CA -- Sacramento -- Nisei War Memorial:
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- Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
- NISEI_140718_06.JPG: Japanese American Civil Liberties Monument
- NISEI_140718_08.JPG: Pursuing the American Dream:
Issei (first generation) immigrants from Japan arrived in the United States as early as the late 1800s. Like many other immigrants of this era, the Issei came to this country seeking a better way of life for themselves and their families.
In 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt signed the Gentlemen's Agreement with Japan. This halted immigration from Japanese laborers to the United States. Japanese women, however, were excluded from this Agreement. From 1907 to 1924, thousands of Japanese women immigrated to the U.S. as "picture brides" to marry husbands who were introduced to them through photos.
In 1913, an Alien Land Law was passed prohibiting Japanese and other Asian immigrants from owning land. Despite this challenge, many Issei leased land and became very successful farmers.
At one point, over forty Japantown communities were established on the West Coast United States. Sacramento's Japantown had over 300 thriving businesses prior to World War II.
Every Japanese American community had a baseball team. "There was nothing quite like baseball fever on a hot Sunday afternoon when even the hard working Issei took time off from picking strawberried to see their favorite team play."
- NISEI_140718_12.JPG: Executive Order 9066:
At the onset of World War II, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066. This Order allowed the military the authority to remove all persons of Japanese Ancestry living on the West Coast of the United States from their homes and place them in concentration camps.
The "Eviction Notice" was posted on telephone poles and in other public areas to inform persons of Japanese Ancestry of their notice to vacate from the West Coast.
The population of Japanese in America increased as the Issei immigrants started to have children. Their Nisei (second generation) children were United States citizens by birthright. By 1942, there were over 127,000 persons of Japanese Ancestry living in the Continental United States, over 90% lived in the West Coast States.
Shortly after the Executive Order was signed, the FBI conducted searches of many Japanese American homes. In the end, no charge of espionage or sabotage was ever filed against any Japanese Americans or permanent alien residents of Japanese Ancestry in the U.S.
"Japs Keep Moving. This is a White Man's Neighborhood".
There were many communities in California that did not want Japanese Americans to remain in their neighborhoods, especially after the United States entered World War II.
"I Am An American"
Japanese Americans believed that the United States was their home, just like many other immigrants.
- NISEI_140718_13.JPG: Forced Removal
Everything came to a grinding halt when Executive Order 9066 was signed on February 19, 1942. The Executive Order, which authorized the forced removal, was viewed in the Japanese American community with shock and disbelief.
Each person could only bring what they could carry. Farmers left valuable crops unharvested. Many items such as treasured heirlooms and family belongings were lost, stolen, or destroyed.
Some Issei men were taken from their homes with little or no notice to unknown destinations. Many young children and mothers were left to resolve all business and other matters by themselves.
Thriving businesses were only given a few weeks notice to close and forced to dispose of everything they had at bargain prices.
Even the family pet had to be left behind.
- NISEI_140718_16.JPG: Processing:
Destined for mass imprisonment without being charged, without an indictment and without a trial of any kind -- this was not the America that Japanese Americans had been taught to believe in and to trust.
Armed guards monitored Japanese Americans on the trains and buses destines to American Concentration Camps.
Over 120,000 men, women, and children of Japanese ancestry were put into American Concentration Camps. Each was given a number to identify themselves. Many of them no longer felt like free citizens, but rather pieces of property.
Upon arrival at the concentration camps, each person was fingerprinted and photographed like a criminal although no charges were filed against them.
Country fairgrounds, race tracks and livestock exhibitions were converted into temporary concentration camps. Often times, horse stalls were used as living quarters for the detained Japanese Americans; some still had manure inside.
- NISEI_140718_20.JPG: American Concentration Camps:
Over 120,000 individuals of Japanese ancestry were imprisoned in American concentration camps, 70 percent were United States citizens.
concentration camp, noun
(1) A camp where civilians, enemy aliens, political prisoners, and sometimes prisoners of war are detained and confined, typically under harsh conditions.
(2) A place or situation characterized by extremely harsh conditions.
Armed guards, barbed wire fences and search lights surrounded each of the concentration camps.
Crude barracks were built of planks covered with tarpaper. Weather conditions varied. At some concentration camps, temperatures fell below 0 degrees in the winter. At others, temperatures reached as high as 120 degrees in the summer.
