Dbq Japanese Internment

In my opinion, the United states was not justified in its policy of keeping Japanese Americans in internment camps. These people were Americans just like those who chose to put them in camps. By singling out these people in camps, the government essentially legitimized racism against them. Most of them had committed no crimes against the United States. Most of them had not involved in the planning of any crimes against the United States.

Prior to World War II, the 127,000 Japanese-Americans along America’s west coast (Japanese American Relocation and Internment Camps) were considered just another immigrant group coming to America searching for a better life. However, with the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, this perception soon saw a drastic change. The attack on the US Naval base on December 7th, 1941 left many casualties in its wake. In total over 2,400 were dead, and over 1,000 were injured in the onslaught; the attack also saw the destruction of eight battleships, three light cruisers and destroyers, and four other naval vessels (Civil Rights, Japanese Americans). With the Japanese

This investigation aims to assess the extent to which Japanese-American internment from 1942 to 1946 was a violation of the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which declares that, “No person shall be… deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” The question must be asked in order to examine the legality of the actions taken by the U.S. government in opposition to American citizens of Japanese extraction (Nisei) and their immigrant parents (Issei). To determine this, the scope of this investigation will concentrate on the reasons for internment and the conditions in which the Japanese people lived during 1942 and 1946, particularly in a camp called Manzanar. One method applied is to explore an oral history interview

I do not think that Roosevelt 's actions were justified in the internment of Japanese-American citizens, because there was very little evidence that the Japanese citizens were a threat to the rest of America. The Executive Order 9066 led to a lot of changes for Japanese-American citizens. The Executive Order 9066 was signed by President Roosevelt two weeks after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, and this authorized the removal of any or all people from military areas "as deemed necessary or desirable." This affected the Japanese-American citizens because the military then defined the entire West Coast, which was home to the majority of Japanese-Americans, as a military area. This then led them to relocate to internment camps, built by the U.S military in scattered locations around the country. For the next two and a half years, many of these Japanese-American citizens endured poor living conditions are poor treatment by their military guards, along with the rest of the country.

One reason why the U.S government’s decision was not justifiable is because many of the Japanese-Americans were innocent people who legally received their American citizenship. For example, in Monica Sone’s “Camp Harmony”,

The internment of Japanese Americans during WWII was not justified. After Pearl Harbor, many Americans were scared of the Japanese Americans because they could sabotage the U.S. military. To try and solve the fear President Franklin D Roosevelt told the army in Executive order 9066 to relocate all Japanese Americans living on the West Coast. They were relocated to detention centers in the desert. Many of them were in the detention centers for three years.

Among all of the other countries, one had the courage to bomb the United States of America. Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor because of the threat the Navy had on the U.S. After that, America feared another attack or even worse, an invasion from Japan in the West Coast. In order to prepare for an invasion America decided to relocate all of the Japanese-Americans, mainly in the West Coast because they were the most threat. Many people debated whether relocating was the right thing to do. The internment of Japanese-Americans was justified because of the security in the Pacific Coast, fear of another attack, and because it was a military necessity.

America’s racist ideals were seeded way before the bombing of pearl harbor. Acts like the Naturalization Act of 1870, Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, and the Immigration Act of 1924 grew racism towards Asians. (Notes). This would lead to the sentiment that Japanese people did not belong in America. In document 9, this is supported with the statement “The Chinese and Japanese are not bona fide citizens.” This was stated by the San Francisco mayor James Phelan in 1900, showing that this racism began long before the war began. Also, in document 11 with “The Japanese race is an enemy race…”. Quotes like these exemplified the racism that occurred toward Asians in the WWII era. In Ronald Takaki’s essay he uses a quote from the Los Angeles Times that compares the Japanese people to a viper and states that they cannot be American. All of these sources exemplify the fact that Americans did not have the capacity to not be racist towards the Japanese. In addition, President Roosevelt himself even had built up resentment towards the Japanese. (Takaki). The extreme racism towards the Japanese people was most likely the most important cause of mass interment, due to the fact that so many people already had their decision negatively made up about their Japanese neighbors, so the mass relocation gave them a reason to send them

The internment of Japanese-Americans was justified because there were Japanese suspects. Between ten internment camps in Arizona, California, Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, and Arkansas, about 250-300 people in each camp were suspects under surveillance. Only around 50-60 people were actually considered dangerous. “It is easy to get on the suspect list, merely a speech in favor of Japan being sufficient to land one there” (Munson 2). Clearly, America was taking extreme precautions. If they would have let one of them leave, they could have rebelled. This is a main reason why Japanese suspects had to be taken away to keep the United States population safe. “It will be hard for them to get near anything to blow up if it is guarded” (Munson 2).

A nice day, Feb 20, 1942 then out of nowhere 20,000 Japanese Americans kicked out of there homes into horror camps, Internment Camps. At the time Japanese Internment camps where a good idea.

No innocent people like the Japanese Americans should have been punished or looked as bad people because of their ancestry. The bombing of Pearl Harbor caused the U.S. to fear the Japanese Americans, so they placed them in internment camps. Japanese Americans shouldn’t of been punished because most of them were born and raised on the West Coast. The condition of the camps were often not pleasant. Japanese Americans were viewed as alien and untrustworthy, and isolated from others. Life of a Japanese American was harsh and scary because you never knew what the mad people would do.

As opposed to righteous view that America was safeguarding its position in the war, the Japanese American internments were created out of resentment and racial prejudice fostered by other Americans. As the article “Personal Justice Denied” stated, the internments were led by “widespread ignorance of Japanese Americans contributed to a policy conceived in haste and executed in an atmosphere of fear and anger at Japan” (Doc E, 1983). It may seem like a precautionary cause to make internments but there aren’t any other extreme measures for other fronts. Caused by a hatred stirred by media and society’s view, many people disdain the Japanese. Even at the high levels of government, officials share similar prejudices. In this sense, there was very