The Rational Actor Model

Following the start of World War II and due to bad advice and popular opinion, President Roosevelt's executive order 9066 went into effect. This order began the marshalling of over 100,000 Japanese Americans into internment camps. Camps were located throughout the most harshest western states. This order was enacted to protect the Japanese Americans from harm by the hands of Americans. It was also ordered to prevent any type of espionage because it was believed the Japanese Americans may still have allegiance to their farmer homeland of Japan. Many Americans were worried that people of Japanese heritage, would become spies or saboteurs for Japan. The United States

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. Furthermore, the United States should do more to compensate the families of those impacted by internment because the recompense provided initially was minimal and should be considered an affront to the memory of the victims.

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.

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

Throughout the history of our country hatred has been common, as Immigrants enter our homeland they are looked down upon and thought of people who are “destroying” this nation. All these new people coming in are only seeking new opportunities but are discouraged by other because of their ancestry. Humanity’s unjust behaviors can be seen in two different aspects of America 's history, we first see it in the internment of the Japanese Americans during WWII and the period of the Salem Witch trials. Arthur Miller’s dramatized play, The Crucible can be correlated to the event of Pearl Harbor because of the similarities between the Japanese Americans and the characters in the play; they both demonstrate the lives of civilians being ruined, a mass hysteria caused by fear of their neighbors, and lack of a just court system.

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).

Japanese Americans shouldn’t have been punished because most of them were born and raised on the West Coast. They had to sell their homes, stores, and most of their assets because they could not be certain their homes and livelihoods would still be there on their return. It made no difference that many had never been to Japan because Japananese American veterans of WW1 were forced to leave. The fear was that if Japanese invaded the west coast of America, they would be loyal to Japan instead of the U.S. They held Japanese prisoners in temporary shelters such as stables in racetracks. After the years had pass, the U.S. government felt sorry for what they did

On the date of Feb 19, 1942 President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an executive order. This executive order forced all Japanese American citizens, regardless of their loyalty to the country. It forced them to evacuate their homes and not just the Japanese Americans in a particular part of the country all Japanese Americans would be put into internment camps. At one point in time all of the camps combined held 120,000 Japanese Americans. This was all cause due to the fact that the Japanese Military at the time bombed Pearl Harbor an American Naval base in Hawaii. All of the camps closed by June in 1946. And in 1988 congress awarded restitution payments to each survivor of the Japanese internment camp.

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

Japanese internment camps made us question who was really an American and it relates to today’s issues. Internment camps were similar to concentration camps or prison and Japanese-Americans were put into them. Even though they were considered Americans, they were still treated unfairly by other Americans. So who is American? In my opinion, the Japanese were still trying to show that they were Americans. They were complying with people putting them into the internment camps and they burned all of their heritage. Honestly, they were not doing anything un-American, but, because of their race, they were targeted. Arresting someone based on race is not constitutional, but we still see it today. Latinos are being discriminated because people

Another reason why President Roosevelt in ordering the Executive Order 9066 resulted in the internment of Japanese American citizens would be the evacuation orders that happened Japanese-American communities giving info and directions on how to obey with the new executive order. Many

The narrative begins with the first two chapters focusing on assessing Roosevelt’s evolving attitude toward Japan and Japanese-Americans, during his pre-presidential years and his first two terms in office. Continuing, Robinson changes directions and focuses on the origin and implementation of the internment policy, beginning with Roosevelt’s decision to issue Executive Order 9066 in February 1942, the authorization of relocating Japanese-Americans from the West Coast into internment camps, the subsequent controversy over with Japanese-Americans deemed “loyal” to the United States, and the decision to finally close the camps in 1946. The final chapter concludes with Robinson attempting to understand how Roosevelt, whom historians have celebrated for his strong commitment to individual rights, could have supported such an unjust policy. Robinson argues Roosevelt’s “past feelings toward the Japanese-Americans must be considered to have significantly shaped his momentous decision to evacuate Japanese-Americans from their homes … whether citizens or longtime resident aliens, [Japanese-Americans] were still Japanese at the core and should be regarded as presumptuously disloyal and dangerous on racial grounds” (p. 118 -

Although the Japanese internment camps were labeled as a way to “protect Japanese-American citizens”, it was the worst decision possible, and ruins the United State’s reputation when people learn about it.