There were ten major American concentration camps (relocation centers) and a number of smaller detention centers. They operated from May 1942 until March 1946.
- NISEI_140718_23.JPG: The Japanese American Civil Liberties Monument is dedicated to the Issei pioneers and their Nisei children, who suffered & persevered so that future generations of Japanese Americans as well as other nationalities can live in American without fear of persecution or race.
Project funded by California Civil Liberties Public Education Program.
- NISEI_140718_26.JPG: The Loyalty Question:
On February 8, 1943, the War Department the War Relocation Authority required all men and women, over the age of seventeen, in each of the concentration camps to answer a loyalty questionnaire. The contradictory nature of the questions created conflict among many of the incarcerated Japanese Americans.
Question #27:
Are you willing to serve in the armed forces of the United States on combat duty, whenever ordered?
Question #27. The question to fight for the United States and the freedom and justice for which it stands was difficult to answer considering that these men, women, and their families were incarcerated in American Concentration Camps.
Many Nisei men from the concentration camps volunteered for the U.S. Army.
Question #28:
Will you swear unqualified allegiance to the United States of America and faithfully defend the United States from any and all attack by foreign or domestic forces, and forswear any form of allegiance to the Japanese Emperor or any other foreign government, power, or organization?
Question #28 caused anger and confusion because answering "Yes" to the question implied that they had an allegiance to the Japanese Emperor. The majority of the incarcerated were American citizens, the only home they had ever know [sic] was the U.S.
Question #28 was reworded later to "Will you swear to abide by the laws of the United States and take no action which would n any way interfere with the war effort of the United States?" Even the rewording of this question did little to relieve the anger and confusion felt by many Japanese Americans.
- NISEI_140718_28.JPG: Japanese American Soldiers:
"You fought for the free nations of the world... You fought not only the enemy, you fought prejudice and you've won. Keep up that fight... continue to win, make this great Republic stand for what the Constitution says it stands for: 'the welfare of all the people, all the time.' "
-- President Harry S. Truman a the presentation of the President Unit Citation
Over 33,000 Japanese Americans [sic] soldiers served in World War II, many of whom had parents and siblings incarcerated in the concentration camps. Their casualty rate was five times greater than that of the overall American forces.
The all-Japanese-American 100th Infantry Battalion / 442nd Regimental Combat Team became the most decorated unit in the [sic] U.S. military history for its size and length of service.
Women's Army Corps (WACs) were trained to translate written documents from Japan, over 300 Nisei women served in the WACs.
Over six thousand Japanese Americans served in the Pacific for the U.S. Armed Forces, Military Intelligence Service (MIS). Nisei soldiers who were proficient in both Japanese and English translated enemy documents, interrogated prisoners of war, and interpreted during combat. The MIS was awarded a Presidential Unit Citation in June, 2000. Shown here are Japanese American MIS interrogating an enemy prisoner of war.
President Harry S. Truman presents the seventh Presidential Unit Citation to the 100th Bn. / 442nd RCT.
7 Presidential Unit Citations
18,143 individual decorations including:
* 9,486 Purple Hearts (casualties)
* 21 Medals of Honor
* 33 Distinguished Service Crosses
* 1 Distinguished Services Medal
* 560 Silver Stars
* 28 Silver Star -- Oak Leaf Clusters
* 22 Legion of Merit Medals
* 4,000 Bronze Stars
* 1,200 Bronze Star -- Oak Leaf Clusters
* 15 Soldier's Medals
* 12 French Croix de Guerre
* 2 Palms -- French Croix de Guerre awards
* 2 Italian Crosses for Military Merit
* 2 Italian Medals for Military Valor
- NISEI_140718_34.JPG: Supreme Court:
There were several Japanese Americans who bravely challenged and deliberately violated the military orders on the grounds that it was a clear violation of their constitutional rights. They believed that the United States had made a mistake and sought legal proceedings to right the wrong.
"No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law."
-- Bill of Rights, 5th Amendment
In 1942, 3 Nisei men, Gordon Hirabayashi, Minoru Yasui and Fred Korematsu were individually charged and convicted of violating the military exclusion order. The three men appealed their cases all the way to the United States Supreme Court. The Supreme Court rulings were as follows:
Hirahayashi and Yasui v US, June 21, 1943.
