Japanese-American life after World War II

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On February 19, 1942, shortly after Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 authorizing the forced removal of over 110,000 Japanese Americans from the West Coast and into internment camps for the duration of the war. The personal rights, liberties, and freedoms of Japanese Americans were suspended by the United States government. [1] In the "relocation centers", internees were housed in tar-papered army-style barracks. Some individuals who protested their treatment were sent to a special camp at Tule Lake, California. [2]

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The unanimous Supreme Court decision Ex parte Endo in December 1944 ruled that the U.S. government could not continue to detain a citizen who was "concededly loyal" to the United States. Word of the upcoming ruling led to the rescinding of the exclusion orders and allowed Japanese Americans to return to the American West Coast starting in January 1945. [3] Many Japanese Americans suffered harsh treatment after leaving the internment camps. Examples include exclusion from being hired by jobs in the LA county, and being shut out by the produce industry, which was the lifeblood of many Japanese Americans prior to WWII. [4]

Japanese-American Evacuation Claims Act

In 1948, President Harry S. Truman signed the Japanese-American Claims Act. [5] This act was a way to compensate Japanese Americans for their economic losses due to their forced evacuation. [6] Although some $38 million was paid out through provisions of the act, it would be largely ineffective even on the limited scope in which it operated. [7]

McCarran-Walter Act

When the war ended, the American opinion of Japanese was altered. Japan was in the process of rebuilding with the help of the U.S. military. Japanese became known for their intelligence, amiable relations, and hardworking ethic. The new perspective of this country changed American minds about Japanese. In 1952, this new opinion of the Japanese resulted in first-generation Japanese Americans receiving the right to become naturalized U.S. citizens with the McCarran-Walter Act. [8]

1965 Immigration Act

The Immigration and Nationality Act amendments of 1965 eliminated the national origins quota that was established by the United States in the Immigration Act of 1924. Emanuel Celler proposed the 1965 Act, which was strongly backed by Senator Ted Kennedy. This legislation “created the foundation of today’s immigration law.” [9]

Congress’s investigation of WWII Japanese-American imprisonment

The Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians (CWRIC) was appointed by the U.S. Congress in 1980 to conduct an official governmental study into the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. It concluded that the incarceration of Japanese Americans had not been justified by military necessity. [10]

Civil Liberties Act

The Civil Liberties Act of 1988 was an official apology made to Japanese Americans in 1988 by Congress. The act granted about US$20,000 to former internees who were still alive when the act was passed. [11]

Repudiation of Korematsu v. United States

In 2018, Chief Justice Roberts, in writing the majority opinion of the Supreme Court in Trump v. Hawaii , stated in obiter dictum that the 1944 decision Korematsu v. United States that upheld the constitutionality of Executive Order 9066 (authorizing the Japanese American Internment) was wrong, effectively disavowing the decision and indicating that a majority of the court no longer finds Korematsu persuasive. [12] : 38  Roberts also added: "The forcible relocation of U.S. citizens to concentration camps, solely and explicitly on the basis of race, is objectively unlawful and outside the scope of Presidential authority." [12] : 38  [13] [14]

Timeline of life after World War II

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Executive Order 9066</span> 1942 U.S. presidential executive order which authorized internment of Japanese-Americans

Executive Order 9066 was a United States presidential executive order signed and issued during World War II by United States president Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942. "This order authorized the forced removal of all persons deemed a threat to national security from the West Coast to "relocation centers" further inland—resulting in the incarceration of Japanese Americans." Two-thirds of them were U.S. citizens, born and raised in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Internment of Japanese Americans</span> World War II mass incarceration in the United States

During World War II, the United States forcibly relocated and incarcerated at least 125,284 people of Japanese descent in 75 identified incarceration sites. Most lived on the Pacific Coast, in concentration camps in the western interior of the country. Approximately two-thirds of the inmates were United States citizens. These actions were initiated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt via Executive Order 9066 following Imperial Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.

Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944), was a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States to uphold the exclusion of Japanese Americans from the West Coast Military Area during World War II. The decision has been widely criticized, with some scholars describing it as "an odious and discredited artifact of popular bigotry", and as "a stain on American jurisprudence". The case is often cited as one of the worst Supreme Court decisions of all time. Chief Justice John Roberts repudiated the Korematsu decision in his majority opinion in the 2018 case of Trump v. Hawaii.

