Preview

Japanese Internment Camps

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
414 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Japanese Internment Camps
Japanese Internment Camp Essay

Japanese Internment Camps were unconstitutional because of the lack of evidence against the Japanese American people and the mistreatment of their American citizenship. The Japanese Internment Camps were created after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The attack left all Americans on high alert and all Japanese Americans were considered a security risk. In February of 1942, President Roosevelt signed an executive order, which relocated all Japanese Americans on the west coast to concentration camps. In every Japanese neighborhood, evacuation orders were posted. Families were forced to leave their homes and belongings, children were forced to leave their friends and school, and some families were even split apart. These innocent people were being treated like enemies instead of United States citizens. I believe that relocating families to internment camps was a poor decision on the American government’s part. The United States Constitution clearly states, in the Fifth Amendment, that every person is presumed innocent until they are proven guilty according to law. I understand that the attack on Pearl Harbor was an attack on the United States as a whole, so technically anyone could be behind it, but I disagree with punishing the entire Japanese American population just because they have Japanese ancestors. The United States government had no concrete evidence to prove that the Japanese American population was involved in the attack. If they had a very specific reason to prosecute a concentrated group, then I believe they should have relocated that concentrated group and not the entire population. Uprooting entire communities and relocating them to isolated camps is a blatant mistreatment of the rights of American citizens. The Fourteenth Amendment clearly states that once you become an American citizen, you stay an American citizen and are treated like one. The Japanese Americans being forced to live in camps were not being

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Although the Japanese-Americans were citizens of the United States and residences within the country, they did not have equivalent rights during this time in history. “The Constitution makes him a citizen of the United States by nativity and a citizen of California by residence. No claim is made that he is not loyal to this country.” Many Japanese-Americans were being treated as if they had been disloyal to the US and even alienated because of how they looked. Also, the freedom to own land was taken from them as well. “The Federal Reserve Banks took charge of property owned by evacuees, while the Farm Security Administration took over the agricultural property.” Owning property is one of the greatest freedoms and American can uphold and as history has shown it can easily be taken away in an instant. Japanese-Americans were forced to sell everything because they were very limited in what they could take with them to the internment…

    • 1180 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Japanese internment was justified because the United States needed to protect its national security. “Our shores were threatened by hostile forces” (Doc D Par 1). America had a great fear of the invasion of our West Coast. The Japanese were living near large oil wells, shipyards, vital aircraft plants, and naval bases. Japanese fisherman had several opportunities to watch the movement of our ships. It was our country’s executive decision to allow Congress to determine that our military leaders would have the power to segregate the Japanese from the West Coast temporarily (Doc D Par 2). Espionage was a major threat to America's national security. Many Japanese-Americans would leave the U.S., move to Japan to get their education, then return…

    • 165 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Korematsu V. United States was a court case during the time of World War II. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, people of Japanese descent were considered threats. As a result, Franklin Roosevelt issued the Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942. This Order demanded that each and every person of Japanese descent be moved to internment camps, regardless of citizenship. Fred Korematsu, a Japanese American citizen, refused to leave his home to go to the internment camp. Therefore, he was convicted of disobeying the law. This landmark court case was deemed unconstitutional due to the violation of Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment:…

    • 643 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    On February 19, 1942, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 which basically authorized the War Department to designate “military areas” and then exclude anyone from them whom it felt to be a danger. But it really wasn’t any one who they thought was a danger they had a target, the more than 110,000 Japanese Americans that lived along the west coast and any German or Italian aliens. These Japanese Americans were forced out of their homes and moved inland into relocation camps. They were only to bring what they could carry that meant only packing the essentials.…

    • 321 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Roosevelt stated: “Yesterday, December 7th, 1941 -- a date which will live in infamy -- the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.”(Document C). At this point in time the United States was at peace with Japan, but that all ended when Pearl Harbor was bombed. We were drug into a war with Japan and eventually this lead us to fight in the second world war. The president only wanted to protect from further harm so he rounded up the Japanese Americans and sent them to internment camps. He justly did this to prevent, protect, and defuse any more problems during the war on…

    • 475 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    No, the resettlement of the Japanese Americans was not justified. Innocent people were being removed from their homes, their belonging, their families to be put in barbaric sacks. There is no excuse for this. The Issei, or first generation in their loyalty to Japan by the fact that they have opted to make this their home and have brought up their children here. Of course it was a different time and people were genuinely scared after the attack, but there were other ways of dealing with Japanese "spies" than just giving an entire race into a camp for…

