Japanese Internment Camps Essay

Accepting Responsibility for the Past

The present United States government should take up responsibility for the leaders before them and try to bring justice to the injustice they have plagued our present society with. The U.S. government believes it determines the fate of all people within our country rather than the people of the country determining its fate. First, it tried to eliminate the Native American culture and mold their behaviors to fit our own standards. Second, the U.S. government once again discriminated against its own citizens due to their origin when they chose to force thousands of Japanese Americans into internment camps. These actions cannot be wiped from the slates of our history for what has happened cannot be changed, but it is up to our government leaders to make amends. To begin, the United

During World War II, over a 100,000 Japanese Americans were forced from their homes to live in hastily put together internment camps. These internment camps were unsanitary and inhumane. In an excerpt from “Remarks on Signing the Bill Providing Restitution for the Wartime Internment of Japanese American Civilians”, paragraph 1 states, “More than 40 years ago, shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry living in the United States were forcibly removed from their homes and placed in makeshift internment camps. This action was taken without trial, without jury. It was based solely on race, for these 120,000 were Americans of Japanese descent.” The excerpt goes on to state that tens of thousands of Japanese Americans remained loyal to the U.S. including those in the internment camps. Many became vital soldiers in the war they were being discriminated against for due to actions that did not involve