Japanese American

Japanese Americans are a group of people who trace their ancestry to Japan or Okinawa and are residents and/or citizens of the United States. Japan is a western Pacific Ocean multi-archipelagic nation east of the China in Asia. Japanese Americans are a subgroup of East-Asian Americans which is further a subgroup of Asian Americans. Okinawa, a former independent nation, was annexed by Japan in the late nineteenth century.

History

The history of Japanese Americans begins in the late nineteenth century when the first Japanese and Okinawan immigrants unload in Honolulu Harbor as indentured laborers of the many sugarcane and pineapple plantations. This event leads to several phases of Japanese American history: anti-alien period of the west coast in the early twentieth century, internment period during World War II, and finally political empowerment period of the late 1960s leading into the present day. Here are some key events for Japanese Americans:

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• 1869, A group of Japanese people arive at Gold Hills, California and build the Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Colony and Okei becomes the first recorded Japanese woman to die and be buried in the US.
• 1890, First wave of Japanese immigrants to provide labor in Hawai'i sugarcane and pineapple plantations, California fruit and produce farms
• 1900s, Japanese begin to lease land and sharecrop
• 1907, Gentlemen's Agreement between United States and Japan that Japan would stop issuing passports for new laborers
• 1908, Japanese picture brides enter the United States
• 1913, California Alien Land Law of 1913 ban Japanese from purchasing land; whites threatened by Japanese success in independent farming ventures
• 1924, United States Immigration Act of 1924 banned immigration from Japan
• 1930s, Issei become economically stable for the first time in California and Hawai'i
• 1941, Japanese attack Honolulu; federal government arrest Japanese community leaders
• 1942, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066 on February 19 uprooting Japanese Americans, except in Hawai'i, to be sent to concentration camps (euphemized by the government as "internment camps")
• 1943, Japanese American soldiers from Hawai'i forming the 100th U.S. Army Battalion arrive in Europe
• 1944, U.S. Army 100th Batallion merges with the all-volunteer Japanese American 442nd Regimental Combat Team
• 1945, 442nd Regimental Combat team awarded 18,143 Medal of Valor decorations and 9,486 Purple Heart decorations becoming the highest decorated military unit in United States history
• 1959, Daniel K. Inouye becomes the first Japanese American in Congress
• 1965, Patsy T. Mink becomes the first woman of color in Congress
• 1971, Norman Y. Mineta elected mayor of San Jose, California; becomes first Asian American mayor of a major US city
• 1974, George R. Ariyoshi becomes the first Japanese American state governor
• 1978, Ellison S. Onizuka becomes the first Asian American astronaut
• 1980, Congress creates Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians to investigate World War II policies over Japanese Americans
• 1983, Commission reports Japanese American internment was not a national security necessity
• 1988, U.S. President Ronald Reagan signs Civil Liberties Act of 1988 apologizing for Japanese American internment and provide reparations of $20,000 to each victim
• 1994, Mazie K. Hirono becomes the first Japanese immigrant elected state lieutenant governor
• 1999, Gen. Eric Shinseki becomes the first Asian American U.S. military chief of staff
• 2000, Norman Y. Mineta becomes the first Asian American appointed to the U.S. Cabinet; worked as Commerce Secretary (2000-2001), Transportation Secretary (2001-2004)

Immigration

People from Japan began migrating to the U.S. in significant numbers following the political, cultural, and social changes stemming from the 1868 Meiji Restoration. Particularly after the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, Japanese immigrants were sought by industrialists to replace the Chinese immigrants. In 1907, the "Gentlemen's Agreement" between the governments of Japan and the U.S. ended immigration of Japanese workers (i.e., men), but permitted the immigration of spouses of Japanese immigrants already in the U.S. The Immigration Act of 1924 banned the immigration of all but a token few Japanese.

Related Topics:
Japan - 1868 - Meiji Restoration - Chinese Exclusion Act - 1882 - 1907 - Gentlemen's Agreement - Immigration Act of 1924

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The ban on immigration produced unusually well-defined generational groups within the Japanese American community. Initially, there was an immigrant generation, the Issei, and their U.S.-born children, the Nisei. The Issei were exclusively those who had immigrated before 1924. Because no new immigrants were permitted, all Japanese Americans born after 1924 were--by definition--born in the U.S. This generation, the Nisei, became a distinct cohort from the Issei generation in terms of age, citizenship, and language ability, in addition to the usual generational differences. Institutional and interpersonal racism led many of the Nisei to marry other Nisei, resulting in a third distinct generation of Japanese Americans, the Sansei. Significant Japanese immigration did not occur until the Immigration Act of 1965 ended 40 years of bans against immigration from Japan and other countries.

Related Topics:
Issei - Nisei - Sansei - Immigration Act of 1965

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The Naturalization Act of 1790 restricted naturalized U.S. citizenship to "free white persons," which excluded the Issei from citizenship. As a result, the Issei were unable to vote, and faced additional restrictions such as the inability to own land under many state laws.

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Japanese Americans were parties in two important Supreme Court decisions, Ozawa v. United States (1922) and Korematsu v. United States (1943). Korematsu is the origin of the "strict scrutiny" standard, which is applied, with great controversy, in government considerations of race since the 1989 Adarand decision.

Related Topics:
Ozawa v. United States - 1922 - Korematsu v. United States - 1943 - Strict scrutiny - 1989 - Adarand

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In recent years, immigration from Japan has been more like that from Western Europe; low and usually marriages between U.S. citizens and Japanese. The number is on average 5 to 10 thousand per year, and is similar to the amount of immigration to the U.S. from Germany. This is in stark contrast to the rest of Asia, where family reunification is the primary impetus for immigration. Japanese Americans also have the oldest demographic structure of any ethnic group in the U.S.; in addition, in the younger generations, due to intermarriage with whites and other Asians, part-Japanese are more common than full Japanese, and it appears as if this physical assimilation will continue at a rapid rate.

Related Topics:
Western Europe - Germany - Assimilation

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Internment

Main article: Japanese American internment

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During World War II, Japanese Americans were interned in special camps. Americans of Japanese ancestry living in the western United States, including the Nisei were, forcibly interned with their parents and children (the Sansei Japanese Americans) during WWII. Despite the treatment, many Japanese Americans served in World War II, mostly as sentries and intelligence agents in the Pacific war.

Related Topics:
World War II - Interned - Interned - Sansei Japanese American

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For the most part, the internees remained in the camps until the end of the war, when they left the camps to rebuild their lives in the West Coast. Several Japanese Americans have started cases against the U.S. government against their internment, which dragged on for decades.

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Farming

Japanese Americans have made significant contributions to the agriculture in the western United States, particularly in California and Hawaii. Nineteenth century Japanese immigrants introduced sophisticated irrigation methods that enabled cultivation of fruits, vegetables, and flowers on previously marginal lands. While the immigrants prospered in the early 20th century, many lost their farms during the internment, although Japanese Americans remain involved in these industries today, particularly in southern California.

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Detainees irrigated and cultivated lands nearby the World War II internment camps, which were located in desolate spots such as Poston, in the Arizona desert, and Tule Lake, California, at a dry mountain lake bed. These farm lands remain productive today.

Related Topics:
Poston - Tule Lake, California

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