Is That Legal?

Prof. Muller writes from Heart Mountain:

"Sixty-two years ago, as twelve-year-olds, these two men attended a Boy Scout Jamboree in Park County, Wyoming. They had a lot in common, but one big thing separated them: at the end of the day, the scout on the right (Stimson) was free to leave. The scout on the left (Mineta) was not. The Jamboree took place behind the barbed wire of the Heart Mountain Relocation Center north of Cody, Wyoming."

Interesting, but in the interest of full disclosure it should be noted that Norman Mineta was one of thousands of American-born minor children of Japanese enemy aliens, such aliens being subject to internment under long-standing law (still in effect today).

Obviously small children were not considered security threats and Mineta, like other such children, was allowed to accompany his parents to Heart Mountain because of the wartime government's humanitarian policy of keeping evacuated and interned families together.

Being under-age, young Mineta would have been free to leave with his parents for a location outside of the West Coast military zones, had his parents applied for leave and qualified for security clearance to do so. Altogether, some 35,000 evacuees, alien and citizen,(approx 1/3rd of those evacuated) applied for permanent leave, were approved, and departed the relocation centers during the war.

Young Norman Mineta could have been among those leaving Heart Mountain except for one of the following reasons: (1) his parents did not apply for leave, (2) his parents applied for leave but did not qualify because of security concerns or other reasons, such as inability to show that they had prospects for gainful employment and would not become public charges.

My parents attended a local Boy Scout event honoring Japanese-American Boy Scouts in the camps. Secretary Mineta recounted a story about sharing a tent with Alan Simpson. When you pitch a tent, you're supposed to dig a trench around it to prevent flooding in the event of rain. Simpson says, can I dig the trench; Mineta replies, sure, no skin off my back. Middle of the night, the heavens open up and Mineta is awakened by the sound of Simpson laughing his ass off as his cunningly directed trench floods the tent next door.

Camp ends and the two kids go their separate ways, one staying in Wyoming and one returning to California. Decades later, the Wyoming kid reads in the paper that the California kid has been elected mayor of San Jose, and sends him a congratulations note. As the reparations movement gathers force, Alan Simpson, Republican Senator from Wyoming, is one of the strongest supporters of the bill that would redress the wrong done to his old tentmate forty years before.

Prof. Muller writes:

"Perhaps Commander Hopwood can explain, then, why orphans as young as six months old were excluded from the West Coast and placed into an orphanage at Manzanar."

Perhaps I can--better than the 8-year-old emotionalized and inaccurate story from the L.A.Times which the professor links to. A more accurate version of the wartime orphan situation vis-a-vis the Japanese evacuation was written by the chief National Park historian, Harlan D. Unrau, in his two volume history of the Manzanar Relocation Center. In addition, the Manzanar camp newspaper "The Manzanar Free Press" in its issue of March 20, 1943 carries much enlightening information about the "Children's Village" at Manazanar, a topic so often distorted in later years by media hyperbolists and their fellow-travelers.

As the aforementioned publications point out, the orphan children of Japanese ancestry were caught up in unfortunate circumstances caused by the exigencies of war. Operation of orphanages was being hampered by the loss of personnel due to evacuation orders, and children cared for in foster homes were also at risk for the same reasons. In addition there were some cases of children becoming separated from evacuated or interned parents. Also cases of unwed mothers evacuated to the centers who gave the children up for adoption. At the time, as Unrau states, California restricted the placement of children only in foster homes of like blood lines and other laws prohibited the placement of California children in out-of-state foster homes, even as many such requests for children were received from outside California.

The Children's Village at Manzanar was established with 62 children aged from 1 to 19 who came from the Maryknoll children's home in L.A. Father Hugh Lavery, director of that home, fully approved and cooperated in the relocation of the children for their own well-being and worked closely with the Army in that effort.

After the intial 62 arrived, only 39 more children came from other locations than L.A., a total of 101 being the total of children arriving during the 30 months of the Children's Village existence. A monumental effort was made by those in charge of the Village to move children out to foster homes or to rejoin them with parents or place them with relatives, all under considerable difficulty because of Califonia's adoption and placement rules. However, despite these hindrances over its short lifetime, 48 children were rejoined with one or both parents, 2 with relatives, 6 placed in foster homes, 5 deparated to accept domestic employment, 10 went to boarding homes, 20 were place in institutions for temporary care, and only 10 remained at war's end.`

Shamefully, what was essentially a humanitarian effort to take care of displaced and orphaned children has been distorted out of all reality for socio/political reasons by those who should know better.

morinaoy writes:

"...As the reparations movement gathers force, Alan Simpson, Republican Senator from Wyoming, is one of the strongest supporters of the bill that would redress the wrong done to his old tentmate forty years before."

Yes, conservative Simpson was a supporter of reparations under P.L. 100-383 to Japanese-Americans and enemy alien Japanese either interned or relocated, but perhaps more interesting are the names of some of the left-wing or "moderate" senators who either voted against or ducked the issue, several of whom were (or still are) candidates for president. The list I have shows that in the Senate there were 69 votes for and 27 against with 4 not voting. Among those voting against reparations were McCain and Chafee. Those not voting at all were Gore, Biden, Teddy Kennedy, and Warner.

Cmdr. Hopwood, you miss the point--in this case, I suspect, on purpose.

The point is not how well or poorly the orphans were treated. The orphans could have been housed in a palace at Manzanar and been fed cookies and ice cream all day long. For the purposes of the discussion we're having right now, it wouldn't have mattered.

You asserted that the reason Norman Mineta left California was not that he was a security risk, but that a humane government allowed him to accompany his parents.

Why, then, was it necessary to make a child without parents leave California?

Senator Chafee:

Mr. CHAFEE. Mr. President, I fully support the underlying goals of this legislation. As I see them, the bill's goals are to acknowledge the grave mistake and injustice that took place when 120,000 individuals of Japanese ancestry were relocated and interned during World War II.

The further objective is to heal for good the wounds resulting from that policy.

I do not support, however, the bill's method of achieving its goals. In my view, the proper way for the U.S. Government to respond to the indignities suffered by the Japanese-Americans who were relocated and interned is to acknowledge the mistake and make an unequivocal, official apology. Payment of the arbitrary sum of $20,000 to every surviving internee, over four decades after the fact, seems to me an inappropriate and imprudent answer to the problem.

Let me explain why I have reached this conclusion.

There is no denying that the relocation and internment of Americans of Japanese descent was a ghastly error. It was a mistaken decision resulting from the suspicion and hysteria of wartime. Thousands of loyal American citizens were uprooted from their homes, jobs, schools and businesses, and placed in the internment camps without good reason. They spent the war years behind barbed wire, forced to endure the bleakness of the camps and the ignominy of official suspicion.

Although it is hard today to comprehend fully the wartime mentality that made the internment program possible, it is easy now to see what a mistake it was. The wartime relocation and internment of Japanese-American civilians is a sad chapter in the history of civil rights in the United States. I wholeheartedly believe that the victims -- and they certainly were victims -- deserve a sincere apology from the U.S. Government.

Senator Warner:

Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I concede that it was an error in judgment by the President of the United States. He should have listened to those advisers who cautioned him against it.

[P]erhaps more interesting are the names of some of the left-wing or "moderate" senators who either voted against or ducked the issue, several of whom were (or still are) candidates for president. [...] Among those voting against reparations were McCain and Chafee.

Point of information: The Senator Chafee in 1988 was not the current Sen. Lincoln Chafee, but his father, Sen. John Chafee, whom he succeeded in 1999.

Prof. Muller:

I don't know how you have the patience to deal with revisionists like Hopwood/Malkin.

I don't always agree with what you have to say--you are much more liberal than I--but on the subject of internment I could not agree more with you.

Ignore 'em and they will go away.

(I realize the response to my suggestion that you ignore them is that six million Jews were murdered because they were ignored, etc.)

Prof Muller writes:

"You asserted that the reason Norman Mineta left California was not that he was a security risk, but that a humane government allowed him to accompany his parents. Why, then, was it necessary to make a child without parents leave California?"

Sometimes your train of thought is a bit confusing, Professor. The UPDATE remark in your blog post asked this:
"Perhaps Commander Hopwood can explain, then, why orphans as young as six months old were excluded from the West Coast and placed into an orphanage at Manzanar."

To bring you up to date, the orphans you asked about didn't leave California. They went to the Children's Village at Manzanar, which, for the enlightenment of those who do not know, was in California. If you miswrote and instead meant to say "Why, then, was it necessary to make a child without parents leave the West Coast?" I think I answered that.

Now I have a question for you. In view of the wartime circumstances adversely affecting the care of the orphan children which I described in a post above, what would you suggest that the government should have done with the orphans had they decided not to move them to Manzanar? Abandon them to their own devices? What?

Yes, Hopwood, I mistakenly wrote "California" there. Do you really think I don't know where Manzanar is?

Other options? Hmmm. Let's see. The government could have left the Japanese American orphans in orphanages along the coast. If "hampered due to loss of personnel because of evacuation," as you claim above, the government could have ... hired replacements. Maybe non-Japanese replacements. (Surely this would have been cheaper than shipping everyone to Manzanar and creating a facility there.) Or it could have moved the orphans to other better-staffed orphanages on the Coast.

I've reached the end of my patience on this latest little absurdity, Commander Hopwood, so I'll give you the last word if you want it.

OK, I'll take the last word, Professor. Thank you.

I see the absurdity here as that of maligning the good intentions of our wartime leaders who were charged with responsibilities you and I will probably never face and to suggest that you could have done a much better job by relocating the orphans into an entirely different cultural environment and expect that they would have received better than the excellent care they did receive as a result of their move to Manzanar.

It appears that Cmdr. Hopwood's argument boils down to "Wartime leaders have a lot on their minds. Criticism of them hurts their feelings. Cut it out. Manzanar was nice." None of which addresses Prof. Muller's point that the "keeping the families together" rationale asserted to be the reason for Mineta's internment fails to justify internment of orphans at Manzanar. Not hard to see why Prof. Muller lost his patience.

Can you explain to us how you reached the conclusion that "Payment of the arbitrary sum of $20,000 to every surviving internee, over four decades after the fact, seems to me an inappropriate and imprudent answer to the problem."? Are you against monetary compensation? Or just the arbitrary amount? Have your views on this changed/evolved? If so, why?

Says Josh:

"...Prof. Muller's point that the "keeping the families together" rationale asserted to be the reason for Mineta's internment fails to justify internment of orphans at Manzanar..."

Yes, the professor's argument is that the orphans should have been left on the coast and placed in the care of non-Japanese caregivers (provided such could be found in view of wartime disruptions and labor shortages) in non-familiar cultural surroundings, one reason he gives is for the purpose of saving the government money. By moving the orphans to the Children's Village at Manzanar, the government's solution was not only more pragmatic but more compassionate.