    • 99 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The United States Government interning the Japanese-Americans after the attack on Pearl Harbor cannot be justified because the actions of the U.S. government toward the Japanese Americans were very immoral, prejudiced, and corrupt. One of the reasons why the internment of Japanese Americans cannot be justified is because Americans had already had bias judgements of Asian Americans, especially the Japanese. Another reason why the actions of the U.S. are so immoral and unfair is that the Japanese Americans were interned without a trial or concrete evidence against them. The U.S. government made a mistake that they later realized and attempted to fix.…

    • 792 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the early stages of World War ll, Japanese Americans were living in peace on the West Coast. All was well until Pearl Harbor wreaked havoc about the United States of America. Billy, a Japanese American who lived to see that time, and was one of the many Japanese Americans who was sent to internment camps, because of their race. Because he and others like him had the same roots as those who bombed Pearl Harbor. The same roots. Not belief, not actions, not because of anything that they had control over. It was mere because of where they came from. If Franklin D. Roosevelt took to mind that he was forcing people out of their homes and lives, just because of where they came from and not that they did anything wrong----the horror that we know…

    • 930 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Japanese were only relocated.”Over one hundred thousand persons of japanese ancestry were removed from their homes.” Some people say that it was wrong for americans to relocate the japanese but really it wasn't. Moving the Japanese americans away from the border was for our own safety. The bombing of pearl harbor was a sad and tragic.We americans need to try to keep and country safe. “Detained in special camps.” the japanese were put into a camp where they would be held until the nasty situation was over the Jews were held in a place where they were killed. The main thing is that japanese americans were only relocated and…

    • 841 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    since Roosevelt did pass this order millions of Japanese citizens were forced into camps to protect them and their families and to protect the citizens of America. and if the Japanese did not listen to anything that they said or even try and harm America they were forced to give up their citizenship and to be punished or sent back to japan, many people were upset about this order but it was for the great or good for the American people, millions could have been hurt and we were trying to prevent that from happening. this order did change the lives of the people who were forced into the camps and most of them were scared of the consequences if something bad was going to happen.…

    • 335 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Have you ever been taken away from your home? Japanese Relocation was a hard time for the Japanese Americans after the Pearl Harbor Attack.We thought that all the Japanese were informants or spies planning for another attack in the 1940’s.The internment camps were in Topaz,Utah,and Granada,Colorado. Many Japanese Americans got taken away from their families. My opinion on that is that we shouldn't have taken people away from their families and just worked with them to get the upper hand on Japan.…

    • 659 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The internment of Japanese Americans was an immoral act based on prejudice and imagined threat rather than justice and law. The social, physical, and physiological consequences of living in overcrowded camps were lifelong. It took years for the Japanese Americans to re-establish themselves again as trustworthy US citizens. Today, the society cherishes and admires Japanese Americans for their healthy lifestyle, longevity, and intelligence.…

    • 63 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    “Deemed a ‘menace which had to be dealt with,’ Japanese-Americans were forced into ‘relocation centers.’” After the events of December 7th, 1941, the west coast of the United States was considered vulnerable to attack by the Japanese. I feel the Japanese internment was wrong, because it was based upon fear, prejudice, and greed. It was also a civil rights violation because the majority of the Japanese detainees were American-born citizens.…

    • 454 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    With the attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese in early December, it caused the United States to dive into war. This quickly led American people to believe that there was treachery about with the Japanese. Along with this fear, there was doubt of the loyalty of those Japanese-Americans that were currently living on the west coast. President Franklin D Roosevelt signed an order in February 1942 stating that U.S. Military was allowed to exclude any and all persons from certain areas of the U.S. as necessary. This removed any Americans with Japanese ancestry from the West Coast, placing them under armed guard, otherwise known as internment camps for up to four years. The Military justified their actions for these internment camps by claiming that there was a danger of those Japanese descent spying for their country. The U.S. Military used the threat to the American people as their justification for the internment camps, but the Executive Order 9066, the order that Franklin D Roosevelt signed in 1942, was used as the Constitutional Justifications for creating the internment camps.…

    • 653 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    There was no reason for us to try and get rid of all of our Japanese-Americans.There were 3 main causes of Japanese-Internment. One reason was because at the time there was a lot of racism in America. Another reason for Japanese-Internment was that the Japanese as a country had bombed Pearl Harbor. The final reason was that the Americans were afraid that the Japanese Americans would take all of the production and money that came out of farming.The final reason was the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The bombing of Pearl Harbor was a ginormous blow to America because it killed 2,335 people 1,177 were from the USS Arizona.…

    • 473 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays