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AP World - General News |
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Sun May 12, 2:27 AM ET By MICHELLE LOCKE, Associated Press Writer SAN FRANCISCO - Ken Yoshida was 19 years old when he was ordered to go to war by the government that had herded him to an internment camp. He refused and was sent to prison where he was branded a traitor by the powerful Japanese American Citizens League and ostracized by his community.
"What we're saying is we shouldn't be condemning or trashing people who took a stand for our community's civil rights," said Andy Noguchi, co-chairman of the Recognition and Reconciliation Ceremony. "These were a group of 300 young men who stood up for the community's civil rights." Fifty-eight years after the fact, those are words Yoshida needed to hear. "I want to be recognized — what I went through. Why we resisted the draft. All that," he said. Yoshida was among nearly two dozen men who were honored at the 2 1/2 hour ceremony held in Japantown here. About 300 people looked on as the resisters — white-haired and frail — stood to be recognized for their stand. Several in the audience wiped away tears as one of the leaders in the draft resistance, Frank Emi, was greeted by a standing ovation. That the ceremony comes at a time when a new group of immigrants has felt the sting of suspicion in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks is not lost on organizers. "The same type of threats and prejudice that Japanese-Americans faced back in the 1940s is something that Arab-Americans and Muslim Americans are facing today and that's why it's important to recognize those who stand up for their rights ... and back them up," Noguchi said. Sixty years ago, it was panic over the attack on Pearl Harbor that triggered the order to round up 120,000 Japanese-Americans and send them to internment camps on grounds they threatened the West Coast. However, in Hawaii, where Japanese-Americans were crucial to the work force, there was no large-scale roundup even though it was much closer to Japan. Some Japanese-Americans fought relocation and other restrictions forced on them. Later, when internees were asked if they would serve in the Army and forswear loyalty to the Japanese emperor, some answered "No" to both, earning the nickname "No-no boys." The draft question came in 1944. JACL leaders endorsed the idea in hopes of showing the rest of the country that Japanese-Americans were loyal. Many joined, fighting bravely. The combined units of the Japanese-American 100th Infantry Battalion and 442nd Regimental Combat Team were among the bravest in U.S. military history, receiving more than 18,000 honors. But a few, like Yoshida, said it was unconstitutional for the United States to strip them of their rights and then draft them. Most were imprisoned. JACL leaders called them "cowards, traitors and subversives." The veterans came home heroes. The resisters came home to a wall of silence. Old resentments die hard. Saturday's ceremony was bitterly opposed by some veterans' groups. "There should be no apology," says Loren Ishii, commander of Sacramento Nisei VFW Post 8985. Eric Muller, who researched the history of the resisters for his recent book "Free to Die for Their Country," thinks the JACL does have something to apologize for. His research showed its leaders worked with the government to jail the resisters. But he says it's a mistake to label veterans or resisters as heroes. "The reality is, as always, somewhere in between. Not every veteran who was drafted out of the camps marched off into the military brimming with patriotism and not every person who resisted the draft did so purely on civil rights grounds." Both sides, he said, have something in common. "They were all victimized by the same horrific government, race-based wrongdoing." ___ On the Net:
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