On December 7,1941 when the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor it shook the whole world and significantly the United States by destroying dozens of warships and killing soldiers and innocent people. This act of war triggered the entrance of the United States into World War II. Without a warming of such distress, the United States was paranoid of future invasion or attacks on American soil and started to question Japanese communities such as Los Angeles, San Francisco and Hawaii. With great tensions between the Japanese and Chinese, the American government was forced to separate Chinese and Japanese residents from American society for safe reasons and to prevent future conflict.
The Japanese and Chinese people were treated the same in the United States based on how they look. In 1882 with thousands of Chinese immigrating to United States because the discovery of gold, the American government established a law prohibiting all immigration of Chinese laborer. With the entrance of the United States into World War II, the U.S had to ease the connection between allied China with the limitation of labor workers. “I think very few American people really know anything about Chinese.” (Takaki 71) People always have trouble trusting other cultures and ethnicities but in hard times we must unite. Most of the Americans were fighting at war, the Chinese stepped in to help the American economy and warfare production. The Chinese had many more privileged rights rather than the Japanese who were treated as secondary residents because of the attack of Pearl Harbor. Chinese had more job opportunity rather than the Japanese.
Since the United States was enemies with Japan, the American government didn’t want future acts in American soil. The U.S established a law that allowed federal agents to relocate thousand of Japanese residents and some Chinese who weren’t contributing to the United States.
“During World War II, the federal government ordered 120,000 Japanese-American who lived to leave their homes and live in 10 large relocation camps in remote, desolate areas, surrounded by barbed wires and armed guards.” (Digital History Pg. 1) This was a harsh period for many Japanese-Americans, many people lost their career and future. Japanese who were innocent Americans contributing to the American dream were treated with no respect. “About 77,000 American citizens and 43,000 legal and illegal resident’s aliens were affected by the order.” (Digital History Pg. 1) This process of relocating the Japanese took several months and even years, many people had to sell their businesses, homes, and lost their jobs.
The United States favored the Chinese people because they were allies in the World War 2. That was the reason congress repealed an exclusion act of 1882, allowing Chinese immigrants to start working in factories. Many Americans primary white criticized the Chinese and Japanese to be the same people and enemies of the United States. That just tells you that people judge you based on your cover. It took the United States several years to apologize to the Japanese-Americans for the actions the United States took during the war. It took 46 years of hate, anger, and shame for the United States to apologize. “President Reagan’s signing of legislation that provides for payments and apologies to Japanese-Americans who were forcibly relocate in World War II brings to an end the “civil rights disaster” internment, leaders of organization who worked for the measure said here today.” (Bishop Pg.l)
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To summarize things up, the United States did constitutional acts during the World War 2 era. They did it for safety reasons and precautious because the Pearl Harbor attack was something very awful thing to experience. We should not treat people based on the color of their skin or how they look like. Everyone is equal and should be treated equal because we are allhuman beings. Now the Chinese and Japanese are allies but have trust issues with different cultures because of there past histoy.
