Chapter 35

America joins the war!1941-1945

America enters the war

►Our strategy was set forth in the ABC-1 agreement with the British Get Germany first Sustained air campaign against

Germany, land troops in N. Africa and enter Europe through the South►Soft underbelly

send just enough troops to the Pacific to prevent Japan from gaining any more territory

The task at hand

►America had to Win the war in Europe Win the war in the Pacific Feed, clothe, and arm itself

►By the end of 1942 we were making more weapons than the Axis powers combined!!!!

Transport its forces all over the world Send huge amounts of food and munitions

to allied countries all over the world

Mobilization

►Convince the country to sacrifice Propaganda and rhetoric

► From 1939 to 1945 our GDP rose from $91 billion to $166 billion.

►War Production Board (January 1942) Under direction of former Sears’ president Allocated scarce materials, limited or stopped

production of certain goods, dealt with government contracts ►Ended civilian car and truck manufacturing during the

war

War economy

►Office of War Mobilization (May 1943) Created to control all aspects of the

economy- took over WPB Headed by former Supreme Court Justice

James F. Byrnes By the end of 1943 33% of our businesses

were focused on manufacturing goods for the war.

War economy►Office of Price Administration (1942)

Created to regulate prices and wages also dealt with rationing Started to control inflation Angered labor unions

►Coal strikes threatened war production

►Smith-Connelly Act (June 1943) Allowed the government to seize and

control vital industries if there was a strike It was illegal to strike against a

government owned industry

Financing the War

►Taxes accounted for about 41% of the $ for the war

►The rest was borrowed from the treasury or made up with bonds sales Bond sales brought in about $186 billion Debt went from $43 billion in 1940 to

$259 billion in 1945

Four Freedoms Speech by FDR

► Delivered January 1942

► In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression -- everywhere in the world.

► The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world.

► The third is freedom from want -- which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the world.

► The fourth is freedom from fear -- which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor-- anywhere in the world.

► From Congressional Record, 1941, Vol. 87, Pt. I. ► http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/fdrthefourfreedoms.htm

Four Freedoms by Norman Rockwell

The shock of war

►Americans were united behind the war effort due to the shocking blow delivered to the nation at Pearl Harbor.

►Anti-Japanese sentiment boiled over during WWII with the internment of thousands of Japanese Americans.

The Shock of War- Internment

►On February 19, 1942, Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which set the removal program in motion. A violation of the basic constitutional rights of

nearly 120,000 Japanese Americans and resident aliens came quickly.

Constitutional Rights taken away

►Fourth Amendment, 1791: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects…

►Fourteenth Amendment, 1868: " No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Executive Order 9066

►The Executive Order 9066 authorized the military to exclude any person from any area of the country where national security was considered threatened. It gave the military broad authority over the civilian population without the imposition of martial law. Although the order did not mention any specific group or recommend detention, its language implied that any citizen might be removed. In practice, the order was applied only to Japanese Americans.

Removal of Japanese

Japanese Internment

►By the end of 1942, more than 120,000 men, women, and children of Japanese ancestry had been uprooted from their homes.

►Their final destinations would be one of 10 camps — "instant cities" — constructed by the War Relocation Authority in seven states.

►Deeply isolated from the rest of America, these "evacuees" — 65 percent of whom were American citizens — would spend up to four years imprisoned, working to rebuild their lives.

Location of Camps

Internment Camps

► "As a member of President Roosevelt's administration, I saw the United States Army give way to mass hysteria over the Japanese...Crowded into cars like cattle, these hapless people were hurried away to hastily constructed and thoroughly inadequate concentration camps, with soldiers with nervous muskets on guard, in the great American desert. We gave the fancy name of 'relocation centers' to these dust bowls, but they were concentration camps nonetheless."—Harold Ickes, Secretary of the Interior, Washington Evening Star, September 23, 1946

Conditions of the Camps

► Individuals arriving at a camp were shocked to find that they would live behind barbed-wire fences, watched over by armed military police in guard towers.

Conditions at the camps

Conditions at the camps

►"The sound of the camp gates closing behind us sent a searing pain into my heart. I knew it would leave a scar that would stay with me forever. At that very moment my precious freedom was taken from me." — Mary Tsukamoto, We the People

Treatment of the interned

►During the initial evacuation period families were separated, often by gender

Treatment of the interned

► "We lined up for mail, for checks, for meals, for showers, for laundry tubs, for toilets, for clinic service, for movies. We lined up for everything."—Mine Okubo, Citizen 13660

► "We had to live under the constant pressure that the food might all stop one day, and it gave me very uneasy and uncomfortable feelings to see the guards watching us from the tower. We were fenced in. I couldn't take my eyes off my children for even a moment so that they would not go outside the fence. The guards were to shoot anyone that did." — Internee

Treatment of the interned

► "The diet of rice, macaroni, and potato was hardly a suitable diet for... anyone." —Akiyo Deloyd, The Japanese American Family Album

"We were fed things we weren't accustomed to. Beef brains, tongue, kidneys and liver were the mainstay of the kitchens. We had very few Japanese staples." —George Sakamoto, The Japanese American Family Album

Treatment of the interned

Is this home?

►"There was a lack of privacy everywhere. The incomplete partitions in the [latrine] stalls and the barracks made a single symphony of yours and your neighbors' loves, hates, and joys. One had to get used to snores, baby-crying, family troubles... The sewage system was poor, [and] the stench from the stagnant sewage was terrible." —Mine Okubo, Citizen 13660

Is this home?

Working conditions

Working conditions

►The pay was low, ranging from $12 for a month of 48-hour weeks as an agricultural worker to $19 a month for physicians, dentists, and other professionals.

Community Life

Loyalty to America ?

►In 1943, every resident in the internment camps was required to complete one of two questionnaires misleadingly entitled "Application for Leave Clearance" to distinguish whether they were "loyal" or "disloyal". After Pearl Harbor, all citizens of Japanese ancestry had been classified 4-C: "enemy aliens."

The Questionnaire

►On both forms, Question 27 asked if an individual would be willing to serve as a combat soldier, nurse, or in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps.

►military service would mean leaving parents and family behind in the harsh conditions of the camps

► Japanese men had also been told they would serve in a segregated combat unit, a prospect many found distasteful

► Finally, when the draft came to camp, many believed they should resist the draft as long as their constitutional rights were being violated.

Loyalty

►"What kind of Americanism do you call that? That's not democracy. That's not the American way, taking everything away from people... Where are the Germans? Where are the Italians? Do they ask them questions about loyalty?" —Morris E. Opler, Manzanar Community Analysis Report, 1943

Loyalty

►Japanese internees who proclaimed themselves loyal began the long road back to a normal life through the work-release program or military service. 25,000 men signed up for military service

►People who responded no were sent to Tule Lake, California.

Service to America

►Their combat record aided the post-war acceptance of Japanese Americans in American society and helped many people to recognize the injustice of wartime internment.

Life after internment

►Supreme Court ruled in Dec 1944 that it was unconstitutional to hold loyal citizens without charging them with a crime.

►Early 1945-December 1945 internment camps are closed

►Each individual received a $25 payment and transportation tickets at the time of release.

►1988 the government issues the first formal apology