Internment of Japanese Americans

During World War II, the American government found it within their power to relocate Japanese Americans to internment camps. This was a serious violation of the constitutional rights of these Japanese Americans. Nearly 120,000 people of Japanese descent were interned by the American government during this time. The internment consisted of a mass evacuation of persons of Japanese ancestry from the Pacific coast states. Japanese Americans were interned from all of California and from the western half of Oregon and Washington. This grave injustice was all done in the name of defense in an atmosphere of World War II hysteria.

“On February 19, 1942, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, authorizing the removal of Japanese Americans from sensitive military areas on the West Coast.”1 This order was created to ensure all possible protection against espionage and sabotage of national defense materials. Executive Order 9066 “gave the military broad powers to ban a...