The redress movement began with the Japanese-American Evacuation
Claims Act of 1948. The act attempted to reimburse evacuees for
their enormous financial losses during the evacuation. The act
required documented proof of such losses. "Holding onto
receipts had not been a high priority for many Japanese-Americans,
who were given only a few days to pack up one bag of belongings"
(Maki, Kitano, and Berthold 1999: 54). Due to the lack of
proof, many Japanese-Americans did not receive compensation.
The compensation was also settled on 1942 prices, without interest,
and minus lawyer's fees. Litigation relating to the Claims Act
lasted over seventeen years (Weglyn
1996: 274).
Due to the lack of actual compensation for the Japanese evacuees,
civic groups began pressuring the government for redress. On
July 31, 1980 President Jimmy Carter created the Commission on
Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians. The Commission
was charged with reviewing the facts and circumstances leading
to Executive Order 9066, to review the directives of military
forces requiring the use of internment camps, and to make recommendations
for appropriate remedy of the past situation. Over the course
of three years the nine-member panel interviewed former evacuees,
ex-governmental officials, administrators of the camps, and reviewed
archival materials and examined numerous secondary source materials.
In 1983 the commission issued its report. The report ultimately
found that the there was no threat of national security along
the west coast and the mass exclusion of people of Japanese ancestry
was not necessary and unjustified. The Commission further made
the following recommendations for remedies.
- Congress should pass a joint resolution, to be signed
by the President, which recognizes the injustice that was done
and offers the apologies of the nation.
- The President should pardon those Japanese who were convicted
of violating the statutes imposing a curfew on American citizens.
Furthermore the Department of Justice should review other wartime
convictions.
- Congress should apply restitution for positions, status
or entitlements lost in whole or in part because of the evacuation.
- Congress should recognize the injustice imposed upon the
evacuees and the need to redress these events by appropriating
money to establish a special foundation. The fund should be used
to sponsor research and public educational activities so that
the events of this inquiry will be remembered.
- Congress should establish a fund to provide for personal
redress. The fund should be used to provide a one-time compensatory
payment of $20,000 to each of the approximately 60,000 survivors.
(Commission
on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians 1997: 462-465).
Before leaving office in 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed
legislation into law which offered a formal apology
to America's ethnic Japanese. In 1990 survivors of the evacuation
began receiving notices
from the government that checks for $20,000 would be forthcoming
and that the oldest survivors would be receiving the checks first.
It was extremely unfortunate that compensation was not given
to the evacuees until fifty years later because thousands of
evacuees were no longer alive.
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