The "will of the people" can be manipulated, and was. Lies were promulgated by local politicians and the Hearst press to stir the people into a deluded, cruel and ignoble frenzy. (Scapegoats are always welcome in some quarters.) To congratulate "democracy" for that 'success' is very strange indeed.
One small example from The LA Times: "[a] viper is nonetheless a viper wherever the egg is hatched – so a Japanese American, born of Japanese parents – grows up to be a Japanese, not an American."
General De Witt: "...we must worry about the Japanese [American] all the time until he is wiped off the map."
A few things were known "at the time," J.C., none of which you appear at all to regret. Some examples, again:
...The U.S. government had been secretly conducting studies on the West Coast population of Japanese for ten years; and in November 1941, at President Roosevelt's request, Curtis B. Munson prepared a 25 page report on their loyalty. He reached the same conclusion the F.B.I. and Naval Intelligence had-- that the Japanese Americans were exceptionally trustworthy and posed no danger to the country.
......Attorney General Francis Biddle and F.B.I. director J. Edgar Hoover opposed the internments.
...Nothing was ever proven against these men; in fact, not one was ever charged...
...many people suffered from malnutrition. 80% of their belonging were rifled, stolen, sold during their incarceration.
...German and Italian Americans suffered no comparable large scale persecution.
...there was no mass internment/relocation of Japanese Americans living in the Hawaiian Islands! -- despite the imposition there of martial law! Of the more than 150,000 persons of Japanese ancestry living in Hawaii (38% rather than the 1% in CA!), only about 1,500 were interned (generally, "for cause," I would guess)."" Why? To keep the Island economy flowing!
Men were taken away without notice. Most families knew nothing about why their men had suddenly disappeared, to where they were taken, or when they would be released. Some arrestees were soon let free, but most were secretly shipped to internment camps around the country. Some families learned what had happened to their men only several years later.
...The evacuation, ostensibly to protect against possible sabotage and espionage... included babies, orphans, adopted children, and the infirm or bedridden elderly. Children of mixed blood, even from orphanages, were included if they had any Japanese ancestry at all. Colonel Karl Bendetsen, who directly administered the program, declared: "I am determined that if they have one drop of Japanese blood in them, they must go to camp."
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Just a few excerpts.
And still you defend it. "You had to be there" means only that you or your family were caught up in that demonstrably stupid, hateful, racist frenzy and are still unwilling to cast off its spell. J. Edgar Hoover wasn't fooled. The Attorney General wasn't. And they were there, too.
Yes, your opinion distresses me. Not because it's yours, but because it was my country's. |
