Legacy of Injustice Exploring the Cross-Generational Impact of the ]apanese American Internment CRITICAL ISSUES IN SOCIAL JUSTICE Published in association with the International Center for Social lustice Research, Department of Psychology, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri. Series Melvin J. Lerner and RHH Vermunt Editors: Washington University University of Leiden St. Louis, Missouri Leiden, The Netherlands

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A Continuation Order Plan is available for this series. A continuation order will bring delivery of each new volume immediately upon publication. Volumes are billed only upon actual shipment. For further information please contact the publisher. Legacy of Injustice Exploring the Cross-Generational Impact of the ]apanese American Internment

Donna K. N agata University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan

Springer Science+Business Media, LLC Llbrary of Congress Cataloglng-In-Publlcatlon Data

Nagata, Donna K. Legacy of lnjustlee : explorlng the eross-generatlonal l~paet of the Japanese-Aoerlean lnternoent / Donna K. Nagata. p. em. -- (Crltleal Issues In soelal justlee) 1neludes blbllographleal referenees and Index.

1. Japanese Amerleans--Evaeuatlon and reloeatlon, 1942-1945. 2. Clvl1 rlghts--Unlted States. 3. World War, 1939-1945--1nfluenee. I. Tltle. 11. Serles. D7S9.8.ASN33 1993 973'.0495S--dc20 93-3927 C1P

ISBN 978-1-4899-1120-9 ISBN 978-1-4899-1118-6 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-4899-1118-6 © 1993 Springer Science+Business Media New York Originally published by Plenum Press, New York in 1993. Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1993 All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher. Für my parents Preface

At the age of 6, I discovered a jar of brightly colored shells under my grandmother's kitchen sink. When I inquired where they had come from, she did not answer. Instead, she told me in broken English, "Ask your mother." My mother's response to the same question was, "Oh, I made them in camp." "Was it fun?" I asked enthusiastically. "Not really," she replied. Her answer puzzled me. The shells were beautiful, and camp, as far as I knew, was a fun place where children roasted marshmallows and sang songs around the fire. Yet my mother's reaction did not seem happy. I was perplexed by this brief exchange, but I also sensed I should not ask more questions. As time went by, "camp" remained a vague, cryptic reference to some time in the past, the past of my parents, their friends, my grand­ parents, and my relatives. We never directly discussed it. It was not until high school that I began to understand the significance of the word, that camp referred to a World War II American concentration camp, not a summer camp. Much later I learned that the silence surrounding discus­ sions about this traumatic period of my parents' lives was a phenomenon characteristic not only of my family but also of most other Japanese American families after the war. "It's like a secret or maybe more like a skeleton in the closet-like a relative in the family who's retarded or alcoholic," said a woman whose mother was also in a camp. "Everyone tiptoes around it, discussing it only when someone else brings it up, like a family scandal. I'm aware of the shame of it, but it's really a paradox. It wasn't anything she did to be ashamed of. There were things done to her, like a rape victim!" In fact, her mother and my parents-along with more than 110,000 Japanese Americans-were moved from their hornes to concentration camps located in desolate areas of the United States. Forced to sell their belongings and evacuate, they took only what they could carry and wore

