'Relocation' Of Japanese In WW II Is Flaw Of People, Not Constitution
'Relocation' of Japanese in WWII is flaw of people, not Constitution
By YUZURU J. TAKESHITA
As we American celebrate the bicentennial of our Constitution, I would like to share with my fellow citizens my thoughts on what that document means to me. Some 40-odd years ago (1942 to 1946), I was a victim of our cherished system gone awry. Because of my ancestry, my constitutional rights as an American citizen (I was born in California) were suspended when war broke out with Japan, where my parents had come from. Those of us of Japanese extractions, citizens and non-citizens alike, were herded off into concentration camps, forcibly removed from our homes on the west coast.
We were incarcerated behind barbed wire fences and treated like “prisoners of war” in our own country, placed there without the benefit or our constitutionally guaranteed “due process of law.” Further, it was an act of blatant racism as only those of us of Japanese ancestry, and not those of German or Italian ancestry, were singled out for this treatment in spite of the fact that not only Japan but Germany and Italy also were at war with the United States at that time.
We had taken civic lessons in public school seriously, proudly committed to memory the Preamble and the Bill of Rights, and believed that we were fighting totalitarianism to protect these rights we considered “unalienable.” President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066 that authorized our being shipped off to concentration camps - that such a thing was happening to us in America, to American citizens - was a terrible shock.
We were confused and bitter as we felt we were betrayed by the very system that we strongly believed in. The Constitution suddenly turned into a meaningless document, a mere scrap of paper, for those of us placed behind barbed wire fences and guarded by soldiers carrying machine guns. The authorities wanted us to believe that they were protecting us from possible attacks from the outside, but many of us remember how those guns were always pointed at us.
Four years of such an outrage could easily have turned me into a life-long cynic about the Constitution and the American system, but for a remarkable high school teacher I had in the camp. Her name is Margaret Gunderson, now 84 and living quietly in Fresno, Calif. I had a reunion with her in early August, for the first time in 41 years, and we remembered together those dark days in camp. She and her husband had given up their regular teaching jobs to join us in camp in protest of what the government was doing to us.
In her American history class, she reminded us that the Constitution was a unique document in the history of civilization and was set up by our founding fathers as a blueprint for a democratic society whose government must be, as Lincoln emphasized, “of the people, for the people, and by the people.” As such, each citizen, no matter what the circumstance, must work towards its realization, protecting its basic tenets, and fighting against any encroachment, not only from external sources but also from within our own borders. The failure of our system represented in our incarceration, she argued, was not the failure of the principles enunciated in our Constitution, but the failure of government, and by extension, of the people, given our form of government. In those darkest hours of our lives, Mrs. Gunderson lifted us out of the abyss of disillusionment and despair, and presented us a challenge and a goal worth striving for as American citizens.
I just returned from a sabbatical year in Japan where I had an opportunity to reflect on the differences between America and Japan. With all our faults, America, I believe, is guided by a set of ideals, lacking by contrast in Japan. Interestingly, this is symbolized in what appears on our currency. One is a picture of an incomplete pyramid on our dollar bill and the other, a motto on our coins, “E Pluribus Unum.” The apex of the pyramid on the dollar bill is “an eye.” I like to interpret this picture to mean that our system is based on the solid foundation of our Constitution, and as a people we continue to strive, or aspire, for the ideal society that the full implementation of the various provisions of our Constitution implies.
This is precisely what my dear teacher instilled in us as high school students behind barbed wire fences during World War II. The motto on our coins, on the other hand, reminds us that we are a society of many different peoples, unlike Japan, and that our goal is to strive for unity among diversity.
In Japan, it may be the homogeneity of her people and culture that sustains unity. In America unity is sustained by our belief in the provisions of our Constitution and our commitment to uphold for all peoples those provisions, the Bill of Rights in particular. An American is not defined by any common set of racial characteristics. An American is defined by his/her commitment to a certain set of principles, those found in our Constitution.
Congress this week votes on a bill that admits the wrong done to Americans of Japanese ancestry some 40-odd years ago. Monetary compensation, in my view, is not the basic issue. The important issue is the capacity of our system to admit, however belatedly, a wrong inconsistent with our Constitution.
Some say: Why now, after so many years? In response to a similar question, Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the Holocaust, said: “When an event is unspeakable, it takes some time to learn the right words.” It took me more than 30 years before I could talk about my camp experience in public. I strongly believe in the Constitution, and it is for that reason that I feel we must acknowledge our failures even as we celebrate our triumphs. It is the duty of every one of us to protect the rights of every citizen as guaranteed in our Constitution. If a wrong was committed by an earlier generation, it is still our responsibility to recognize that wrong and make amends so that new wrongs are not committed. On my way back from Japan, I took my family to visit the place in northern California where I was incarcerated and where, ironically, I was inspired, under the tutelage of a fine teacher, by the idealism embodied in our Constitution. There stands a monument with the following inscriptions, appropriate on this day to remind us how easy it is to fail in our efforts to build “a more perfect union” but, above all, to help each of us in renewing our dedication to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and to our posterity,” as our founding fathers sought 200 years ago:
“Tule Lake was one of ten American concentration camps established during World War n to incarcerate 110,000 persons of Japanese ancestry, of whom the majority were American citizens, behind barbed wire and guard towers without charge, trial or establishment of guilt. These camps are reminders of how racism, economic and political exploitation, and experience can undermine the constitutional guarantees of United States citizens and aliens alike. May the injustices and humiliation suffered here never recur.”
Yuzuru j. Takeshita is professor of health behavior and health education in the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan.
THE CONSTITUTION
20th Century Reflections
'. . each citizen, no matter what the circumstance, must work towards (the) realization (of the Constitution), protecting its basic tenets, and fighting against any encroachment, not only from external sources but also from within our own borders.'