of the camp. They refused to go. Organized under the name of the Fair Play Committee, the boys stated that they were willing to go and fight for their country, but not until that country restored their rights as citizens and released their families from camp. This was the largest organized draft resistance in history, leading to the largest trial for draft resistance. The men were charged as criminals, and were sent to prison for two to three years. They were seen as traitors to other Japanese Americans. After the Japanese were released from the camps, many were drafted immediately (this was the case of my grandfather, who had been too young prior to his release). Men that weren’t drafted, women, children, and the elderly returned to their lives as before the war, only with nothing left. They had been persecuted for their heritage. Their belongings were gone; their homes, their land, their farms, their lives, were no longer as they had once been. Many of these people now had nothing, and the government wasn’t about to return it to them. That is, until almost 50 years later.46 years after the signing of Executive Order 9066, the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, “Restitution for World War II Internment of Japanese Americans and Aleuts” was passed. This provided for acknowledgement of and apologies for wrongdoing and restitution for injustices suffered, hardships endured, personal and community property taken or destroyed by U.S, and for the discouragement of similar injustices in the future. Each surviving internee was given $20,000 and an apology from the government. But does that fix things?The rights of these people had been diminished – the Japanese were no longer people in this country. They were treated like animals, herded along at gunpoint, made to stay in stalls inside large buildings, no privacy, no belongings, and no freedom. They were cattle. And the sad thing is, nobody knows. In s...
