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Japanese Internment Camps In America Essay

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The following events caused the tensions to raise between Japan and The United States of America which led up to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the Internment of Japanese Americans. They are the Rape of Nanking and the sudden stop of U.S exports to Japan. In the 1930s Japan, had become very nationalistic, militaristic, and desired for more land to expand the population. So, Japan went to China and conquered Manchuria, Northern China, then most of China, and eventually Southeast Asia. This help Japan get out of its economic crisis but soon a very tragic and horrendous even took place. The Rape of Nanking was a total massacre of the Chinese because at the time it was a glorified city that stood testament to China’s wealth and beauty. Within a …show more content…

In the Anonymous Letter to Attorney General Biddle, the person brings up specific reasons how the violation of rights occurred. “In the case of the Nisei it is a complete abrogation of American citizen’s rights… As for the Issei—by what right do we discriminate against them as aliens when we won’t allow them to become citizens?” (Anonymous, March 16, 1942). This quote questions the justification the U.S. government used to lock up the Japanese Americans. The government used the fact the parents of the Nisei (Issei) were aliens and since they’re aliens they must be disloyal to America. This was not the case because the Government didn’t allow the Issei to become citizens because of bias stereotypes the Americans had of the Issei. The Nisei had their rights violated because by birth they were Americans so that automatically makes them loyal to America. When the government came and collected them, they were given questionnaires that was supposed to prove their loyalty on how they answered, which meant the government was collecting all types of private information without valid reason which is in violation of The Fourth Amendment. When Robert Gordon Sproul gave his speech, he took the stance of defending the Japanese Americans. “The American citizen of Japanese ancestry

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927 Words | 4 Pages

Imprisoning thousands of Japanese and disciplining them for the actions of a small group, is inappropriate and unfair. Due to the internment camps, many family members were lost and many families were torn apart. There was absolutely no justification in the American Government taking away the Japanese’s civil rights and flipping their whole lives

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163 Words | 1 Pages

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

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1699 Words | 7 Pages

How would you feel if one day you were told to leave your whole life behind to live in captivity just because people halfway across the world did something wrong? This horror story was all too true for the thousands of Japanese Americans alive during World War II. Almost overnight, thousands of proud Japanese Americans living on the west coast were forced to leave their homes and give up the life they knew. The United States government was not justified in the creation of Japanese internment camps because it stripped law-abiding American citizens of their rights out of unjustified fear.

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808 Words | 4 Pages

Akiko Kurose, who was 16 and attending a Seattle high school at the time, described when, after the Pearl Harbor attack, “one of the teachers said, ‘You people bombed Pearl Harbor’”, referencing Akiko’s Japanese heritage (Document 1). If, indeed, this was the general feeling of all non-Japanese Americans, than it is easy to see how amassed public hatred could lead to the internment of the hated. The government was even aware of the minimal threat posed by the interned—The Munson Report, delivered to President Roosevelt by his Special Representative of the States Department, Charles Munson, has such a statement as follows, “There is no Japanese ‘problem’ on the Coast. There will be no armed uprising of Japanese” (Document 4). And Mary Tsukamoto, who was an American of Japanese heritage, was forced in 1942 to an internment camp with her husband and child, leaving their strawberry farm behind, described her shock, “We couldn't believe that they would need all of us to quit our work to produce our fruit, food for victory... and then be put away”(Document 3).

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786 Words | 4 Pages

Due to the increasing fear of a Japanese attack on the West Coast, Lt. General John L. Dewitt recommended that all people of Japanese descent living in America be removed to the interior of the country. In the article “An American Tragedy: The Internment of Japanese-Americans During World War II” by Norman Y. Mineta, former US Secretary of Transportation, Dewitt backed up his suggestion with rumors that “ethnic Japanese on the West Coast were signaling Japanese ships out in the Pacific ocean” and they “had stockpiled numerous rounds of ammunition and weapons” (Mineta 161). In order to combat this threat in case of enemy invasion, the camps would detain the Japanese Americans so they cannot aid the enemy. The warped logic used to imprison 110,000 people purely based on ethnic background was convincing enough to the American people that they didn’t even question

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535 Words | 3 Pages

The Executive Order 9066 is where the order for the internment camps originated from. It shows how the American government addressed the Japanese-Americans living in the United States. At first everyone including the President defended the Japanese living in the United States until the Niihau incident where two Hawaiian born with Japanese ethnics helped and aided a downed pilot that assisted in the attacks of Pearl Harbor. After that the fear of Espionage became a huge concern and the racially motivated crimes and discrimination against the Japanese-American’s, is why the Executive Order 9006 was signed and enforced. The order forced 120,000 Japanese-Americans with most of them being American citizens to leave their homes, businesses and American constitutional rights behind and spend the war years behind barbed wire (By, 1988).

