasing public access to those documents...
showing that the government had altered, suppressed and withheld important and relevant information from the Supreme Court, most notably, the Final Report by General DeWitt justifying the internment program. The Army had destroyed documents in an effort to hide the fact that alterations had been made to the report. The
coram nobis cases vacated the convictions of Korematsu and Hirabayashi (Yasui died before his case was heard, rendering it moot), and are regarded as one of the impetuses for the
Civil Liberties Act of 1988The Civil Liberties Act of 1988 is a United States federal law that granted reparations to Japanese-Americans who had been interned by the United States government during World War II. The act was sponsored by California's Democratic Congressman Norman Mineta, an internee as a child, and Wyoming's...
.
The rulings of the US Supreme Court in the 1944 Korematsu and Hirabayashi cases, specifically in its expansive interpretation of government powers in wartime, have yet to be overturned. They are still the law of the land because a lower court cannot overturn a ruling by the US Supreme Court. However, the
coram nobis cases totally undermined the
factual underpinnings of the 1944 cases, leaving the original decisions without the proverbial legal leg to stand on. Nonetheless, in light of the fact that these 1944 decisions are still on the books, a number of legal scholars have expressed the opinion that the original Korematsu and Hirabayashi decisions have taken on renewed relevance in the context of the War on Terror.
Terminology debate
There has been much discussion over what to call the internment camps. The WRA officially called them "War Relocation Centers."
ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
, for instance, was officially known as the Manzanar War Relocation Center. Because of this, the National Park Service has chosen to use "relocation center" in referring to the camps. Some historians and scholars, as well as former internees, object to this wording, noting that the internees were literally imprisoned, such that "relocation" becomes a euphemism.
Another widely used name for the American camps is "internment camp". This phrase is also potentially misleading, as the
United States Department of JusticeThe United States Department of Justice is a Cabinet department in the United States government designed to enforce the law and defend the interests of the United States according to the law and to ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans...
operated separate camps that were officially called "internment camps" in which some Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II.
"Concentration camp" is the most controversial descriptor of the camps. This term is criticized for suggesting that the Japanese American experience was analogous to the Holocaust and the
Nazi concentration campsNazi Germany, under Adolf Hitler, maintained concentration camps throughout the territories it controlled. The first Nazi concentration camps were greatly expanded in Germany after the Reichstag fire in 1933, and were intended to hold political prisoners and opponents of the regime...
. For this reason,
National Park ServiceThe National Park Service is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations...
officials have attempted to avoid the term.
Franklin D. RooseveltFranklin Delano Roosevelt , the only U.S. President elected to more than two terms, was a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
,
Dwight D. EisenhowerDwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was a five-star general in the United States Army and the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. During the Second World War, he served as Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe, with responsibility for planning and supervising the...
and Secretary of the Interior
Harold L. IckesHarold LeClair Ickes was a United States administrator and politician. He served as Secretary of the Interior for 13 years, from 1933 to 1946, the longest tenure of anyone to hold the office. Ickes was responsible for implementing much of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's "New Deal" and is the...
each referred to the American camps as "concentration camps," at the time. When the nature of the Nazi concentration camps became clear to the world, and the phrase "concentration camp" came to signify a Nazi death camp, most historians turned to other terms to describe Japanese internment.
Recognizing the controversy over the terminology, in 1971, when the
Manzanar Committee applied to the
California Department of Parks and RecreationThe California Department of Parks and Recreation, also known as California State Parks, manages the California state parks system. The system administers 278 parks and 1.4 million acres , with over of coastline; of lake and river frontage; nearly 15,000 campsites; and of hiking, biking, and...
to have Manzanar designated as a California State Historical Landmark, it was proposed that both "relocation center" and "concentration camp" be used in the wording of the plaque for the landmark. Some Owens Valley residents vehemently opposed the use of "concentration camp," and it took a year of discussion and negotiation before both terms were accepted and included on the plaque.
Notable internees
- Richard Aoki
Richard Aoki was an American civil rights activist. He was one of the first members of the Black Panther Party and was eventually promoted to the position of Field Marshall. Although there were several Asian Americans in the Black Panther Party, Aoki was the only one to have a formal leadership...
