In order to protect the United States from any internal espionage or betrayal that would lead to “another Pearl Harbor”, certain minority Americans were stripped of their rights. This uncertainty regarding Japanese Americans’ loyalty was amplified after the Niihau incident in which Japanese American Harada on the Hawaiian island of Niihau tried to assist the downed Japanese pilot Nishikaichi who was part of the Pearl Harbor mission. The duo terrorized the island, capturing prisoners of Niihau inhabitants and shooting a native. This event which stemmed from Pearl Harbor contributed greatly to the passing of Executive Order 9066, as according to a January 1942 Navy report, the event indicated a high "likelihood that Japanese residents previously believed loyal to the United States …show more content…
This order led to the displacement of “120,000 Japanese Americans [that] were permanently moved to 10 relocation centres in 7 states”(Lee 210). The court cases Hirabayashi v. United States, Yasui v. United States, and Korematsu v. United States regarded issues of curfew regarding the Executive Order of 9066 as well as the Civilian Exclusion Order No.34, which required all citizens of Japanese descent be excluded from Military areas. The court ruled in favor of the act’s constitutionality as a measure to protect against the “possibility of an attempt at invasion somewhere along the Pacific Coast” due to fear from “the damage wrought by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor”, thus restricting the rights of Japanese Americans (Supreme Court 1943). Ultimately, Pearl Harbor had an immense impact on the rights of Americans of Japanese descent. The attack and subsequent Niihau incident which resulted from it served as the justification for legislation and court decisions which led to the mass forced relocation and dismissal of the rights Japanese citizens had as