Question

Discuss the Chinese Exclusion Act and the internment of Japanese Americans.

Answer 1

America was not very friendly to foreigners, especially eastern ones, in the last 19th and early 20th century. How do you know this? Just look at these acts:

• Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 (Basically banned Chinese laborer immigrants.)
• Gentlemen's Agreement of 1907 (Specifically, prevented Japanese immigration)
• Immigration Act of 1917 (Added specific Asian groups to be banned from immigration)
• Immigration Act of 1924 (Outright banned Asians and Arabs.)

All of these can be characterized as the Yellow Peril.

So what does this mean?

Well, it means that people are used to treating Asians poorly, but it also means that the treatment of Asians, specifically Japanese and Japanese-Americans, were more easily justified, especially in light of the Pearl Harbor bombings and war-time atmosphere. We can see that this is especially apparent with the fact that the internment order came less than 3 months after the Pearl Harbor bombings.

Thus, Executive Order 9066, the order that allowed for the internment of Japanese was executed since their was already a sense of fear against Asian foreigners, a fear that was shot to an all time high since they were now our enemies and "living among us".