Ex parte Mitsuye Endo, 323 U.S. 283 (1944), was a United States Supreme Court ex parte decision handed down on December 18, 1944, in which the Justices unanimously ruled that the U.S. government could not continue to detain a citizen who was "concededly loyal" to the United States. Although the Court did not touch on the constitutionality of the exclusion of people of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast, which it had found not to violate citizen rights in its Korematsu v. United States decision on the same date, the Endo ruling nonetheless led to the reopening of the West Coast to Japanese Americans after their incarceration in camps across the U.S. interior during World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">War Relocation Authority</span> U.S. government agency created to intern Japanese Americans during WWII

The War Relocation Authority (WRA) was a United States government agency established to handle the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. It also operated the Fort Ontario Emergency Refugee Shelter in Oswego, New York, which was the only refugee camp set up in the United States for refugees from Europe. The agency was created by Executive Order 9102 on March 18, 1942, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and was terminated June 26, 1946, by order of President Harry S. Truman.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Civil Liberties Act of 1988</span> Law granting reparations to interned Japanese Americans

The Civil Liberties Act of 1988 is a United States federal law that granted reparations to Japanese Americans who had been wrongly interned by the United States government during World War II and to "discourage the occurrence of similar injustices and violations of civil liberties in the future". The act was sponsored by California Democratic congressman and former internee Norman Mineta, Wyoming Republican senator Alan K. Simpson and California senator Pete Wilson. The bill was supported by the majority of Democrats in Congress, while the majority of Republicans voted against it. The act was signed into law by President Ronald Reagan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Japanese American Citizens League</span> Asian-American civil rights charity based in San Francisco, California

The Japanese American Citizens League is an Asian American civil rights charity, headquartered in San Francisco, with regional chapters across the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tule Lake National Monument</span> National Monument of the United States in California

The Tule Lake National Monument in Modoc and Siskiyou counties in California, consists primarily of the site of the Tule Lake War Relocation Center, one of ten concentration camps constructed in 1942 by the United States government to incarcerate Japanese Americans forcibly removed from their homes on the West Coast. They totaled nearly 120,000 people, more than two-thirds of whom were United States citizens. Among the inmates, the notation "鶴嶺湖" was sometimes applied.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fred Korematsu</span> Japanese-American civil rights activist (1919–2005)

Fred Toyosaburo Korematsu was an American civil rights activist who resisted the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Shortly after the Imperial Japanese Navy launched its attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, which authorized the removal of individuals of Japanese ancestry living on the West Coast from their homes and their mandatory imprisonment in incarceration camps, but Korematsu instead challenged the orders and became a fugitive.

Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U.S. 81 (1943), 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's ancestors originated. The case arose out of the issuance of Executive Order 9066 following the attack on Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entry into World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt had authorized military commanders to secure areas from which "any or all persons may be excluded", and Japanese Americans living in the West Coast were subject to a curfew and other restrictions before being removed to internment camps. The plaintiff, Gordon Hirabayashi, was convicted of violating the curfew and had appealed to the Supreme Court. Yasui v. United States was a companion case decided the same day. Both convictions were overturned in coram nobis proceedings in the 1980s.

People from Japan began emigrating to the U.S. in significant numbers following the political, cultural, and social changes stemming from the 1868 Meiji Restoration. Japanese immigration to the Americas started with immigration to Hawaii in the first year of the Meiji era in 1868.

The following article focuses on the movement to obtain redress for the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, and significant court cases that have shaped civil and human rights for Japanese Americans and other minorities. These cases have been the cause and/or catalyst to many changes in United States law. But mainly, they have resulted in adjusting the perception of Asian immigrants in the eyes of the American government.

Nisei is a Japanese-language term used in countries in North America and South America to specify the ethnically Japanese children born in the new country to Japanese-born immigrants. The Nisei are considered the second generation, and the grandchildren of the Japanese-born immigrants are called Sansei, or third generation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of Japanese Americans</span> History of ethnic Japanese in the United States

Japanese American history is the history of Japanese Americans or the history of ethnic Japanese in the United States. People from Japan began immigrating to the U.S. in significant numbers following the political, cultural, and social changes stemming from the 1868 Meiji Restoration. Large-scale Japanese immigration started with immigration to Hawaii during the first year of the Meiji period in 1868.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Day of Remembrance (Japanese Americans)</span>

The Day of Remembrance is a day of observance for the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II. Events in numerous U.S. states, especially in the West Coast, are held on or near February 19, the day in 1942 that Executive Order 9066 was signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, requiring internment of all Americans of Japanese ancestry.