(1938-2009), Black Panther Party, as a child at Topaz
- Violet Kazue de Cristoforo
Violet Kazue de Cristoforo was a Japanese American poet and composer of haiku. Her haiku reflected the time that she and her family spent in detention in Japanese internment camps during World War II. She wrote more than a dozen books of poetry during her lifetime...
(1917–2007), poet (Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
and JeromeThe Jerome War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeastern Arkansas near the tiny town of Jerome. Open from October 1942 until June 1944, it was the last relocation camp to open and the first to close; at one point it contained as many as 8,497 inhabitants.,...
)
- Takayo Fischer
Takayo Fischer is an American stage, film and TV actress, as well as voice-over actress and singer.-Personal life:Fischer was born in Hardwick, California, the daughter of Issei Chukuro and Kinko Tsubouchi...
, actress (JeromeThe Jerome War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeastern Arkansas near the tiny town of Jerome. Open from October 1942 until June 1944, it was the last relocation camp to open and the first to close; at one point it contained as many as 8,497 inhabitants.,...
and RohwerThe Rohwer War Relocation Center was a World War II Japanese American internment camp located in rural southeastern Arkansas, in Desha County. It was in operation from September 18, 1942 until November 30, 1944, and held as many as 8,475 Japanese Americans forcibly evacuated from California...
)
- Bill Hosokawa
William Kumpai Hosokawa was a Japanese American author and journalist who worked for 38 years at The Denver Post, before retiring as the editorial page editor from that particular paper in 1984. Hosokawa retired from the newspaper industry in 1992.Hosokawa was also a prolific author...
(1915–2007), journalist (Heart MountainThe Heart Mountain Relocation Center, named after nearby Heart Mountain Butte, was one of ten internment camps used to incarcerate Japanese Americans excluded from the West Coast during World War II under the provisions of Executive Order 9066 signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt...
)
- Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston
Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston is an American writer. Her writings are mostly focused on the ethnic diversity of the United States. She is best known for her autobiographical novel Farewell to Manzanar which details her own experiences as a Japanese American in the World War II internment camps.-...
, author (ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
)
- Lawson Fusao Inada
Lawson Fusao Inada is an American poet and is currently the poet laureate of the U.S. state of Oregon.-Early life:...
, poet (multiple camps)
- Robert Ito
Robert Ito is a voice, television, and movie actor.Of Japanese descent, Robert Ito was, for many years, a dancer with the National Ballet of Canada before turning to acting in the mid-1960s...
, actor (Japanese-Canadian Internee)
- Hiroshi Kashiwagi
Hiroshi Kashiwagi is a Nisei poet, playwright and actor. For his writing and performance work on stage he is considered an early pioneer of Asian American theatre.-Biography:...
, actor, poet, playwright (Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
)
- Yuri Kochiyama
Yuri Kochiyama is a Japanese-American human rights activist.Kochiyama was born Mary Nakahara in San Pedro, California. After the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Kochiyama's father was imprisoned the same day...
, activist (JeromeThe Jerome War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeastern Arkansas near the tiny town of Jerome. Open from October 1942 until June 1944, it was the last relocation camp to open and the first to close; at one point it contained as many as 8,497 inhabitants.,...
)
- Ralph Lazo (Manzanar
Manzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
)
- Bob Matsui
Robert Takeo Matsui was an American politician from the state of California. Matsui was a member of the Democratic Party and served 13 terms in the U.S...
(1941–2005), U.S. Congressman (Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
)
- Doris Matsui
Doris Okada Matsui is an American politician of the Democratic Party who represents in the United States House of Representatives...
, U.S. Congresswoman (born in PostonThe Poston War Relocation Center, located in Yuma County of Arizona, was the largest of the ten American internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II....
)
- Pat Morita
Noriyuki "Pat" Morita was an American actor who was well-known for playing the roles of Arnold on the TV show Happy Days and Mr...
(1932–2005), actor, comedian (Gila RiverThe Gila River The Gila River The Gila River ( is a tributary of the Colorado River, 650 miles (1,044 kilometers) long, in the southwestern states of New Mexico and Arizona.-Description:...
