Japanese Americans before World War II[edit]

Further information: Japanese American history

Due in large part to socio-political changes stemming from the Meiji
Restorationand a recession caused by the abrupt opening of Japan's economy to the
world marketpeople began emigrating from the Empire of Japan in 1868 to find work
to survive.[27][better source needed] From 1869 to 1924 approximately 200,000
immigrated to the islands of Hawaii, mostly laborers expecting to work on the
islands' sugar plantations. Some 180,000 went to the U.S. mainland, with the
majority settling on the West Coast and establishing farms or small businesses.[17]
Most arrived before 1908, when the Gentlemen's Agreement between Japan and the
United States banned the immigration of unskilled laborers. A loophole allowed the
wives of men already in the US to join their husbands. The practice of women
marrying by proxy and immigrating to the U.S. resulted in a large increase in the
number of "picture brides".[27][28][better source needed]

As the Japanese-American population continued to grow, European Americans on the

West Coast resisted the new group, fearing competition and exaggerating the idea of
hordes of Asians keen to take over white-owned farmland and businesses. Groups such
as the Asiatic Exclusion League, the California Joint Immigration Committee, and
the Native Sons of the Golden West organized in response to this "Yellow Peril."
They lobbied successfully to restrict the property and citizenship rights of
Japanese immigrants, as similar groups had previously organized against Chinese
immigrants.[29] Several laws and treaties attempting to slow immigration from Japan
were introduced beginning in the late 19th century. The Immigration Act of 1924,
following the example of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, effectively banned all
immigration from Japan and other "undesirable" Asian countries.

The 1924 ban on immigration produced unusually well-defined generational groups

within the Japanese-American community. The issei were exclusively those who had
immigrated before 1924; some desired to return to their homeland. Because no new
immigration was permitted, all Japanese Americans born after 1924 were, by
definition, born in the U.S. and automatically U.S. citizens. This nisei generation
were a distinct cohort from their parents. In addition to the usual generational
differences, issei men had been typically ten to fifteen years older than their
wives, making them significantly older than the younger children of their often
large families.[28] U.S. law prohibited Japanese immigrants from becoming
naturalized citizens, making them dependent on their children to rent or purchase
property. Communication between English-speaking children and parents who spoke
mostly or completely in Japanese was often difficult. A significant number of older
nisei, many of whom were born prior to the immigration ban, had married and already
started families of their own by the time the US joined World War II.[30]

Despite racist legislation that prevented issei from becoming naturalized citizens
(and therefore from owning property, voting, or running for political office),
these Japanese immigrants established communities in their new hometowns. Japanese
Americans contributed to the agriculture of California and other Western states, by
introducing irrigation methods that enabled the cultivation of fruits, vegetables,
and flowers on previously inhospitable land.[31] In both rural and urban areas,
kenjinkai, community groups for immigrants from the same Japanese prefecture, and
fujinkai, Buddhist women's associations, organized community events and charitable
work, provided loans and financial assistance, and built Japanese language schools
for their children. Excluded from setting up shop in white neighborhoods, nikkei-
owned small businesses thrived in the Nihonmachi, or Japantowns of urban centers
such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle.[citation needed]

In the 1930s the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI), concerned by Imperial Japan's
rising military power in Asia, began conducting surveillance on Japanese-American
communities in Hawaii. From 1936, at the behest of President Roosevelt, the ONI
began compiling a "special list of those who would be the first to be placed in a
concentration camp in the event of trouble" between Japan and the United States. In
1939, again by order of the President, the ONI, Military Intelligence Division, and
FBI began working together to compile a larger Custodial Detention Index.[32] Early
in 1941, Roosevelt commissioned Curtis Munson to conduct an investigation on
Japanese Americans living on the West Coast and in Hawaii. After working with FBI
and ONI officials and interviewing Japanese Americans and those familiar with them,
Munson determined that the "Japanese problem" was nonexistent. His final report to
the President, submitted November 7, 1941, "certified a remarkable, even
extraordinary degree of loyalty among this generally suspect ethnic group."[33] A
subsequent report by Kenneth Ringle, delivered to the President in January 1942,
also found little evidence to support claims of Japanese-American disloyalty and
argued against mass incarceration.[34]

After Pearl Harbor[edit]

San Francisco Examiner, February 1942

A Japanese American unfurled this banner the day after the Pearl Harbor attack.
This Dorothea Lange photograph was taken in March 1942, just prior to the man's
internment.

