Government rationale of internment camps

Executive Order 9066: "Now, therefore, by virtue of the authority vested in me as President of the United States, and Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, I hereby authorize and direct the Secretary of War, and the Military Commanders whom he may from time to time designate, whenever he or any designated Commander deems such actions necessary or desirable, to prescribe military areas in such places and of such extent as he or the appropriate military commanders may determine, from which any or all persons may be excluded, and with such respect to which, the right of any person to enter, remain in, or leave shall be subject to whatever restrictions the Secretary of War or the appropriate Military".

Executive Order 9066 was signed by President Roosevelt on February 19, 

1942. The order gave the military leaders the discretion on how to implement the language of the order. Ultimately, 10 interment camps were set up away from the West coast of the United States in remote locations where over 110,000 Japanese-Americans were sent.

The president's infamous Executive Order 9066, which made the military the sole arbiter in cases of military need and security. This sweeping order was applied to the Japanese-American community with few exceptions. With the Europe first approach the government utilized, why were German-Americans or Italian-Americans not detained in commensurate numbers as fellow American citizens of Japanese lineage? Why Japanese-Americans in Hawaii were virtually exempted from internment?

Milton Eisenhower explains to the public in 1943 the government's rationale behind the internment of all people of Japanese heritage (citizen and non-citizens). Mr. Eisenhower fails to mention the Munson Report or why so few Japanese in Hawaii were sent to internment camps in comparison with those Japanese-Americans on the mainland United States.




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Munson Report (below): Commissioned in 1941, PRIOR to the attack on Pearl Harbor.

The report was issued before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. While tensions between the two countries were escalating, President Roosevelt commissioned a study to find the risk that Japanese-Americans posed to the safety of the United States if war broke out between Japan and the United States. The report finds that there is "no Japanese 'problem' on the coast." Why would President Roosevelt advance Executive Order 9066 in the face of this report?

An exerpt from the San Franciso Chronicle May 21, 1942:

S.F. CLEAR OF ALL BUT 6 SICK JAPS

San Francisco Chronicle
May 21, 1942

For the first time in 81 years, not a single Japanese is walking the streets of San Francisco. The last group, 274 of them, were moved yesterday to the Tanforan assembly center. Only a scant half dozen are left, all seriously ill in San Francisco hospitals.

Last night Japanese town was empty. Its stores were vacant, its windows plastered with "To Lease" signs. There were no guests in its hotels, no diners nibbling on sukiyaki or tempura. And last night, too, there were no Japanese with their ever present cameras and sketch books, no Japanese with their newly acquired furtive, frightened looks.

A colorful chapter in San Francisco history was closed forever. Some day maybe, the Japanese will come back. But if they do it will be to start a new chapter - with characters that are irretrievably changed. It was in 1850 - more than 90 years ago - that the first Japanese came to San Francisco, more than four years before Commodore Perry engineered the first trade treaty with Japan. The first arrival was one Joseph Heco, a castaway, brought here by his rescuers. What happened to Heco is, apparently, a point overlooked by historians. He certain came and probably went – but nobody seems to know when or where.

Not for another 11 years did the real Japanese migration begin. In 1861, the second Japanese came here. Five years later, seven more arrived. The next year there were 67, and from then on migration boomed. By 1869 there was a Japanese colony at Gold Hill near Sacramento. In 1872 the first Japanese Consulate opened in San Francisco – an office that passed through many hands, many regimes, and many policies before December 7, 1941. On that fateful day, according to census records, there were 5,280 Japanese in San Francisco.

They left San Francisco by the hundreds all through last January and February, seeking new homes and new jobs in the East and Midwest. In March, the Army and the Wartime Civil Control Administration took over with a new humane policy of evacuation to assembly and relocation centers where both the country and the Japanese could be given protection. The first evacuation under the WCCA came during the first week in April, when hundreds of Japanese were taken to the assembly center at Santa Anita. On April 25 and 26, and on May 6 and 7, additional thousands were taken to the Tanforan Center. These three evacuations had cleared half of San Francisco. The rest were cleared yesterday.

These last Japanese registered here last Saturday and Sunday. All their business was to have been cleaned up, all their possessions sold or stored. Yesterday morning, at the Raphael Weill School on O'Farrell Street, they started their ride to Tanforan. Quickly, painlessly, protected by military police from any conceivable "incident," they climbed into the six waiting special Greyhound buses. There were tears – but not from the Japanese. They came from those who stayed behind – old friends, old employers, old neighbors. By noon, all 274 were at Tanforan, registered, assigned to their temporary new homes and sitting down to lunch.

The Japanese were gone from San Francisco.

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According to the United State Census of 1940 (link) the mainland United States had approximately 126,000 Japanese-Americans inhabitants. The U.S. territory of Hawaii in 1940 had approximately 157,000 Japanese inhabitants. Of the 126,000 mainland U.S. Japanese, approximately 108,000 were sent to internment camps. In contrast, approximately 2,000 Japanese in Hawaii were processed for internment. The census also reports that farming and carpentry, vital skills needed by a country at war or peace, were dominated by Japanese-Americans. Why such a glaring disparity among a race of people so vital to a local and national economies?  Racism by the United States government doesn't explain the vast disparity of treatment of Japanese-Americans in Hawaii versus those in the mainland of the United States?


DBQs.

A) Given the United States military approach to internment of the Japanese, what could explain the different rates of internment for those living in Hawaii versus those Japanese on the mainland?

B) What reason(s) can be deduced for President Roosevelt's signing of Executive Order 9066 when the Munson Report contradicts the president's conclusion?