' Yet Japan's ultimate aim was not limited to California or the Pacific Coast but was global domination achieved through a race war. 'It is the determined purpose of Japan,' the report stated, 'to amalgamate the entire colored races of the world against the Nordic or white race, with Japan at the head of the coalition, for the purpose of wrestling away the supremacy of the white race and placing such supremacy in the colored peoples under the dominion of Japan.'
The presence of sizeable numbers of persons of Japanese origin in California and other Western states was seen as but the beginnings of a Japanese attempt to not merely expand territorially into the United States, but to literally substitute the existing racial order with a new scheme entirely under Imperial Japanese control. Interestingly, the "Japanese menace" is also linked directly to white American fears of all, non-white, and therefore inferior races. It is the old terror of African-Americans, non-Anglo-Saxon immigrants, and a host of hostile "others" that have, or will, insinuate themselves within the body of "pure" American society.
Anti-Japanese racial attitudes were further enhanced and encouraged by the treatment that resulted from the attitudes themselves. Japanese who attempted to "make it" in white American society, to succeed on the terms of their new country found themselves under attack. A case in point is that of Yamato Ichihashi, who pursued a career at Stanford University. A professor of history at the university, Ichihashi was evacuated along with other Japanese in 1942.
Japanese academics, like Ichihashi, were commonly accused of stealing jobs from whites; a charge that led the government of Japan to employ Ichihashi as an agent to counteract anti-Japanese propaganda.
The Japanese government believed money to support Ichihashi and others like him who were sympathetic to Japan was money well spent."
The situation created a catch-22 in which, by accepting payment from the Japanese government to improve white Americans' images of Japan and the Japanese people, Ichihashi and others, were simultaneously appearing to confirm those same white Americans' suspicions that they were nothing more than agents of the Japanese government.
Ichihashi publicly urged Japanese immigrants to 'Americanize.' They should assimilate as 'the first step for their success,' he maintained, and then by 'contributing to the national interests of America they could attain their own economic development.' They should not live a sojourner life, planning to make quick money and return to Japan, but rather should accept America as their permanent home."
It was this sort of thinking that made the Nisei believe, in the early months of the war, that they would be safe from any anti-Japanese agitation. They accepted that restrictions would be placed upon their Japanese-born parents, but believed that their own American birth set them apart.
The appointment of General John L. DeWitt - who had remarked, "A Jap's a Jap" - as the official in charge of the evacuation of Japanese-Americans confirmed their worst fears.
Within the space of only sixty-eight days, nearly the entire Japanese-American population of the West Coast had been herded into detention centers, from there to be transferred to concentration camps - grim facilities consisting of stark, uniform barracks.
The facilities were surrounded by barbed while searchlights played up and down on any nearby streets. "Families were to sleep in the barracks; they were to eat, wash themselves and their clothes, go to the toilet, and play in the communal buildings in the center of the block.
Inmates were dependent on government administrator sin the camp for food and medicine, while those who could work were forbidden to earn more than twenty-one dollars a day - white workers continued to garner regular wages.
In short, Japanese-Americans - men, women, and children, had been reduced to the level of prisoners. Their liberties were gone and they would henceforth be entirely dependent upon the good graces of the military authorities.
Such conditions produced extremism on both sides. Denied their rights, and treated as enemy aliens, many Japanese-Americans actually embraced ultranationalist Japanese ideologies. In the Tule Lake Camp, fanatical groups, such as the Young Men's and Young Women's National Defense Associations (Hokoku Dan) and the Service Association (H-shi Dan), would occasionally engage in violent acts.
Military authorities responded with martial law,...
Government Since gang-related crimes fall within the jurisdiction of state, this research will give an insight on the need to find solutions that increasingly include all levels of government. Congress needs to pass legislation that will change immigration enforcement laws and make more aliens deportable. In addition, the federal government should take a more active participation in helping local and state jurisdictions develop anti-gang responses. The local, state and federal governments
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