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932 Words | 4 Pages

In my opinion, the internment of Japanese-Americans in 1941 was not only unnecessary for national defense, it was also a racist act. Due to the bombing of Pearl Harbor, over 110,000 Japanese Americans were forced by the executive order 9066 to evacuate the west coast, being placed in internment camps. Even though to some measure it is understandable that one may be sceptical after such a traumatic experience takes place, internment camps for innocent men, women and children cannot be justified. A large majority of these Japanese-Americans were forced to stay and withstand immensely difficult living conditions and harsh treatment for two and a half years. Relocation has left many with a sense of shame that continues to live on in our modern day.

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428 Words | 2 Pages

Japanese Internment Camps On december 7, 1941 Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. They destroyed seven battleships, 121 aircrafts, and killed 2,400 people. A year after Pearl Harbor the government opened Japanese internment camps. Although the internment camps were for the Japanese, it was just like what Hitler did to the Jews.

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1034 Words | 5 Pages

Abstract Imagine not being able to walk outside at night or having to sell your possessions and abandon your home to spend years behind barbed wire—even though you’d done nothing wrong. For Japanese Americans during World War II, this scenario was reality. The freedom they once had is now gone, as they are put into concentration camps no longer in their home. Now having to line up for meals and to do laundry, thing you did before on a normal basis, while being hovered over. The internment of Japanese Americans in the U.S. was the act of forcing those of Japanese decent to relocation and incarcerating them during World War II.

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496 Words | 2 Pages

Their civil rights were violated because they took away everything that they had and they were an American citizens. Even though they were born in the U.S. they were still put into camps as American citizens. Even though this violated their civil rights they still did what they were told because most of the were truly American citizens. “The internment of persons of Japanese ancestry during World War II sparked constitutional and political debate” (national archives). When they were sent to the camps many Nisei’s had lost their homes, their pets, some even lost family, and businesses.

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187 Words | 1 Pages

If I was alive during the 1940’s when the Japanese-American Internment happened, I would be really shocked, but obviously more scared. Honestly, I would have tried to get my family together and tried to live our lives low key. There really much, me as a teenager, would be able to do. I just be hoping that if one day, I had a friend sent to an internment camp, that they would be safe and live for longer years. If I saw or heard that one of my close friends were sent to an internment camp and I would never see them again, I would be really depressed and most likely tear up.

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255 Words | 2 Pages

The internment of Japanese Americans was not justified because there was little evidence suggesting they were a threat. The people were left financially ruined as they lost their homes, businesses, and land. Prior to the war, people of the Japanese were a valuable element in the population. They were law-abiding citizens who contributed to the contributed to the arts, agriculture, and many actually joined the armed forces. Thousands of Japanese workers helped construct the Great Northern, Northern Pacific, Oregon Short Line and other railroads in the Columbia River Basin.

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748 Words | 3 Pages

People from Japan began migrating to the U.S. in significant numbers following the political, cultural, and social changes stemming from the 1868 Meiji Restoration. Large numbers went to Hawaii and to the West Coast. In 1907, the "Gentlemen 's Agreement" between the governments of Japan and the U.S. ended immigration of Japanese unskilled workers, but permitted the immigration of businessmen, students and spouses of Japanese immigrants already in the U.S. The Immigration Act of 1924 banned the immigration of nearly all Japanese. The ban on immigration produced unusually well-defined generational groups within the Japanese-American community.

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1089 Words | 5 Pages

As a result, all Japanese were discriminated in the U.S.A. as biased perceptions were already set in their minds. They were judging the Japanese as the whole, just because the attack of a small part of the

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707 Words | 3 Pages

I strongly disagree with the internment of Japanese-Americans because it was unconstitutional, the Japanese-Americans showed loyalty by volunteering to fight in the 442nd combat team, and because of the hypocrisy of the situation. The surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, on December 7, 1941 brought the United States into World War II. This brought worry and disgust from American citizens, towards the Japanese Americans and caused the passing of Executive Order 9066. The executive order imprisoned 110,000 of citizens in internment camps.

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