Occasional reader of this blog Arthur D. Jacobs (Ret. USAF) made me aware of a bill that is slowly working its way through Congress. S.621 would establish commissions to review the facts and circumstances surrounding injustices suffered by European Americans, European Latin Americans and Jewish refugees during World War II.
The internment of over 100,000 Japanese-Americans in detention camps has been studied and recognized by congress as a grave injustice. Less well-known is the fact that 10,000 German-Americans – most of them US citizens – were arrested as "enemy aliens" and transported to secret prison camps across the United States. Families were separated, lives were ruined; there was little or no evidence that any of these detainees posed any threat to the security of the US.
Arthur Jacobs was just a young boy when his family was arrested in 1941 ; they were forced to leave their home in Brooklyn for an internment camp in Crystal City, Texas. There Arthur and his parents were forced to live, cut off from their relatives and friends, through the war. After the war, the Jacobs family was forcibly "repatriated" to Germany, and young Arthur wound up briefly in a prison in Asperg together with Nazi war criminals.
Arthur never forgot the injustice his family and thousands of other families experienced in wartime America, even as he rose to the rank of Major in the US Air Force. The Civil Rights Act of 1988 provided (belated) compensation to Japanese-Americans who had been unlawfully incarcerated; European-Americans were excluded. Arthur Jacobs filed a suit on behalf of German-Americans and other Americans of European descent who were incarcerated; the case made it all the way the Supreme Court in 1991 (Arthur D. Jacobs v. William Barr et al #91-2061). The High Court ruled against Jacobs, but he has not given up. Senator Russ Feingold (D-Wisconsin) is the sponsor of S. 621, which reads in part:
(1) During World War II, the United States Government deemed as `enemy aliens’ more than 600,000 Italian-born and 300,000 German-born United States resident aliens and their families and required them to carry Certificates of Identification and limited their travel and personal property rights. At that time, these groups were the 2 largest foreign-born groups in the United States.
(2) During World War II, the United States Government arrested, interned, or otherwise detained thousands of European Americans, some remaining in custody for years after cessation of World War II hostilities, and repatriated, exchanged, or deported European Americans, including American-born children, to European Axis nations, many to be exchanged for Americans held in those nations.
(3) Pursuant to a policy coordinated by the United States with Latin American nations, many European Latin Americans, including German and Austrian Jews, were arrested, brought to the United States, and interned. Many were later expatriated, repatriated, or deported to European Axis nations during World War II, many to be exchanged for Americans and Latin Americans held in those nations.
(4) Millions of European Americans served in the armed forces and thousands sacrificed their lives in defense of the United States.
(5) The wartime policies of the United States Government were devastating to the Italian American and German American communities, individuals, and their families. The detrimental effects are still being experienced.
(6) Prior to and during World War II, the United States restricted the entry of Jewish refugees who were fleeing persecution or genocide and sought safety in the United States. During the 1930’s and 1940’s, the quota system, immigration regulations, visa requirements, and the time required to process visa applications affected the number of Jewish refugees, particularly those from Germany and Austria, who could gain admittance to the United States.
(7) The United States Government should conduct an independent review to fully assess and acknowledge these actions. Congress has previously reviewed the United States Government’s wartime treatment of Japanese Americans through the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians. An independent review of the treatment of German Americans and Italian Americans and of Jewish refugees fleeing persecution and genocide has not yet been undertaken.
(8) Time is of the essence for the establishment of commissions, because of the increasing danger of destruction and loss of relevant documents, the advanced age of potential witnesses and, most importantly, the advanced age of those affected by the United States Government’s policies. Many who suffered have already passed away and will never know of this effort.
You can read about Arthur D. Jacobs and other German-American stories of incarceration at his Home Page (and contact him as well)
Could something like this happen again? In 2004 the right-wing media darling Michelle Malkin published a book – In Defense of Internment: The Case for Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror – where she celebrated the incarceration of Japanese-Americans and seemed to be calling for the detention of Muslim-Americans. The book received rave reviews on Fox News and made an appearance on the New York Times bestseller list, even though the book was riddled with errors and distortions. The success of this book, and the star status of Malkin, is a cautionary tale. So, yes, it could easily happen again.