)
- Norman Mineta
Norman Yoshio Mineta, is a United States politician of the Democratic Party. Mineta most recently served in the Presidential Cabinet of George W. Bush as the United States Secretary of Transportation, the only Democratic Cabinet Secretary in the Republican George W. Bush Administration...
, former Mayor of San Jose, CaliforniaSan Jose or San José is the third-largest city in California and the tenth-largest in the United States. The county seat of Santa Clara County, it is located at the southern end of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region commonly referred to as Silicon Valley...
, U.S. Congressman, Sec. of Commerce, Sec. of Transportation (Heart MountainThe Heart Mountain Relocation Center, named after nearby Heart Mountain Butte, was one of ten internment camps used to incarcerate Japanese Americans excluded from the West Coast during World War II under the provisions of Executive Order 9066 signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt...
)
- Jimmy Mirikitani (1920- ), artist, painter (Tule Lake
Tule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
)
- Tōyō Miyatake
Tōyō Miyatake was a Japanese American photographer, best known for his photographs documenting the Japanese American people and the Japanese American internment at Manzanar during WWII.- Life :...
(1896–1979), photographer (ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
)
- Sadao Munemori
Sadao S. Munemori was a posthumous recipient of the Medal of Honor, after he sacrificed his life to save those of his colleagues at Seravezza, Italy during the closing stages of World War II. Munemori was a private first class in the United States Army, in Company A, 100th Infantry Battalion,...
(1922–1945), Congressional Medal of Honor recipient (ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
)
- Robert A. Nakamura
Robert Akira Nakamura is a pioneering filmmaker and teacher, sometimes referred to as "the Godfather of Asian American media." In 1970 he co-founded Visual Communications the oldest community-based Asian Pacific American media arts organization in the United States.-Personal:Nakamura was born in...
(1937 – ), Filmmaker, Founder of Visual Communications (VC)Visual Communications – known as "VC" – is a community-based non-profit media arts organization in Los Angeles, dedicated to creating, preserving and presenting Asian Pacific American history and culture through the media arts...
(ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
)
- George Nakashima
George Katsutoshi Nakashima was a Japanese American woodworker, architect, and furniture maker who was one of the leading innovators of 20th Century furniture design and a father of the American craft movement...
(1905–1990), woodworker, furniture designer, architect (Minidoka)
- Miné Okubo
Miné Okubo , a pioneering Nisei woman, artist and writer, created approximately 2000 drawings and sketches of her experiences while confined along with approximately 110,000 Japanese Americans in US internment camps following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor...
(1912–2001), artist, author Citizen 13660 (Tanforan and TopazTopaz is a silicate mineral of aluminium and fluorine with the chemical formula Al
2SiO
42. Topaz crystallizes in the orthorhombic system and its crystals are mostly prismatic terminated by pyramidal and other faces....
)
- Yuki Shimoda
Yuki Shimoda was an American actor best known for his starring role as Ko Wakatsuki in the NBC movie of the week, "Farewell to Manzanar" in 1976. He also co-starred in a 1960s television series, "Johnny Midnight" , with Edmond O'Brien. He was a star of the silver screen, early television and the...
(1921–1981), actor (Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
)
- Larry Shinoda
Lawrence Kiyoshi Shinoda was a noted automotive designer who was best known for his work on the Chevrolet Corvette and Ford Mustang....
(1930–1997), automotive designer
- Monica Sone
Monica Sone is a Japanese American writer, best known for her 1953 autobiographical memoir Nisei Daughter, which tells of the Japanese American experience in Seattle during the 1920s and 30s, and in the World War II internment camps and which is an important text in Asian American Studies...
(1919- ) autobiographer (Nisei Daughter, 1953) (Camp HarmonyCamp Harmony was the unofficial name of the Puyallup Assembly Center, a temporary facility within the system of internment camps set up for Japanese Americans during World War II...
and Minidoka)
- Jack Soo
Jack Soo was a Japanese American actor. He is best known for his role as Detective Nick Yemana on the television sitcom Barney Miller.-Early life:...
