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I'm sure my mother and grandmother and another neighbor of theirs would have had many bad things to say about it. But then they said what they felt by their actions.
Another neighbor was a Japanese American family who had owned the store everyone shopped at for years. The family was second and third generation Americans. But because their origion was Japanese, they were forced to sell their store. It was bought cash with the implication it could be bought back, but then when they returned someone had bought it for full value and they had no business.
My mother and grandmother were horrified by the internment. They emptied the garage and every single thing the family owned was packed and moved there. When they came home, they got everything of their personal possissions back. And another neighbor officially 'rented' the house. He never lived there, but he kept the utilities on and it clean and undamaged, kept up the yard, and of course kept in touch. He shipped anything they needed to them which was often food. When the family got home, it was waiting for them to walk in.
My mother honored Elenore Roosevalt in part because she openly spoke out against the internment and continued to. She never bought into the 'it was for their own good' rational and she told me so I'd know and not either.
Since German Americans were left at home, the ONLY reason the Japanese were imprisoned without trial was because they were identifyable as Japanese. A very very sorry moment in our history.
German-Americans were not left alone. They were also rounded up and sent to camps.
It was horrible!! Innocent Japanese were beaten, tortured, raped and killed in those PRISONS! Let's not romanticize evil or change the past to look sweet when it was monstrous for those who suffered.
An elderly white journalist for the Wall Street Journal recently said that slave owners were not so bad b/c they were Americans after all. It's that kind of insanity that belies the horror of slavery and tries to change what really happened. Untold millions worked to death, women, men and children raped anytime day or night, beaten, hung, burned alive, hunted (coon hunts) like animals....
Indigenous People slaughtered down to 12% of their original population from Canada, to Mexico from the Atlantic to Pacific. Their babies snatched from their mothers arms and put in "Government Schools" where the children were beaten, raped, experimented on and , so that
only 2% actually survived.
Look, the truth is ugly, but it is the truth. If we try to cover it up, lie about it, we are in danger of repeating it and viewing black, brown, yellow and red humans that same way they were viewed in the past; as non-human, therefore disposable.
the Japanese on Hawaii were contained they were on an Island, so they were already controlled in a way , since they couldnt freely travel to the states or go back to Japan
Except that island just happened to be the headquarters for the entire Pacific War. Did you know that following the attacks on Pearl Harbor, there were massive projects undertaken to improve the defenses of the island? Did you know that the vast majority of the laborers on that project were Japanese?
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another thing the Japanese society at the time was a lot different, they were very loyal to the Emperor of Japan and would do anything for him, he was like a God to the Japanese
Yes, the Japanese people in Japan saw the emperor as a god. However, most Japanese Americans did not share that view. They were not living in the US because they were "loyal Japanese citizens".
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Originally Posted by Teddy52
My point being in WWII the US did everything they believed would help them win the war.
Except rounding up American citizens of Japanese descent had NOTHING to do with winning the war. You can't claim it did because they only interned Japanese people on the west coast. What, Japanese people in Hawaii or the mid west or the east coast, can't be Japanese agents?
I have a strong suspicion that most people posting in this thread have no idea how internment actually came about and what it involved. It was the brainchild of General John L. DeWitt, who quite frankly was incredibly racist. He convinced FDR of the necessity of creating military exclusion zones that the miltiary would manage. Essentially these zones allowed the military to exlude persons or groups from certain areas under their command. General DeWitt used the authority to turn the entire West Coast into a massive exclusion zone and begin the internment process.
Many people also think that it was "just Japanese" but it was not. People who were considered "1/16th" Japanese, meaning they had one great-great grandparent who was Japanese, were eligible. Koreans and Taiwanese were also eligible since their nations were under Japanese rule.
DeWitt also used his powers to control life on the West Coast. He banned deer hunting. He banned the playing of all sports at night. He imposed travel restrictions on people attempting to go to or leave Alaska. He cancelled the Rose Bowl parade and major outdoor sporting events. He ran the West Coast of the US like it was his own personal empire.
In 1943 a Federal Judge ruled that the forced removal and detainments were illegal without a declaration of martial law. DeWitt's response was to state that "all orders of this headquarters remain in full effect." He essentially denied the order and authority of a Federal Judge. The case continued all the way to the Supreme Court which culminated in a series of decisions in favor of the governments position. However, what was unknown then to the Supreme Court was that the government and General DeWitts command, altered, destroyed and suppressed reams of documents related to the real reason for the internment, racism. The governments position was that it was necessitated by fears of sabotage and that they had evidence to that effect. They did not.