Children at the Weill public school in San Francisco pledge allegiance to the
American flag in April 1942, prior to the internment of Japanese Americans.

Taken by Russell Lee, this photograph is labeled "Tagged for evacuation, Salinas,
California, May 1942".
The attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, led military and political leaders
to suspect that Imperial Japan was preparing a full-scale attack on the West Coast
of the United States. Due to Japan's rapid military conquest of a large portion of
Asia and the Pacific between 1936 and 1942, some Americans feared that its military
forces were unstoppable.

American public opinion initially stood by the large population of Japanese

Americans living on the West Coast, with the Los Angeles Times characterizing them
as "good Americans, born and educated as such." Many Americans believed that their
loyalty to the United States was unquestionable.[35]

But, six weeks after the attack, public opinion along the Pacific began to turn
against Japanese Americans living on the West Coast, as the press and other
Americans[citation needed] became nervous about the potential for fifth column
activity. Though the administration (including the President Franklin D. Roosevelt
and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover) dismissed all rumors of Japanese-American
espionage on behalf of the Japanese War effort, pressure mounted upon the
Administration as the tide of public opinion turned against Japanese Americans.
Civilian and military officials had serious concerns about the loyalty of the
ethnic Japanese after the Niihau Incident which immediately followed the attack on
Pearl Harbor, when a civilian Japanese national and two Hawaiian-born ethnic
Japanese on the island of Ni'ihau violently freed a downed and captured Japanese
naval airman, attacking their fellow Ni'ihau islanders in the process.[36]

Several concerns over the loyalty of ethnic Japanese seemed to stem from racial
prejudice rather than any evidence of malfeasance. Major Karl Bendetsen and
Lieutenant General John L. DeWitt, head of the Western Command, each questioned
Japanese-American loyalty. DeWitt, who administered the internment program,
repeatedly told newspapers that "A Jap's a Jap" and testified to Congress,

I don't want any of them [persons of Japanese ancestry] here. They are a dangerous
element. There is no way to determine their loyalty... It makes no difference
whether he is an American citizen, he is still a Japanese. American citizenship
does not necessarily determine loyalty... But we must worry about the Japanese all
the time until he is wiped off the map.[37][38]

DeWitt also sought approval to conduct search and seizure operations aimed at
preventing alien Japanese from making radio transmissions to Japanese ships.[39]
The Justice Department declined, stating that there was no probable cause to
support DeWitt's assertion, as the FBI concluded that there was no security threat.
[39] On January 2, the Joint Immigration Committee of the California Legislature
sent a manifesto to California newspapers which attacked "the ethnic Japanese," who
it alleged were "totally unassimilable."[39] This manifesto further argued that all
people of Japanese heritage were loyal subjects of the Emperor of Japan; the
manifesto contended that Japanese language schools were bastions of racism which
advanced doctrines of Japanese racial superiority.[39]

The manifesto was backed by the Native Sons and Daughters of the Golden West and
the California Department of the American Legion, which in January demanded that
all Japanese with dual citizenship be placed in concentration camps.[39] Internment
was not limited to those who had been to Japan, but included a very small number of
German and Italian enemy aliens.[39] By February, Earl Warren, the Attorney General
of California, had begun his efforts to persuade the federal government to remove
all people of Japanese ethnicity from the West Coast.[39]

Those who were as little as 1/16 Japanese could be placed in internment camps.[12]
There is evidence supporting the argument that the measures were racially
motivated, rather than a military necessity. Bendetsen, promoted to colonel, said
in 1942 "I am determined that if they have one drop of Japanese blood in them, they
must go to camp."[13]

Upon the bombing of Pearl Harbor and pursuant to the Alien Enemies Act,
Presidential Proclamations 2525, 2526 and 2527 were issued designating Japanese,
German and Italian nationals as enemy aliens.[40] Information from the CDI was used
to locate and incarcerate foreign nationals from Japan, Germany and Italy (although
Germany and Italy did not declare war on the U.S. until December 11).

Presidential Proclamation 2537 was issued on January 14, 1942, requiring aliens to
report any change of address, employment or name to the FBI. Enemy aliens were not
allowed to enter restricted areas. Violators of these regulations were subject to
"arrest, detention and internment for the duration of the war."[41]