vii viii Preface impersonal numbered tags for identification. Most ]apanese Americans were forced to move twice-first to assembly centers at horsetracks and fairgrounds, where many lived in animal stalls; and later to the barren, hastily constructed camps themselves. Barbed wire and armed guard towers surrounded the camps despite the fact that approximately two­ thirds of those incarcerated were D.S. citizens. More than 90% of the ]apanese American population on the D.S. mainland lived in confine­ ment, for up to 4 years, without the right to a trial or individual review. Although the American government claimed that the action was neces­ sary to prevent espionage by ]apanese Americans in this country, it would eventually be revealed that there was no evidence to support the military necessity for such drastic measures (Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians [CWRIC] (1982). Ironically, at the same time that ]apanese Americans were living in concentration camps and considered hazardous to national security, 23,000 additional ]apanese Americans (including the relatives of those in camps) served in the D.S. military during World War 11, protecting the American ideals of equality, justice, and democracy (Daniels, 1988). These were American-born second-generation Japanese American (Nisei) men who enlisted directly from the camps and from Hawaii in an effort to prove their loyalty to the Dnited States. The service record of the Nisei was exemplary. The all-Japanese American 100th Battalion and the 442nd Regimental Combat Team were among the war's most decorated units, and the work of Nisei in military intelligence contributed signifi­ cantly to the American war effort. In 1980, nearly 40 years after the war, the D.S. government seriously reviewed the facts and circumstances surrounding the internment and recommended redress for the injustices suffered by the Japanese Ameri­ cans during the war. At that time, an act of Congress established the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians. The commission conducted hearings in cities across the Dnited States, receiving testimony from more than 750 witnesses including former interne es , government officials, and historians. Based on these testi­ manies and volurnes of government documents, it concluded that "there was no justification in military necessity for the exclusion" and, ac cord­ ingly, "there was no basis for the detention" (CWRIC, 1982, p. 10). The commission summarized its findings as follows:

The broad historical causes which shaped these decisions were race preju­ dice, hysteria and a failure of politicalleadership. Widespread ignorance of Japanese Americans contributed to a policy conceived in haste and executed in an atmosphere of fear and anger at Japan. A grave injustice was done to American citizens and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry. (CWRIC, 1982, p. 18) Preface ix