Original drafts of reports from DeWitt were uncovered in the 1980's that contained such blatant racism and racist remarks, that they would have been considered shocking in the 1940's. Therein lies the real reason. White people on the west coast did not like the Japanese to begin with. The war gave them an excuse to act and General DeWitt had no problem acting as he shared the same views. The internment was racially motivated and served no end to helping the war effort in any way. The newly uncovered documents led to a series of coram nobis Supreme Court cases in the 1980's that overturned the earlier decisions. The court stated that had the court of the 1940's had all of the suppressed and hidden evidence that the modern court had, they would have ruled against the government. The action of internment and the Executive Order authorizing it were declared unconstitutional.
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Easy for someone to sit on their fat butt in front of a computer and 2nd guess decisions made 70 years ago.
"The Members of Congress and distinguished guests, my fellow Americans, we gather here today to right a grave wrong. More than 40 years ago, shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry living in the United States were forcibly removed from their homes and placed in makeshift internment camps. This action was taken without trial, without jury. It was based solely on race, for these 120,000 were Americans of Japanese descent.
Yes, the Nation was then at war, struggling for its survival and it's not for us today to pass judgment upon those who may have made mistakes while engaged in that great struggle. Yet we must recognize that the internment of Japanese-Americans was just that: a mistake. For throughout the war, Japanese-Americans in the tens of thousands remained utterly loyal to the United States. Indeed, scores of Japanese-Americans volunteered for our Armed Forces, many stepping forward in the internment camps themselves. The 442d Regimental Combat Team, made up entirely of Japanese-Americans, served with immense distinction to defend this nation, their nation. Yet back at home, the soldier's families were being denied the very freedom for which so many of the soldiers themselves were laying down their lives."
~ Ronald Reagan, President of the United States, August 10th 1988
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Originally Posted by markg91359
There were perhaps 90,000 Japanese Americans who were interned in camps. Out of these the loyalty of 99.9% was unquestionable. Yet, perhaps 100--if given an opportunity--might have committed espionage or acts of sabotage for Japan. There was no time to investigate every one of these people and hold a trial. Internment was a drastic remedy, but it did solve that problem.
The argument made by DeWitt to FDR was that any move against Japanese saboteurs might risk tipping the US's hand that they had broken the Japanese code. For instance, if they decoded a transmission that said "X is going to attack Y" and they then went and arrested X it would let the Japanese know that we had broken their code. All of that could be avoided if we just rounded up all 120,000 or so Japanese people on the west coast and put them in camps.
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For those who think this act was illegal and unconstitutional, I won't dispute that. What I will say is that when a President obtains a declaration of war from Congress, the courts have historically held he has broad powers to wage that war. Those powers may include drafting soldiers to fight. This is a deprivation of their liberty and freedom as well. Perhaps, one could argue that the Japanese Americans were "drafted" to aid their country by spending the war in internment camps. I don't like the argument and I tend to see what happened as a mistake.
The President is given broad powers to wage war. However, he is still bound by the Constitution to some extent. Any deprivation of life, liberty and property must be made with cause. The President never declared martial law and that was one of the sticking points legally in the case. The reasoning can also not be born solely out of contempt for a single race with no legitimate proof (though the court was never given that bit of information at the time).
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The difference is that I can place it in context of a much larger picture.
As can I. I see it as a mistake as well, a grievous one that we would do well to not repeat. I don't think this act diminishes the Presidency of FDR and his leadership during the war, but it is certainly not something one should count among his best acts. Ultimately, I place more of the blame on DeWitt who was the real engineer of the internment and once he started the ball rolling it was hard to go back especially given the immense public support he had for his actions.
One thing I want to make very clear before I begin with my post is that I am not trying to justify the unconstitutional internment of Japanese-Americans. That is something that should not have happened.
Yet considering the way the Japanese treated the Chinese - or the way the Germans treated all of Europe, or how the Russians treated the Germans, etc. etc., the Japanese-Americans here had it easy. Very easy. While losing one's property, home, and freedom is never "easy" in the strict sense of the word, comparatively, the other wartime nations treated their prisoners and occuipied populations far worse.
But that's not really the point.
Japanese sabotage really was an issue, and the proof of that comes from Brazil. That nation had a large Japanese population and there was proven sabotage of Brazilian industry by Japanese living there. They also had a nasty habit of supplying the Germans with convoy shipping routes and departure times so that wolf packs could be waiting for them.
Therefore, whether the internment of the Japanese-Americans actually helped the war effort is one of those things that we'll never really know for certain. Perhaps it did keep sabotage from occurring on the west coast - or maybe it didn't prevent anything at all. The most we can do is speculate.
