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At the time Japan bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, some 125,000 persons of Japanese birth (called Issei) or descent (Nisei) were living in the United States. The Nisei, as people bom on American soil, were U.S. citizens, and many of the Issei had obtained citizenship. Certainly the vast majority of them considered themselves Americans, with all the loyalties that this implied; but in a wave of hysteria that followed the outbreak of World War 11, they lost many of their civil liberties.

On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945; President 1933-1945) signed Executive Order 9066, which led to the internment of thousands of Japanese in camps throughout the United States. Executive Order 9066 did not explicitly provide for such internment, nor did it even mention the Japanese Americans as such; rather, it "authorize[d] the Secretary of War, and the Military Commanders whom he may...