(1917–1979), actor, comedian (Topaz)
- Pat Suzuki
Pat Suzuki is an American popular singer and actress, who is best known for her role in the original Broadway production of the musical Flower Drum Song, and her performance of the song "I Enjoy Being a Girl" in the show.-Career:Suzuki is a Nisei or second-generation Japanese American...
, singer, actress, entertainer
- Shinkichi Tajiri
Shinkichi Tajiri was a Dutch-American sculptor of Japanese ancestry . He was also active in painting, photography and cinematography....
(1923-2009), soldier, 442nd. Documentadocumenta is an exhibition of modern and contemporary art which now takes place every five years in Kassel, Germany. It was founded by artist, teacher and curator Arnold Bode in 1955 as part of the Bundesgartenschau which took place in Kassel at that time...
artist, sculptor, photographer, lived in the Netherlands. With the family at PostonThe Poston War Relocation Center, located in Yuma County of Arizona, was the largest of the ten American internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II....
. (Dutch WP :nl:Shinkichi Tajiri)
- Iwao Takamoto
Iwao Takamoto was an American animator, television producer, and film director. He was most famous as being a production and character designer for Hanna-Barbera Productions shows such as Scooby-Doo.-Biography:...
(1925–2007), animator, TV producer (ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
)
- George Takei
George Hosato Takei Altman is an Japanese American actor, best known for his role in the television series Star Trek, in which he played Hikaru Sulu, helmsman of the USS Enterprise. He played the father of Hiro Nakamura, Kaito Nakamura, on the NBC television show Heroes...
, (1937- ), actor (RohwerThe Rohwer War Relocation Center was a World War II Japanese American internment camp located in rural southeastern Arkansas, in Desha County. It was in operation from September 18, 1942 until November 30, 1944, and held as many as 8,475 Japanese Americans forcibly evacuated from California...
and Tule LakeTule Lake Segregation Center National Monument was an internment camp in the northern California town of Newell near Tule Lake. It was used in the Japanese American internment during World War II. It was one of the largest and most controversial of the camps, and did not close until after the war,...
)
- A. Wallace Tashima
Atsushi Wallace Tashima is the third Asian American and first Japanese American in the history of the United States to be appointed to a United States Court of Appeals.-Early life:...
, Ninth Circuit judge (PostonThe Poston War Relocation Center, located in Yuma County of Arizona, was the largest of the ten American internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II....
)
- Hisaye Yamamoto
- Background and career:Yamamoto was born in Redondo Beach, California, and is a Nisei, a Japanese-American whose parents were born in Japan . She was interned in the Poston War Relocation Center during the Second World War for three years. During her time there, she wrote for the Poston Chronicle...
, author (PostonThe Poston War Relocation Center, located in Yuma County of Arizona, was the largest of the ten American internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II....
)
- Wakako Yamauchi
Wakako Yamauchi is a Nisei Asian American female writer. Her plays are considered pioneering works in Asian American theatre.- Biography :...
, author, playwright (PostonThe Poston War Relocation Center, located in Yuma County of Arizona, was the largest of the ten American internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II....
)
Popular culture
- Topaz
Topaz is a 1945 documentary film, shot illegally , which documented life at the Topaz War Relocation Center in Utah during World War II....
, a 1945 documentary of the internment filmed by Dave TatsunoDave Tatsuno was a Japanese American businessman who documented life in his family's internment camp during World War II. His footage was later compiled into the film Topaz...
in the Topaz War Relocation Center in Utah.
- Farewell to Manzanar
Farewell to Manzanar is a memoir published in 1972 by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston. It was adapted in the form of a television movie in 1976 starring Yuki Shimoda, Nobu McCarthy, Pat Morita, and Mako.- Plot/main characters :...
, a memoir by Jeanne Wakatsuki HoustonJeanne Wakatsuki Houston is an American writer. Her writings are mostly focused on the ethnic diversity of the United States. She is best known for her autobiographical novel Farewell to Manzanar which details her own experiences as a Japanese American in the World War II internment camps.-...
of her time spent in ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
. Jeanne, who was seven at the time of the relocation, had never lived around Asians other than her own family.