While historians are now able to develop a retrospective accounting for the causes of the internment, it is more difficult to document the long-term effects of that injustice. The writings that do exist describe the social and psychological suffering created by the internment and forced evacuation (e.g., Mass, 1986; Morishima, 1973). Although they had done nothing wrong, many Nisei felt ashamed and humiliated by what hap­ pened to them, and some even blamed themselves for not being Ameri­ can enough. Today the aftereffects from the internment elude casual inspection. Educationally and economically, both those ]apanese Americans who were interned and their offspring seem outwardly successful and un­ affected by their experiences of racism; they have accomplished much. Discussion of what happened has been conspicuously absent from classroom history books, and the vast majority of Americans know little, if anything, about the internment. Only through efforts leading to the passage of the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which apologized for wrongful imprisonment and authorized the payment of $20,000 redress to each surviving internee, has the silence begun to break. Most adult children of the internees, third-generation ]apanese Americans (Sansei), were born after the war and did not experience the internment. Although they were born and raised in the United States like their Nisei parents, these Sansei-who are now primarily in their 30s and 40s-have experienced significantly less overt racism than their parents. Yet recognizing the great injustice that took place, they carry with them the legacy of their parents' internment. Time has not severed the psychological ties to events that preceded them, nor has the fact that their parents will not openly discuss the internment. On the contrary, the vast majority of Sansei feel that the incarceration has affected their lives in significant ways, and the re cent ]apanese American redress movement was "led largely by younger ]apanese Americans whose parents and grandparents still bore the psychological scars of intern­ ment" (Irons, 1983, p. 348). What is the nature of this legacy? How is the impact of one genera­ tion's historie injustice passed on to the next generation? And what long­ term effects has the internment had for the offspring of those who were incarcerated? These are the questions addressed in this book through data collected for the Sansei Research Project. The Sansei Research Project, conducted in 1987, represents the first large-scale study to explore the impact of the internment on third­ generation ]apanese Americans. The Project surveyed over 700 Sansei from across the United States and included in-depth interviews with over 40 Sansei. Responses from participants confirmed the salience of x Preface the internment for the Sansei generation. More than half who completed the 20-page survey wrote additional comments to express their personal views, attaching lengthy descriptions of their emotional reactions to the topics raised in the survey. Others expressed surprise that there might be other Sansei beside themselves whose families had been silent about the camps. Several Sansei requested additional copies of the survey to pass on to friends and relatives or requested permission to share it with Sansei in their community to stimulate dialogue about the internment. Many thanked me for giving them an opportunity to participate in the research and express views that they had kept inside for years. Inter­ viewees who stated that they had little to say other than the fact that their parents never discussed the internment were surprised to discover many feelings and observations related to their parents' camp experiences. The Sansei Research Project employs a cross-generational frame­ work to examine the transmission of trauma and injustice from the Nisei to the Sansei generation. The impact of parents' traumatic experiences on their children has been well documented by an extensive body of research on the adult children of Holocaust survivors (e.g., Danieli, 1985; Davidson, 1980; Epstein, 1979; Keinan, Mikulincer, & Rybnicki, 1988; Rose & Garske, 1987; Sigal, 1971; Wanderman, 1976). This study explores the presence of similar long-range effects of the internment on the adult children of previously interned Japanese Americans. In contrast, justice literature reveals relatively little work in the area of intergenerational issues. Yet the question of how experiences of injustice from one genera­ tion affect subsequent generations is a crucial one. Conceptualizations of what is viewed as just or fair change historically and culturally over time (Sampson, 1981). By comparing the Sansei and Nisei, we can begin to explore how perceptions and responses to the internment differ across the generational lines. At the broadest level, the Project's cross-generational framework allows us to study a specific historical event-the internment-and its consequences over time. Because the large survey sampie included both Sansei who had a parent interned and those who did not, it was possible to statistically compare these groups on a range of demographic and attitudinal variables and to describe the population characteristics that distinguish the children of former internees. Differences on these vari­ ables between Sansei who had parents interned and those who did not were hypothesized to reflect the cross-generational effects of a parent's incarceration. The Sansei Research Project also studied the cross­ generational impact of the internment at the individual level through the use of in-depth interviews. These interviews yielded rich narrative data Preface xi that detail specific and personal ways in which Sansei perceived the internment to have influenced their lives. Taken together, the survey and interview results presented here illustrate the many levels at which the internment remains a significant force in the lives of the Sansei. It is clearly impossible to capture the viewpoint and experiences of all Sansei, and this book does not purport to do so. What emerges from the present data can perhaps best be seen as a snapshot of a generation, a snapshot that describes how many Sansei experience the internment's effects today. Definitive statements on the cause-effect relationships between a parent's internment and current Sansei characteristics and perceptions are equally impossible. A true experimental design cannot be applied to the internment because Japanese Americans were not randomly as­ signed to "camp" or "no camp" conditions during the war (Kitano, 1986). The numbers of Sansei on the V.S. mainland whose parents were interned far outnumber those whose parents were not, and, as described in Chapter 4, there can be no true "control" group when it comes to evaluating the effects of the internment. There is also a fine line between focusing on the suffering created by the internment and focusing on the strength and resilience with which Japanese Americans have been able to respond to this trauma. Over­ emphasis on suffering runs the risk of portraying the Japanese Ameri­ cans as "damaged" victims, while overemphasis on their coping strengths runs the risk of minimizing the negative aspects of the intern­ ment. I have made an effort to describe the variety of ways, both positive and negative, in which the internment has had a cross-generational impact. By focusing on the effects of the concentration camps, the book does not cover other important Japanese American experiences related to the internment. Although much smaller in numbers, there were, for example, Japanese Americans who moved inland to avoid the incarceration and experienced a unique set of hardships trying to relocate. There were also citizen and alien Japanese Americans who, disillusioned by their incar­ ceration, left the Vnited States to live in Japan. The long-term effects of such circumstances are fascinating in their own right. They deserve extensive research but are beyond the scope of this study. Writing this book has reminded me of my own silence about the internment. Colleagues and friends who read early drafts encouraged me to include personal anecdotes and perspectives, yet I was reluctant to do so. It was much easier to stay with academic information and remain "anonymous." However, in conducting this research I have, xii Preface like the participants in the Project, become aware that my personal story is linked to the stories of thousands of other Japanese Americans. I hope that my perspective as a Sansei whose parents were also in­ terned has helped put into context the origins of this research and its findings.

