JF Ptak Science Books Post 1779
On Evacuees, Excludees, and "Segregees": Closing an Ugly Chapter in U.S. History--the Japanese Internment Camps, 1942-1945
As of April 30, 1945, the U.S. government allocated a total of $39 million to relocate 120,000 or so Japanese "evacuees" from "evacuation centers" back to their "normal homes". That comes to about $275.00 per person: but that is mostly allocated to payment for personnel, because, really, all that was happening was that these people were being sent back home somewhere, or if their homes/farms had been undersold from under them, to somewhere not-their-home. Of course the figure is slightly inflated, because of all of those Japanese interred during this time nearly 10% of them volunteered to fight in the U.S. Armed Forces, so for those who survived after serving in some of America's most highly-decorated units of all time, Uncle Sam was paying the bill to send those young men home. But offsetting the Americans of Japanese decent who fought in the war were about another 10,000 babies born in the "segregation centers", so the numbers stay fairly-well the same. (I cannot offhand find any numbers on the numbers of people who died in the camps, or for that matter what happened to their remains after the camps (and camp cemeteries) were closed. I do not know if that was a government expense--to move the coffin and pay for reburial--or if that expense became a private affair.)
Dillon Myer, who was the director of the War Relocation Authority, testified in Congress on 30 April 1945 that it was time for the "relocation centers" to be closed, and for the "evacuees" to go home. And to go home on schedule.
"Not later than 15 months, after revocation of the general exclusion orders, all evacuee property services to persons other than excludees (including segregees) will terminate, and all evacuee property warehouses not utilized for the property of such persons will be emptied..."
I expect that few of the American Japanese wanted to linger.
Dillon went on to say that his duties--and that of the WRA--were maligned (by "a few people") and that the function of the organization was successful:
"We found that there were a few people who started out to try to prove to the public during 1942 that we had a misconception of our duties, and tried to get the American public to believe that the Japanese evacuees were in internment camps, and that if they were allowed to leave the centers they might be dangerous. I think it has been proven that such has not been the case."
It is certainly compelling to write some bitter things about Dillon and the WRA, to term the centers "concentrations camps" and so on, but given the time and the overwhelming influence of the war and the executive branch, that there was little that could be done to prevent such a thing from happening once the idea had been formulated. It was definitely a product of its time, and it would be difficult to remove it from that context and judge the whole thing from our perspective almost 70 years in the future. I am not saying that the event was necessary, only that it happened, and that it unfolded badly, and that the man in charge of it all--Myer--was not equipped to serve as the overseer of the entire process. The man had a background in agriculture who had risen to mid-manager federal agricultural management bits when he was tapped for this assignment. He was not prepared, never got up to speed, and was absolutely not the right man for the job. IT was also a position that he never grew into, and he never rose above a dim mediocracy.
And in the thick of it all, trying to figure out how to close the relocation centers and send their people home, Mr. Myer really didn't have a solid idea of how many people were there, waiting. Evidently, there were some 20,000 people who were "not eligible" for relocation. Here's a part of the rather Catch-22ian exchange:
Mr. Myer. There were, as of April 21, 72,755 in all the centers, including Tule Lake.
Mr. Wigglesworth. I thought you said there were 53,000.
Mr. Myer. There are 20,000 that we estimate will not be eligible for relocation, and if you subtract the 20,000 from the 72,755 it will leave you around 53,000.
Mr. Taber. You have some who will not be eligible for relocation scattered at other places?
Mr. Myer. That is right. There will be about 20,000 as near as we can estimate, in that category.
Mr. Taber. I would like you to set out in the record how many you have and where they are.
Mr. Myer. Mr. Taber, I cannot give you the exact number. That is only an estimate based upon what we think will be the Army action; they make a determination as to the number of people and that estimate is changing every day.
Mr. Taber. I see.
Mr. Myer. We do not make that determination, and we simply have had to make that an estimate.
Mr. Taber. The 72,755 is an estimate?
Mr. Myer. No; the 72,755 is an accurate figure.
Mr. Taber. I thought you said it was an estimate.
Mr. Myer. No; that is not an estimate.
The figure at the beginning of the testimony was between 110,000 and 120,000.
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