- To The Stars, autobiography of actor George Takei
George Hosato Takei Altman is an Japanese American actor, best known for his role in the television series Star Trek, in which he played Hikaru Sulu, helmsman of the USS Enterprise. He played the father of Hiro Nakamura, Kaito Nakamura, on the NBC television show Heroes...
, including description of his time spent in RohwerThe Rohwer War Relocation Center was a World War II Japanese American internment camp located in rural southeastern Arkansas, in Desha County. It was in operation from September 18, 1942 until November 30, 1944, and held as many as 8,475 Japanese Americans forcibly evacuated from California...
and Tule LakeTule Lake is an intermittent lake covering an area of , long and across, in northeastern Siskiyou County, California, along the border with Oregon. It is fed by the Lost River....
internment camps, and the difficulties faced by his family as a result of the forced relocation.
- Back Home by Bill Mauldin
William Henry "Bill" Mauldin was a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist from the United States...
(1947, Sloane), pages 165 - 170. Mauldin, the artist most famous for his "Willie and Joe" cartoons in the Army's Stars and Stripes newspaper, learned of the internment camps when meeting members of the 100th BattalionThe 100th Battalion, 442nd Infantry is the only remaining combat arms unit in the U.S. Army Reserve, the other units in the Army Reserve being combat support or combat service support. The unit combines the identities of two World War II Japanese-American units, the 100th Infantry Battalion and the...
and the 442nd Regimental Combat TeamThe 442nd Infantry, formerly the 442nd Regimental Combat Team of the United States Army, was an Asian American unit composed of mostly Japanese Americans who fought in Europe during the Second World War. The families of many of its soldiers were subject to internment...
, both composed of Nisei volunteers, who were fighting in Europe. Following the war, Mauldin was an outspoken critic of the treatment given to the Japanese Americans, both during and following the war. Several of his cartoons of the period, featured in this book, sharply address this issue.
- Desert Exile: The Uprooting of a Japanese-American Family by Yoshiko Uchida
Yoshiko Uchida was a Japanese American writer.-Life:Yoshiko Uchida was the daughter of Japanese immigrants Takashi and Iku Uchida. Her father came to the United States from Japan in 1903 and worked for the San Francisco offices of Mitsui and Company...
(1982, University of Washington PressThe University of Washington Press is the nonprofit book and multimedia publishing arm of the University of Washington. Since its establishment in 1920, the University of Washington Press has been the major scholarly publisher in the U.S. north of California and west of the Rockies...
). Uchida's autobiography from the 1930s through the end of the internment. Her father was arrested by the FBI in the sweep of community leaders. The rest of her family were sent to Tanforan RacetrackTanforan Racetrack in San Bruno, California was a thoroughbred horse racing facility that operated from September 4, 1899 to July 31, 1964.Tanforan was constructed to serve a clientele from the nearby city of San Francisco. The facility was named after Toribio Tanforan, the grandson-in-law of Jose...
and housed in horse stables, where her father eventually rejoined them, then later interned at Topaz War Relocation Center.
- Come See The Paradise
Come See the Paradise is a 1990 film directed by Alan Parker, starring Dennis Quaid and Tamlyn Tomita. Set before and during World War II, the film depicts the treatment of Japanese people in America following the attack on Pearl Harbor, and the subsequent loss of civil liberties within the...
, a 1990 film directed by Alan ParkerSir Alan William Parker, CBE is an English film director, producer, writer and actor. He has been active in both the British film industry as well as in Hollywood...
, starring Tamlyn TomitaTamlyn Naomi Tomita is a Japanese American actress, who has appeared in many Hollywood films and television series.-Early life:...
and Dennis QuaidDennis William Quaid is an American actor. He became known during the 1980s after appearing in several successful films.-Early life:...
.
- Snow Falling on Cedars
Snow Falling on Cedars is a novel written by American writer David Guterson. Guterson, who at the time was a teacher, wrote the book in the early morning hours over a ten-year period...
, a David GutersonDavid Guterson is an American novelist, short story writer, poet, journalist, and essayist.-Early life:...
novel (made into a 1999 filmSnow Falling on Cedars is a film directed by Scott Hicks. It is based on David Guterson's novel of the same title. It was released in 1999 and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Cinematography.-Plot:...