Organization of the Book

The chapters of this book can be grouped into four general sections. The first seetion, consisting of Chapters 1 and 2, sets the context for understanding the significance of the internment. Chapter 1 discusses the events and conditions surrounding the internment decision. Chapter 2 presents an overview of the judicial, economic, social, and psychologi­ cal impacts of America's concentration camps. Together, these initial chapters provide a sociohistorical context for the book. In the second seetion, the Sansei Research Project is described. Chapter 3 provides the theoretical rationale for adopting a cross-generational paradigm that assesses the impact of the internment, highlighting literature on the children of Holocaust survivors as an example of cross-generational research on traumatic stress. Chapter 4 then presents the specific meth­ odology of the Sansei Research Project. Chapters 5 through 11, which discuss the Project results, make up the third section of the book. Chapter 5 presents descriptive data on actual patterns of communication about the internment. Next, Chapter 6 presents results on the interest and knowledge levels of the Sansei regarding the internment, while Chapter 7 evaluates findings on the Sansei's attitudes toward ethnic preferences, their sense of confidence in this country, and their predicted reactions to a future internment. Chap­ ter 8 describes data on how the internment affected seH and family perceptions, while Chapter 9 presents the Sansei's perceptions of paren­ tal coping and suffering. In Chapter 10, data on Sansei dating and marriage patterns, understanding of the Japanese language, and level of activity in Japanese American organizations are summarized. Chapter 11 is devoted to a discussion of the redress movement, a critical and recent piece in the continuing story of the internment. This chapter includes both a summary of events that led to the redress effort and a presentation of Project results on the Sansei's views on redress. In the last section of the book, Chapter 12 provides an overview of the Project results and evaluates these findings in the context of existing literature on the consequences of injustice and trauma. The final chap­ ter, Chapter 13, raises questions for future research. Preface xiii

A Word about Definitions

One will notice that the term concentration camp has been used to describe the locations where Japanese Americans were interned. How­ ever, there has been considerable controversy regarding this term and its application to the internment. When people hear the words concentra­ tion camp, they envision the horrors experienced by the Jews during World War II. "Concentration camp" is equated with "death camp." America's camps were not death camps, and some individuals caution against lumping the Holocaust and the internment together under a single category. Others, however, deliberately use the term concentration camp to describe America's incarceration of the Japanese Americans. They note that the use of the term relocation camp, favored by the official agencies who oversaw the imprisonment process, was a euphe­ mism that minimized the significance of what took place. Roger Daniels (1986a), a noted scholar of Asian American history, points out that technically the Japanese American camps do fit the definition of con­ centration camps: That is, they were indeed "places to which persons were sent, not for crimes or legal status but because of race or ethnicity" (p. 6). In fact, even President Franklin D. Roosevelt referred to the camps as concentration camps. Confusion also exists as to whether the treatment of Japanese Amer­ icans should be termed relocation, internment, or incarceration. For example, Daniels has noted that the term internment camps is techni­ cally incorrect. "Internment," states Daniels, "is a well-defined legal process by which enemy nationals are placed in confinement in time of war" (Daniels, 1986a, p. 6). He points out that while the noncitizen male immigrant (first-generation, or Issei) Japanese American leaders rounded up after Pearl Harbor were "interned," the vast majority of Japanese Americans were "incarcerated" rather than interned. In discussing the problems with terminology, Daniels wrote: The problem with the ward "relocation" is that it also has been used to describe the process by which some Japanese Americans "voluntarily" moved out of the forbidden zone, and to the process by which, during and just after the war, thousands of Japanese Americans moved out of the camps to new hornes and businesses in the interior of the United States. To further the semantic confusion, it has become common in recent years to speak of the "internment" of Japanese Americans as describing all the procedures affect­ ing aliens and citizens, a practice that has been given official sanction by Congress (Daniels, 1986a, p. 72) The terms concentration camp and internment camp are both used in this book to describe the Japanese American camps, while internment xiv Preface is used to refer to the process of uprooting and incarcerating the ]apanese Americans. The use of the term concentration camp here is not meant to equate the ]apanese American and ]ewish experiences during World War H. Important differences clearly existed between the Nazi death camps and America's concentration camps. There were ]apanese Americans who died in the camps: Some deaths were due to inadequate medical facilities; other deaths were a result of the emotional stresses they encountered; and some were killed by the military guards posted around the camps. However, more ]apanese Americans were born in the camps than died (Daniels, 1986a). The American camps also affected thousands rather than millions of individuals, and their physical conditions were far less harsh than the Nazi camps. Direct comparisons between the Holocaust and the internment run the risk of diminishing the signifi­ cance of the ]apanese American trauma. When compared with the Holocaust, the ]apanese American internment can seem inconsequen­ tiaI. However, while the treatment of the ]apanese Americans was less dramatic than that of the lews, it was far from humane. The legacy of the Holocaust continues to have an impact on survivors and their children, and the internment continues to affect the ]apanese Americans and their children. In both cases, the injustices suffered have implications for all humanity. Acknowledgments

