Once Dewitt was converted to support the idea of Japanese internment, the path was cleared. Stimson presented President Roosevelt with the extraction of Japanese-Americans and was told to take the most reasonable action. When the act went to Congress, “only the West Coast politicians and a handful of diehard racists from Southern states spoke out, leaving the impression that the majority in Congress was disinterested in the subject but willing to go along with F.D.R..” The American government had failed its loyal Japanese American Citizens. The congressmen had fallen to false racist assumptions of Japanese as participants in espionage and sabotage. Little did they know, they had torn down the civil rights America had stood for. Their decision …show more content…
Most the community leaders had been taken away by the FBI after Pearl Harbor. Therefore, there were few left who would speak up. Thus, began the mass evacuation of “more than 110,000 Japanese Americans on the West Coast” into “10 hastily constructed Spartan ‘relocation camps’ in seven states.” Many of these camps were not fully functioning when the people arrived. They were very cramped and lacked privacy. Mitsuko Hashiguchi, an internee, had “heard of cases where evacuees were put in horse stalls and they hadn’t even whitewashed them, or washed them down or anything – smelly, dirty.” These conditions made living in the camps difficult and a new experience for all the children, Issei, and …show more content…
In the camps, Issei experienced an identity crisis. They could not answer the question of whether they were Japanese or American, for they were treated by Americans as Japanese but they lacked thw cultural knowledge to be fully incorporated by the Nisei. Wartime Japanese Americans, such as Norman Ikari, experienced racism as soon as they arrived back on U.S. soil. Ikari returned to the U.S. after sustaining injuries in battle, and was asked to dress as a Japanese Soldier, because of his appearance, to train other soldiers. During the time people had been interned, racism had increased. During the three years of internment, “wartime propaganda—racist headlines, atrocity movies, hate slogans, and fright-mask posters—had turned the Japanese face into something despicable and grotesque.” Few had homes to return to. Most the land the Japanese had owned was lost. Bank accounts had been frozen when internment began. The emotional battle became far greater in this way than any of the physical experiences in the