) about a 1950s murder trial case with a Japanese American defendant. It shows the deep xenophobia toward people with Japanese ancestry, and depicts the internment camps.
- Day of Independence
Day of Independence is a short film, broadcast as a half-hour PBS television special. It is a drama, set during the Japanese American internment of World War II, produced by Cedar Grove Productions with Visual Communications as fiscal sponsor....
(2003), an Emmy-nominated half-hour PBS television specialA television special is a television program which interrupts or temporarily replaces programming normally scheduled for a given time slot. Sometimes, however, the term is given to a special TV telecast of a theatrical film, such as The Wizard of Oz or The Ten Commandments, as opposed to the...
from Cedar Grove ProductionsCedar Grove Productions is an independent production company based in Los Angeles, CA., specializing in media and theatre arts representing the Asian Pacific American community...
, about a young NiseiDuring the early years of World War II, Japanese Americans were forcibly relocated from their homes in the Pacific coast states because military leaders and public opinion combined to fan unproven fears of sabotage...
baseball player and his separation from his parents while in camp.
- Stand Up for Justice: The Ralph Lazo Story
Stand Up For Justice: The Ralph Lazo Story is an educational narrative short film, co-produced by Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress and Visual Communications .- Background :...
(2004), a half-hour educational film from Visual Communications (VC)Visual Communications – known as "VC" – is a community-based non-profit media arts organization in Los Angeles, dedicated to creating, preserving and presenting Asian Pacific American history and culture through the media arts...
about the Mexican AmericanMexican Americans are Americans of Mexican descent. They account over 12.5% of the country's population: 28.3 million Americans listed their ancestry as Mexican as of 2006 forming about 64% of all Hispanics and Latinos in the United States. The United States is home to the second largest Mexican...
citizen who voluntarily accompanied his Japanese Americanare Americans of Japanese heritage, either born in Japan or their descendents. Japanese Americans have historically been among the three largest Asian American communities, but in recent decades have become the sixth largest group at roughly 1,204,205, including those of mixed-race or...
friends to ManzanarManzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the south and Independence to the north, it is...
.
- Only the Brave
Only the Brave is a 2006 independent film about the 100th Infantry Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat Team, a segregated World War II fighting unit completely made up of Japanese Americans, which for its size and length service became the most decorated unit in U.S. military history...
(2005), independent film about the 100th Infantry Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat TeamThe 442nd Infantry, formerly the 442nd Regimental Combat Team of the United States Army, was an Asian American unit composed of mostly Japanese Americans who fought in Europe during the Second World War. The families of many of its soldiers were subject to internment...
, directed by Lane NishikawaLane Nishikawa is an American actor, filmmaker, playwright and performance artist. He is Sansei and his work often deals with Asian American history and identity issues. He is widely known for a series of one-man shows, including Life in the Fast Lane, I'm on a Mission From Buddha, Mifune and Me...
; includes portions depicting camp
- American Pastime
American Pastime is a 2007 film set in the Topaz War Relocation Center, a Utah camp which housed thousands of people during the Japanese American internment during World War II....
(2007), a drama set in the Topaz War Relocation Center, in which the Topaz internees form a baseball team, eventually challenging the local minor league team to an important game.
- The Colonel and the Pacifist, by Klancy Clark de Nevers (2004, University of Utah Press). This book details the background of Karl Bendetsen
Karl Robin Bendetsen was born in Aberdeen, Washington. His parents, Albert M. and Anna Bendetson, were first-generation American citizens, and his grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe...
, architect of the internment, raising questions about his honesty (including his concealment of his Jewish heritage) and motivation (having been raised in an area with a history of strong sentiment against Japanese Americans).
- When the Emperor was Divine (2002), by Julie Otsuka. A lean and evocative first novel of the internment of a Japanese American family from Berkeley, California
Berkeley is a city on the east shore of the San Francisco Bay in Northern California, United States. Its neighbors to the south are the cities of Oakland and Emeryville. To the north is the city of Albany and the unincorporated community of Kensington...
and the resulting experiences.
