Background

Japan and America were major rivals before the start of World War 2

Pearl Harbor

• Pearl Harbor was a U.S. Naval Base in Hawaii

• On December 7th 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor

• The attack killed over 2,400 Americans and destroyed 21 ships and 300 planes.

• The next day the U.S. declared war on Japan

U.S. Fears

• Many Americans along with the military feared Japanese Americans might be acting as spies helping Japan attack the U.S.

• However, the FBI did not consider them a threat

Executive Order 9066

Franklin D. Roosevelt signed it in 1942

The order forced Japanese-Americans to move from there homes to internment camps

The camps were military zones , where people lived in prison-like surrondings.

Executive Order 9066

• The Executive Order violated Japanese Americans human and constitutional rights.

• However, the Supreme Court upheld it as law

Japanese-American Internment

• Nearly all Japanese Americans lived on the West Coast

• Ten internment camps were set up in 6 western states

• 120,000 Japanese Americans were forced into the camps

Japanese American

• Families were forced to sell belongings they could not carry to the camp

• Business men and women had to sell their businesses in a matter of days or weeks

The Camps

• Surronded by barbed wire and towers with watch guards

• Families slept on cots and shared bathrooms with other internees

• Guards were ordered to shoot residents who tried to escape

Japanese Americans inside the camps

• Established schools

• Churches

• Newspapers

• Farms

• Sporting activties