The Supreme Court ruled that a curfew may be imposed against one group of American citizens based solely on ancestry. Hirabayashi and Yasui were convicted of violating the military orders and sentenced to prison terms.
Korematsu v US, December 18, 1944.
The Supreme Court ruled that one group of citizens may be singled out and expelled from their homes and imprisoned for several years without a trial, based solely on ancestry. Korematsu was convicted of violating the military order and sentenced to prison.
In 1983, Gordon Jirabayashi, Minoru Yasui and Fred Korematsu filed legal proceedings called a write of coram nobis requesting the courts to overturn their wartime convictions. They argued that the court rulings at the time were based upon historically false War Department findings that there was a "military necessity" for the mass incarceration of 120,000 Japanese Americans. This time they won. All three men's convictions were vacated.
In July 1942, Nisei, Mitsuye Endo filed a writ of habeus corpus (right to be brought before a court) for being detailed against her will without being charged. It took nearly a year for a federal district court to announce the decision denying her plea for release. Mitsuye Endo appealed her case and was eventually heard by the Supreme Court. After nearly two and a half years of detainment, on December 18, 1944, the Supreme Court ruled that Endo and other admittedly loyal American citizens cannot be imprisoned indefinitely without being charged.
Wayne Collins served as the attorney for many Japanese Americans, including Fred Korematsu. Despite hostility from the white American community for his defense work for Japanese American civil rights, Collins firmly believed that the Bill of Rights applied to everybody.
- NISEI_140718_37.JPG: Resettlement:
On December 18, 1944, in the case of Endo v US, the Supreme Court ruled that Endo and other admittedly loyal American citizens cannot be imprisoned indefinitely. Effective January 2, 1945, 120,000 men, women and children of Japanese ancestry were free to return to their homes on the West Coast.
Returning back to their homes and farms from the concentration camps proved very difficult for Japanese Americans. They were targets of violence and terrorism. Many businesses refused to provide services to Japanese Americans.
United States Army Captain Daniel K. Inouye lost his right arm in military combat fighting for his country. Inouye stepped into a barbershop, in full uniform displaying all his medals, and was denied service. He was told, "We don't serve Japs here."
Army Captain Daniel K. Inouye is now a United States Senator.
4th and M Streets, the heart of post war, Sacramento Japantown.
The forced removal of the Japanese Americans during World War II led to a decline in Sacramento Japantown's community.
[In] 1958, forced removal due to redevelopment, led to the final demise of Sacramento's Japantown.
Against their protest, redevelopment of the "downtown area" forced Japanese American businesses, churches and residences to relocate to other areas of Sacramento.
Over forty Japantowns existed in the State of California prior to World War II. Many thriving businesses and communities that existed before World War II were not able to reestablish themselves upon resettlement.
As of 2003, only three Japantowns remain in the State:
San Jose Japantown,
San Francisco Japantown,
and Los Angeles Little Tokyo.
The Nisei War Memorial Hall was created to honor the Nisei Veterans who fought in World War II. Today, the Nisei War Memorial Hall stands as the last reminder of where the Sacramento Japantown once thrived and prospered.
- NISEI_140718_42.JPG: Redress
Executive Order 9066 was rescinded on Feb. 19, 1976. "An honest reckoning must include a recognition of our national mistakes as well as our national achievements. Learning from our mistakes is not pleasant, but as a great philosopher once admonished, We must do so if we want to avoid repeating them."
August 10, 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed The Civil Liberties Act of 1988 requiring an apology and reparation to an estimated 60,000 survivors of incarceration in American Concentration Camps.
On October 9, 1990, President George Bush signed a Letter of Apology which was sent to all individuals incarcerated in American Concentration Camps along with a reparation payment.
"The great victory of redress was not the apology and the reparation; it was the gifts we gave to this country -- the gift of education, of strengthening the Constitution, of strengthening our civil rights."
-- Dale Minami, Civil Rights attorney
- NISEI_140718_45.JPG: Stamp Out Prejudice and Racism:
By stamping your feet upon this plaque, you are taking a stand that you will not accept prejudice and racism.
- NISEI_140718_54.JPG: Post Nisei 8985
- NISEI_140718_57.JPG: Nisei War Memorial Community Center
A memorial to our comrades who had given their lives in the defense of our nation.
...
Dedicated September 11, 1955
Plaque donated by Nisei Post No. 8985
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