Many people have helped make this book a reality. First, I would like to thank all the Sansei who volunteered to participate in the Project and share their life stories. I would also like to thank Fletcher Blanchard for encouraging me early on to pursue this research. I am grateful to Faye Crosby both for constantly encouraging me and giving me feedback throughout the many stages of the Project and for urging me to write this book. Her guidance and mentoring have been invaluable. This research would not have been possible without the assistance of the Japanese American Citizens League and its members, administrators, and chapter presidents. I also wish to acknowledge Franklin Odo for his efforts in locating interviewees; Jane Okubo for providing names of survey respon­ dents in Hawaii, and the Young Buddhist Association for providing a directory of their organization. Computer and statistical consultations were provided by Steven Trierweiler and Mary Ann Coughlin. Abby Levinson assisted with data entry. I am also grateful to my research assistants at Smith College who carefully transcribed the many interviews recorded for the Project. Thanks to Kathy Bartus for her outstanding clerical assistance in prepar­ ing both the Project survey and the book. I would like to thank Riel Vermunt, Mel Lerner, Faye Crosby, Steven Trierweiler, Vivian Leskas, and an anonymous reviewer for their com­ ments on drafts of this manuscript, and Roger Daniels for reviewing the chapter on historical background and granting permission for the use of his maps. In addition, I wish to express my appreciation to Eliot Werner at Plenum for supporting and facilitating the publication of this book. The majority of work for this book and the Sansei Research Project was conducted at Smith College. The project was funded by the Picker Fellowship of Smith College and by the college's Committee on Faculty Compensation and Development.

xv xvi Acknowledgments

A special thank you to my husband, Steve, who has been a consul­ tant and colleague from the beginning of this work to its very end. He was a constant source of creative ideas, support, and encouragement. Thanks also to my children, Danielle, Marissa, and Aaron, for their patience throughout. Finally, I am thankful to my mother and father, whose own experi­ ences led me to begin this work. It is often hard for me to believe that the internment happened. It is even harder to believe that it happened to them. If this research contributes to illuminating the effects of injustice, it is due in no small part to the inspiration they have given me. Their lives are areminder that on the one hand, freedom is not as secure as it may appear-yet, on the other, even inconceivable disruptions of life can be faced with strength of spirit and love of family. Contents

1. Historical Background...... 1 The Decision to Evacuate ...... 1 The Evacuation Process ...... 6 Dissension and Resistance ...... 13 Resettlement ...... 14

2. The Consequences of Injustice ...... 17 Economic Lass ...... 17 Judicial Significance ...... 20 Japanese American Responses to the Injustice ...... 20 The Response of the Justice Department ...... 22 Social and Psychological Effects on Internees ...... 26 Impact on the Community ...... 27 Impact on the Issei ...... 29 Impact on the Nisei ...... 30

