Existing comment:
Assimilation and Relocation:
Coping with Evacuation:
After the United States declared war on Japan in 1941, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 creating zones "from which any or all persons may be excluded" -- the justification for evacuating and incarcerating about 120,000 citizens and non-citizens of Japanese descent to camps away from the Pacific Coast. This newspaper from an evacuation center in North Portland, Oregon, illustrates how internees tried to maintain normalcy.
Japanese Americans Reach Out:
In 1941, about 127,000 Japanese immigrants and Japanese Americans lived in the mainland United States. The President of the Japanese American Citizens League wrote the Immigration and Naturalization Service offering assistance with education programs "inculcating to the foreign born first generation ... an intimate and sincere appreciation for the things which make America great." |