Aiko Herzig-Yoshinaga was a Japanese American political activist who played a major role in the Japanese American redress movement. She was the lead researcher of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians (CWRIC), a bipartisan federal committee appointed by Congress in 1980 to review the causes and effects of the Japanese American incarceration during World War II. As a young woman, Herzig-Yoshinaga was confined in the Manzanar Concentration Camp in California, the Jerome War Relocation Center in Arkansas, and the Rohwer War Relocation Center, which is also in Arkansas. She later uncovered government documents that debunked the wartime administration's claims of "military necessity" and helped compile the CWRIC's final report, Personal Justice Denied, which led to the issuance of a formal apology and reparations for former camp inmates. She also contributed pivotal evidence and testimony to the Hirabayashi, Korematsu and Yasui coram nobis cases.

The Japanese American Evacuation and Resettlement Study (JERS) was a research project funded by the War Relocation Authority (WRA), an agency responsible for overseeing the relocation of Japanese Americans, The University of California, the Giannini Foundation, the Columbian Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation with the total amount of funding reaching almost 100,000 U.S. dollars. It was conducted by a team of social scientists at the University of California, Berkeley. The team was led by sociologist Dorothy Swaine Thomas, a Lecturer in Sociology for the Giannini Foundation and a professor of rural sociology, and included anthropologists John Collier Jr. and Alexander Leighton, among others. The study combined each of the major social sciences such as sociology, social anthropology, political science, social psychology, and economics to effectively illustrate the effects of internment on Japanese Americans. The terminology of "relocation" can be confusing: The WRA termed the forced removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast an "evacuation" and called the incarceration of these people in the ten camps as "relocation." Later it also applied the term "relocation" to the program that enabled the evacuees to leave the camps (provided they had been certified as loyal.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Esther Takei Nishio</span> Japanese-American internee

Esther Takei Nishio was an American woman from California, incarcerated at the Granada War Relocation Center in Colorado during World War II. She was the first Japanese-American student to enroll in a California university after returning from camp, in 1944, when she was chosen as a test case for resettlement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cherry Kinoshita</span> Japanese American activist

Cherry Kinoshita was a Japanese American activist and leader in the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL). She helped found the Seattle Evacuation Redress Committee and fought for financial compensation for Japanese Americans who had been incarcerated during World War II.

References

  1. ↑ "After Internment: Seattle's Debate Over Japanese Americans' Right to Return Home - Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project". depts.washington.edu. Retrieved 2019-11-13.
  2. ↑ "Japanese-American Incarceration During World War II". National Archives. 2016-08-15. Retrieved 2022-03-17.PD-icon.svg This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain .
  3. ↑ Shiho Imai. "Korematsu v. United States" Densho Encyclopedia (accessed 5 June 2014).
  4. ↑ Pearson, Bradford (2020-08-20). "For Japanese-Americans, Housing Injustices Outlived Internment". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2020-10-26.
  5. ↑ "Executive Order 9066." Encyclopædia Britannica. Ed. Of Encyclopædia Britannica. N.p., 3 June 2014. Web.http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/197921/Executive-Order-9066#ref1118060
  6. ↑ "Japanese American Evacuation Claims Act | Densho Encyclopedia". encyclopedia.densho.org. Retrieved 2019-11-13.
  7. ↑ Niiya, Brian (1993). Japanese American History: An A-To-Z Reference from 1868 to the Present. Facts on File. p. 68. ISBN   978-0816026807.
  8. ↑ Hong, Jane. "Immigration Act of 1952". Densho Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2020-06-14.
  9. ↑ "The Legacy of the 1965 Immigration Act". cis.org. Center for Immigration Studies. 1995-09-01.
  10. ↑ Yamato, Sharon. "Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians". Densho Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2020-06-15.
  11. ↑ "Civil Liberties Act of 1988 | Densho Encyclopedia". encyclopedia.densho.org. Retrieved 2019-11-13.
  12. 1 2 Trump v. Hawaii, 585 U.S. ___ (2018)
  13. ↑ de Vogue, Ariane (June 26, 2018). "Supreme Court finally rejects infamous Korematsu decision on Japanese-American internment". CNN . Retrieved June 26, 2018.
  14. ↑ Savage, Charlie (June 26, 2018). "Korematsu, Notorious Supreme Court Ruling on Japanese Internment, Is Finally Tossed Out". The New York Times . Retrieved June 26, 2018.
  15. ↑ Do, Anh (July 18, 2017). "James Kanno, one of America's first Japanese American mayors and a founder of Fountain Valley, dies at 91". LA Times . Retrieved July 18, 2017.
  16. ↑ "Milestones for Women in American Politics | CAWP". Cawp.rutgers.edu. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  17. ↑ "Congressional Gold Medal Presented to Nisei Soldiers of World War II". United States Mint. 2011-11-02. Retrieved 2020-05-30.

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