Executive Order 906 Research Paper

Executive Order 9066 was a presidential executive order in the United States of

America that was issued and signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt during World

War II. It was signed on February 19, 1942. This order “authorized the Secretary of War

to prescribe certain areas as military zones, clearing the way for the deportation of

Japanese Americans, Italian Americans, and German Americans to internment camps.

This executive order was spurred by a combination of war hysteria and reactions to Pearl

Harbor and the Niihau Incident”. This order specifically and especially affected people

of Japanese-descent that were living in the United States at the time. Not only was this

order morally corrupt, it was unfair and ultimately an act
of discrimination.

The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits unreasonable

searches and seizures and requires any warrant to be judicially sanctioned and supported

by probable cause. Japanese Americans were searched and many of their belongings,

including their homes were put up for sale to be sold at a fraction of the cost of what they

were actually worth. This means that in addition to being morally unjust, it was actually

legally unjust as well.

Moreover, this was purely an act of discrimination. One particular race was

grouped together because of an act of terrorism that had occurred. The events that

occurred at Pearl Harbor were devastating and heartbreaking, without any shred of doubt.

However, we cannot blame an entire race for what happened that day. Terrorism can

occur in many circumstances, we even have domestic terrorists.
How is it ethical to say

that every Japanese American poses a potential threat to the safety of the United States of

America? It is not.

Finally, forcing an entire group of people to live in an internment camp

completely goes against what the United States stand for; and that is freedom. We as

Americans pride ourselves on being the land of the free. Being forced to live within a

camp located in a remote area is not freedom. It is cruel. The government finally

recognized this in 1988. Each survivor that was placed in an internment camp received a

$20,000 compensation for “the violation of their liberties”. Therefore, even the United

States government recognized that this act was not just.

All in all, there is no way to justify Executive Order 9066. It is without a doubt

morally unjust and legally unfair. Although the United States had suffered a great loss at

Pearl Harbor, we cannot just blame an entire group for the events of that day. The

Japanese-Americans were discriminated against and treated very poorly just because of

their ethnicity. That is not what America stands for and we should never approve of

anything like this ever
again.