On the morning of December 7th, 1941, an aircraft of the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked the United States Naval base at Pearl Harbor. The attack shocked Americans, and the federal government decided to involve themselves in World War II. During the war, in February 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, along with the government, betrayed Japanese individuals by signing Executive Order 9066. This order authorized the forced relocation and imprisonment of over 100,000 individuals of Japanese descent, because they were deemed as a threat. Analyzing the context and tragedy of this order, it becomes clear that this policy is not justifiable. Executive Order 9066 was not legitimate, as it represents a dark chapter in American history, characterized by the violation of civil liberties, racial discrimination, and made government officials reconsider their conduct.
This order represented a disregard for the civil liberties of individuals, which are engraved into the U.S. Constitution. According to the pamphlet by Carey McWilliams, Japanese Relocation Problems, “It is doubtful if any deprivation of civil rights so sweeping and categorical as this has ever been performed under the war powers and justified by the courts”. The idea of officials saying the lack of civil rights has never been this bad, is …show more content…
Rather than targeting individuals that were linked to the crime, the order punished an entire race. As claimed in the pamphlet created in 1944, ancestral ground served as the basis for the evacuation. “Chinese and Koreans, who belong to the same race as Japanese, were not removed; but all persons having japanese blood, however slight, were excluded”. During this time period, people were fighting against racism every day. This quote accurately reflects the removal was solely based on Japanese heritage, giving them greater motivation to defend
This order represented a disregard for the civil liberties of individuals, which are engraved into the U.S. Constitution. According to the pamphlet by Carey McWilliams, Japanese Relocation Problems, “It is doubtful if any deprivation of civil rights so sweeping and categorical as this has ever been performed under the war powers and justified by the courts”. The idea of officials saying the lack of civil rights has never been this bad, is …show more content…
Rather than targeting individuals that were linked to the crime, the order punished an entire race. As claimed in the pamphlet created in 1944, ancestral ground served as the basis for the evacuation. “Chinese and Koreans, who belong to the same race as Japanese, were not removed; but all persons having japanese blood, however slight, were excluded”. During this time period, people were fighting against racism every day. This quote accurately reflects the removal was solely based on Japanese heritage, giving them greater motivation to defend