The Internment Of Japanese Americans
29 JUN 45 MEMORANDUM From: Foreign Policy Advisor to President Harry S Truman Subj: THE INTERNMENT OF JAPANESE AMERICANS I'm not in favor of the internment of Japanese-Americans. I intend to show that the internment of the Japanese -Americans, which many of them are U.S citizens, is morally and ethically wrong. The internment of Japanese-Americans is a shameful time in American history. This period of history leads me to wonder what it is that generates so much fear and paranoia as to feel the need to lock up innocent and productive citizens of our country. Of course, nothing about World War II is predictable. Though the country has already been through World War I, it can be said that so much time has lapsed that when World War II began, most of the people in the United States were unaffected by the war in Europe. It would only be after the bombing of Pearl Harbor that Americans would begin to look to Europe to see what sorts of horrors may await America as they entered the war. With sickening clarity, we have been shown photographs of war prisoners in Germany, were told of whole towns being leveled by the German. Fearing that the same fate is awaited us at the hands of the Japanese, widespread and irrational paranoia has swept our nation. Families, who had been pillars of the community, had been respected shopkeepers, teachers, or scientists, are now viewed with suspicion. Millions of Japanese-Americans have been rounded up and taken to internment camps, it is purely ironic. It can be said that it is ironic for the pure fact that while America has been fighting to secure the freedoms that America supposedly stands for, millions of our citizens are being considered disloyal or a threat, based on their ethnic backgrounds. Many of the internees are children and the elderly. Nowhere has it been proven that a child or even the elderly have ever been a threat to national security. We are locking up Japanese-Americans but we...
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