Hearings and Reports on the Evacuation Claims Bills

              We  feel that  one way in which we   can justify our volunteering and
service to this   country is to make   clear  to  all the peoples  of the world
that we believe  in the American way.    And we know  that   America  in the
long  run will play square with us.
Gentlemen,   I realize  there  is   a question and a very real question;
what about  the  sacrifices  of the   soldier,   and other groups?    May  I say
that American soldiers  of Japanese ancestry in the majority volunteered,
they were   not drafted,   for military  service.     Not only that,   a great many
of us  came  out  of barbed wire  encampments which were,   in spite  of what
the 11RA and Government  say, worse  than the  concentration camps we erected
for  the  Germans   in Italy and Germany,   and  in France,
I  say  it  takes a  real Araerican to see beyond these barbed wire
fences,   to see beyond  the  military police,  to see  the  future  of the
American people.
I  grant  there were  gold miners,   air-plane  makers,  and othe rs who
suffered seriously  and  directly as  a. result of war-time action.    But we
point  out,  even as Mr.  Engle   conceded;   first,  that the   action levied
against Americans  of Japanese  ancestry and  their   residential  alien parents
was  an unprecedented  act  levied  solely because  of race .
The  Supreme  Court of  the United States  called it an  "affinity" with
the enemy.    The  same Supreme  Court,  although condoning evacuation,  says
it goes  to the very brink of  constitutional  law.     It has  a melancholy
resemblance  to what happened in Europe   and with Hitler.
I would  like to   say,  gentlemen,   the  Japanese American suffered
losses   as  did no  other people.    No other  people were  called upon to suffer
bankruptcy as well as to  go to jail,  as   it were,  to help the war effort.
As pointed out by Dr.  Bloom,   others  perhaps were  incapacitated because
of war  and war-time  regulations,  but they  could go  out  and seek other
jobs,  sometimes more   lucrative than those  they gave up.
With the  Japanese Americans,   they were  asked  to go to war-time
relocation centers and there  to  live  out their  lives  for three  or  four
years.     There is  a distinct difference   there.
Many evacuees  had their health ruined for   life,  since they were
moved without  adequate preparations  from the   climate of the  coast to that
of the  desert.    And  those evacuated were  not just menfolk;  women and
children,   the  old  and the  young,  the weak and   the   sick were all moved
out.
I would   like  to  say frankly that   I  feel  that any individual,  any
group,  racial,  economic,  or  any person that has  suffered  loss  as  a result
of the war should have an opportunity to  present their case to   Congress  and
to have  Congress  adjudicate  them;  but,   I  do not believe that we  ought
to join the various  kinds  of  losses  suffered together,     I believe  that
Congress  should  have an  opportunity to  scrutinize  each on its  individual
merits  and upon  its  findings  to decide what  ought to be  done.
Finally,   I would  like   to just  talk a bit  on what Mr. Walter suggested
in a question this morning.     The  evacuation and wartime  treatment of
American citizens  of Japanese ancestry and  resident parents was  the
biggest source for enemy propaganda during the World War  just finished.
The  Germans used it and particularly the  Japanese.     Yet the   Japanese
Americans  in this country declared  to the  Japanese militarists that this
was  not a race war and they proved it by fighting  Japan.     This was just
an act of  wartime  hysteria and  perhaps  a wartime mistake.     The United
States  Government,   and particularly  our  counter-intelligence workers
used that  argument,  and  they pointed to  our  exemplary conduct and behavior
as  an indication that we were  still Americans  in spirit and  action;  that
this was  an act of discrimination.    May we  say now the people  throughout
the world,  particularly  in Asia, more   specifically in Japan,  are   looking
61.