3. Using a Cross-Generational Approach ...... 37 Studying the Cross-Generational Effects of Historical Events ...... 37 The Importance of a Developmental Perspective ...... 40 Studying the Transgenerational Impact of the Internment: Lessons from Research on the Holocaust ...... 42 Methodological Issues in Evaluating the Cross- Generational Effects of Trauma ...... 49

4. The Sansei Research Project: Description and Methodology ...... 53 Focusing on the Sansei Generation...... 53

xvii xviii Contents

The Sansei Research Project Survey ...... 55 Sample ...... 55 Measures ...... 65 Demographics and Background Information ...... 66 Communication Patterns ...... 66 Interest in the Internment ...... 66 Level of Knowledge about the Internment ...... 66 Impact on Attitudes ...... 67 Behavioral Indices...... 67 Perceptions of Coping and Suffering ...... 67 Redress Attitudes ...... 68 The Sansei Research Project Interviews ...... 68 Interview Procedure ...... 69 Rationale for Analyses and Presentation of Findings ...... 69 Some Methodological Notes ...... 71

5. Patterns of Communication 75 Age of First Memory...... 75 Source of Information...... 77 Frequency and Length of Conversations with Parents ..... 80 Style of Communication ...... 85 Barriers to Communication ...... 91 Degree of Comfort Discussing the Internment ...... 93 Reactions to Communication Patterns ...... 95 Assessing the Impact of Communication Level ...... 96 Summary...... 99

6. Interest in and Knowledge of the Internment ...... 103 Interest in the Internment ...... 103 Level of Knowledge and Number of Asian American Courses...... 106 Summary...... 113

7. Ethnic Preference, Confidence in üne's Rights, and the Possibility of a Future Internment ...... 115 Assessing General Attitudes ...... 115 Ethnic Preference ...... 116 Sense of Confidence ...... 125 Resistance to Future Internment ...... 131 Summary...... 134 Contents xix

8. Perceptions of Personal and Family Impact...... 137 Assimilation ...... 137 Achievement ...... 138 Self-EsteemlSelf-Identity ...... 139 Parental Insecurity ...... 140 Health Problems in Parents ...... 141 "What UT' Questions ...... 143 Family Impact Factars ...... 144 Familial Distance ...... 144 Negative Affect ...... 148 Positive Impacts ...... 149 Additional Family Impact Items ...... 151 Summary ...... 151

9. Perceptions of Suffering and Coping ...... 155 Suffering and Coping among Japanese Americans ...... 157 Parental Suffering and Coping ...... 161 Summary ...... 163

10. Impact on Behaviors ...... 167 Dating History ...... 167 Outmarriage and Intermarriage Rates...... 169 Parental Preferences for Marriage ...... 174 Current Socialization Patterns ...... 175 Lass of the Japanese Language and Culture ...... 176 Membership in Japanese American Organizations ...... 179 Education and Career Choices ...... 182 Summary ...... 183

11. Redressing Injustice ...... 185 The Development of the Redress Movement ...... 186 Barriers to Overcome ...... 186 Moving toward Redress ...... 189 Perceptions of Sansei Respondents .. , ...... 193 Summary ...... 203

12. Overview and Implications of Findings ...... 207 Overview ...... 207 Implications for Understanding Traumatic Stress and Injustice ...... 211 xx Contents

Traumatic Stress, Culture, and Ethnicity ...... 211 Implications for the Study of Injustice ...... 214 A Comprehensive Look at the Sansei ...... 216

13. Questions for the Future ...... 219

Appendix A: Sansei Research Project Survey ...... 223

Appendix B: Sansei Research Project Interview Questions 243

Appendix C: Summary of Results by Sansei and Parent Characteristics ...... 245

References ...... 255

Index ...... 267