- "Kenji
"Kenji" is a song off the album The Rising Tied by Fort Minor. The song features clips from an interview with the father and aunt of lead singer Mike Shinoda and tells the vivid story of the life of Mike's family before, during and after World War II including their internment at Manzanar...
" is a song by Mike ShinodaMichael Kenji "Mike" Shinoda is an American musician, record producer, and artist from Agoura Hills, California. He is best known as the rapper, songwriter, keyboardist, vocalist and rhythm guitarist of rock band Linkin Park, and as a solo rapper in his side-project, Fort Minor...
for the album The Rising TiedThe Rising Tied is the debut album of hip hop ensemble Fort Minor, the side project by Linkin Park rapper Mike Shinoda. The album was released on November 22, 2005 through Linkin Park's Warner Bros. Records imprint label Machine Shop Recordings...
by Fort MinorFort Minor is the hip-hop side-project of Mike Shinoda, the vocalist, guitarist and songwriter of the alternative rock band Linkin Park. Shinoda's first solo album as Fort Minor, The Rising Tied, was released in 2005 with the singles "Where'd You Go" featuring Holly Brook and Jonah Matranga and...
describing the life of a Japanese-American named Kenji.
- George Carlin
George Denis Patrick Carlin was an American stand-up comedian. He was also an actor and author, and he won five Grammy Awards for his comedy albums....
mentions the Japanese American internment in It's Bad for YaIt's Bad for Ya is the 14th and final HBO stand-up comedy special by stand-up comedian George Carlin. It was televised live on March 1, 2008 on HBO, less than four months before he died of heart failure....
while discussing freedom and rights (and tells his audience to look it up on WikipediaWikipedia is a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Its name is a portmanteau of the words wiki and encyclopedia...
as "Japanese Americans 1942").
- Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
-Plot summary:Young Chinese American Henry Lee meets Keiko Okabe, a Japanese American girl, in the early 1940s. They both attend an white prep school as "scholarship students" in Seattle. Henry's father is adamantly anti-Japanese, as is the increasingly hostile general population of Seattle...
, a Jamie Ford novel about a young Chinese boy in love with a Japanese girl in Seattle, Washington and the young girl is sent to an internment camp. It tells the true story of the discovery of trunks containing family possessions stored in a hotel by families who were leaving for interment that were forgotten until they were found 40+ years later.
See also
- Anti-Japanese sentiment
Anti-Japanese sentiment involves hatred, grievance, distrust, dehumanization, intimidation, fear, hostility, and/or general dislike of the Japanese people as ethnic or national group, Japan, Japanese culture, and/or anything Japanese...
- Anti-Japanese propaganda
Anti-Japanese propaganda was used to dehumanize, antagonize, and create fear of the Japanese people and Japanese nation. It was commonplace in the United States and China during World War II. It was designed to help sell war bonds and was coupled with anti-Axis Powers propaganda....
- Japanese Canadian internment
Japanese Canadian internment refers to the confinement of Japanese Canadians in British Columbia during World War II. The internment began in December 1941, following the attack by the Japanese air force on the American base at Pearl Harbour, Hawaii and was justified on grounds of national security...
- Italian American internment
Italian American internment refers to the internment of Italian Americans in the United States during World War II.-Terms:The term "Italian American" does not have a legal definition...
- German American internment
German American Internment refers to the detention of people of German ancestry in the United States during World War II. Many of the detainees were American citizens.-World War II:...
- List of documentary films about the Japanese American internment
- Population transfer
Population transfer is the movement of a large group of people from one region to another by state policy or international authority, most frequently on the basis of ethnicity or religion...
Archival sources of documents, photos, and other materials
- Densho: The Japanese American Legacy Project, Free digital archive containing 100s of video oral histories and 10,000 historical photographs and documents
- "Beyond Barbed Wire: Japanese Internment through Salem Eyes", Statesman Journal, videos, stories, photographs and documents.
- "Japanese American Relocation Digital Archives", University of California, contains personal & official photographs, letters, diaries, transcribed oral histories, etc.