"The Members of Congress and distinguished guests, my fellow Americans, we gather here today to right a grave wrong. More than 40 years ago, shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry living in the United States were forcibly removed from their homes and placed in makeshift internment camps. This action was taken without trial, without jury. It was based solely on race, for these 120,000 were Americans of Japanese descent.
Yes, the Nation was then at war, struggling for its survival and it's not for us today to pass judgment upon those who may have made mistakes while engaged in that great struggle. Yet we must recognize that the internment of Japanese-Americans was just that: a mistake. For throughout the war, Japanese-Americans in the tens of thousands remained utterly loyal to the United States. Indeed, scores of Japanese-Americans volunteered for our Armed Forces, many stepping forward in the internment camps themselves. The 442d Regimental Combat Team, made up entirely of Japanese-Americans, served with immense distinction to defend this nation, their nation. Yet back at home, the soldier's families were being denied the very freedom for which so many of the soldiers themselves were laying down their lives."
~ Ronald Reagan, President of the United States, August 10th 1988
I was 10 years old, the day of the attack on Pearl Harbor. I am pure WASP, but my best friend was Japanese American for several generation. His family owned a huge greenhouse growing flowers and vegetable just across the city limits of San Leandro California (Next to Oakland for those not acquainted with the Bay Area). They made a very good living for the time, and had numerous relatives working there. It was about 150 feet from our house.
On the morning of the attack, I was at their house for breakfast after a sleepover. I saw 3 adult generations at their breakfast table. You cannot even imagine the hate they all showed as we listened to the news. Not hatred towards America, but against as the called them 'those damn Japs'.
The next day several young single men from those sitting at the table for breakfast, went down to the army recruiters and wanted to join up and, "kill all those Japs" and a few more derogatory terms.
They refused to let them join, and I was there when they got back home. They were sick they could do nothing to protect their country (United States). I watched from in front of our home, when they came to collect those fine American Citizens and haul them away to Concentration Camps.
At the time, Americans understood that the Japanese Americans were not terrible, and they were just as angry at the country of Japan as any other American. In fact from what I saw at the start of WWll, Japanese Americans were more that ready to go to war, than the average White American.
The country rounded them up and put them into concentration camps, was to give Americans something to hate, and get them into a war mentality. Trying to use racism to get Americans angry enough to go to war. They did not round up all German Americans and Italian Americans, they looked too American to intern them. Japanese due to their racial features, were selected to be the scrape goat.
Actually, I was thinking much the same along a different line. If you want to take the glass-half-full way of looking at both of those things.. The good part that you can take from them is that because they happened, it reinforces why they should never happen again and makes them much less likely to ever happen again.
Not sure how you get to communism there.. But, I get your basic point.
Here is how I got to Communism here:
-Someone here argued that Japanese-American internment was actually a good thing because it prevented violence against them, et cetera. Using a similar rationale, someone else can state that the Holocaust was actually a good thing. Why?
-Out of the 6 million Jews who were killed in the Holocaust, as far as I know, 5+ million of them lived in areas which would end up under Communist control after World War II.
-Communist countries often had very strict limits on emigration.
-Many people in Communist countries were miserable because the economic systems there generally could not provide (continued) prosperity and a decent standard of living, et cetera.
-Many people (including many Jews, such as in the Soviet Union) only had a real opportunity to emigrate from Communist countries once the Communist system in these countries began "cracking"/collapsing.
-Thus, had the Holocaust not occurred, there would have probably been more miserable Jews and other individuals living under Communist rule.
Note: Once again, I am not saying that Japanese-American internment and/or the Holocaust were good thing. They were not--both of these things were actually extremely bad, atrocious, and morally unjustifiable.
this is a horrible post. i personally know many that were in the camps the entire state of CA was declared under military control all japanese american citizens were given 7 days to sell all possessions, usually at about 10 cents on a dollar and report to detention centers called camps. many of these people had huge land and real estate holdings. there is much talk that greedy investors engineered the entire scheme so they could grab off huge amounts of cheap real estate.
later the government gave the survivors about $30 000 a piece as compensation a drop in the bucket for what they lost.
these were american citizens. its ok to jail people if you think they are terrorists but you cant take their stuff or force them to get rid of it without due process. this is on par with our treatment of the american indian.
I have been told by some old vets that they actually found caches of Imperial Japanese Army uniforms here in the US, so it appears they did have some support among the US population that had infiltrated and posed as immigrants or citizens, and had some inside help in the preparation of possible guerilla forces or sleeper cells ready to sabatoge or damage the US war effort
Japanese midget subs off the coast of California that never made it
even if some Japanese Americans did help to aid the enemy, and got away with it you will never hear about it, maybe they just never got caught? just because it wasnt reported in the news doesnt mean it didnt happen
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