- Large number of documents — Official documents, including official court opinions on the Yasui, Hirabayashi, and Korematsu Supreme Court cases
- InternmentArchives.com — Online archive of primary source documentation regarding relocation; argues that internment was warranted (this site is sponsored by Athena Press, a publisher, one of whose products is a book supporting the internment).
- Pearl Harbor History Associates, Inc. — Their slogan is "Remembering Pearl Harbor. Keeping the record straight."
- Ansel Adams, "Photographs of Japanese American Internment at Manzanar", American Memory Collection, Library of Congress
- Born Free & Equal, High quality Library of Congress scans, 1944 edition, with printed text and photographs by Ansel Adams.
- Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself — Photo gallery at U.S. Library of Congress.
- University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections – Social Issues Photographs — 500 historical images from Western United States and the Pacific Northwest region covering political and social topics such as women's issues, labor and government, and ethnic groups, with special emphasis on the Japanese internment camps in the Northwest during World War II.
- "Letters from the Japanese American Internment", Correspondence between librarian Clara Breed and young internees, Smithsonian Institution
- "German American Internee Coalition", Official website, Information on German American and Latin American citizens and legal residents interned by the United States during World War II.
Other sources
United States government documents
- Civilian Restrictive Order No. 1, 8 Fed. Reg. 982, provided for detention of those of Japanese ancestry in assembly or relocation centers.
- House Report No. 2124 (77th Cong., 2d Sess.) 247-52
- Hearings before the Subcommittee on the National War Agencies Appropriation Bill for 1945, Part II, 608-726
- Final Report, Japanese Evacuation from the West Coast, 1942 (pg 309-327), by Lt. Gen. J. L. DeWitt. This report is dated June 5, 1943, but was not made public until January, 1944.
- Further evidence of the Commanding General's attitude toward individuals of Japanese ancestry is revealed in his voluntary testimony on April 13, 1943, in San Francisco before the House Naval Affairs Subcommittee to Investigate Congested Areas, Part 3, pp. 739–40 (78th Cong., 1st Sess.)
- Hearings before the Committee on Immigration and Naturalization, House of Representatives, 78th Cong., 2d Sess., on H. R. 2701 and other bills to expatriate certain nationals of the United States, pp. 37–42, 49-58.
- 56 Stat. 173.
- 7 Fed. Reg. 2601
- House Report No. 1809, 84th Congress, 2d session, 9 (1956).
- Opler, Marvin in Tom C. Clark, Attorney General of the United States and William A. Carmichael, District Director, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Department of Justice, District 16 vs. Albert Yuichi Inouye, Miye Mae Murakami, Tsutako Sumi, and Mutsu Shimizu. No. 11839, United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. August 1947.
- Personal Justice Denied: Report of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, Washington D.C., December, 1982
Further reading
- Drinnon, Richard. Keeper of Concentration Camps: Dillon S. Meyer and American Racism. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989.
- Gardiner, Clinton Harvey. (1981). Pawns in a Triangle of Hate: The Peruvian Japanese and the United States. Seattle: University of Washington Press
The University of Washington Press is the nonprofit book and multimedia publishing arm of the University of Washington. Since its establishment in 1920, the University of Washington Press has been the major scholarly publisher in the U.S. north of California and west of the Rockies...
. 10-ISBN 0295958553; ISBN 978-0-295-95855-2
- Higashide, Seiichi. (2000). Adios to Tears: The Memoirs of a Japanese-Peruvian Internee in U.S. Concentration Camps. Seattle: University of Washington Press. 10-ISBN 0-295-97914-3; 13-ISBN 978-0-295-97914-4
- Hirabayashi, Lane Ryo. The Politics of Fieldwork: Research in an American Concentration Camp. Tucson: The University of Arizona Press, 1999.
- Mackey, Mackey, ed. Remembering Heart Mountain: Essays on Japanese American Internment in Wyoming. Wyoming: Western History Publications, 1998.
- Miyakawa, Edward T. Tule Lake. Trafford Publishing, 2006. ISBN 1-55369-844-4
- Robinson, Greg. By Order of the President: FDR and the Internment of Japanese Americans. Cambridge and others: Harvard University Press, 2001.