Japanese Resistance

in America’s

Concentration Camps:

A Re-euulzcution

Gary Y. Okihiro

The literature dealing with Japanese resistance in the concentration camps, not unlike the literature on American slavery and European colonialism in Africa, reflect the a priori assumptions of the writers. Resistance phenomena were filtered through “liberal-humanitarian” eyes in an almost reflex reaction to the accusations of enemy elements among the Japanese in America and specificially among the internees. Thus, with slight variations, the Japanese prisoners were depicted as downtrodden victims of a racist America gone hysterical, as hopelessly impotent and retiring yet ultimately rising up from the dust of defeat to patriotic triumph when given the opportunity to prove their basic loyalty.

Accordingly, writers have tended to minimize the importance of Japanese resistance to white control, to treat instances of revolt as sporadic and uncharacteristic, and to resort to either the pressure- release theory or the “pro-Fascist’’ trouble-making minority to explain the anomalous (in their view] instances of open resistance. The pressure-release theory of resistance, with its modifications, is based upon the notion of frustration-aggression, where an individual or group subjected to pressure regains hislits former state of equilibrium through a release of the accumulated tension. In this way resistance is seen as inevitable due to the pressures exerted on the Japanese internees, as part of the camps’ frustration syndrome and as constructive to the community as a

GARY Y. OKIHIRO 21

whole by regaining its stability through the act of tension release. Thus, the WRA could report in their WRA A Story of Human Conservation’ of the Poston “incident” of 1942. “On the whole the incident probably provided a healthy release for pent-up emotions and qualified observers are generally agreed that Post on emerged as a stronger and more stable community after it was over.’’ In addition to this notion of healthy release, the pressure-release theory assumes initial equilibrium and a period of relative peace during which time pressure accumulates until a catalytic event occurs precipitating a chain of resistance phenomena.

The “pro-Fascist” troublemaking minority explanation reflected the wider wartime American milieu in which people were seen either as “pro-American’’ or “pro-Fascist.’’ This theory for resistance and its variations focussed upon personalities as the cause for spreading discontent and engaging in resistance activities rather than on social forces. Further, this perspective viewed the artificially contrived communities in terms of what they identified as the generational and educational cleavages between Issei, Nisei and Kibei. Writings of this nature tend to extol Nisei patriotism and cooperation, depict the Issei as “exhibiting the pat ient stoicism and silent resignation characteristic of their philosophy” and identify the Kibei with the major portion of the “malcontents” and “incorrigibles” within the camp population.2 In this way, a major portion of the interned Japanese was exonerated from “anti-Americanism’’ and the resisters were seen as a minority response, sporadic and therefore unimportant.

Within the last decade, the historiography of colonialism in Africa and slavery in America has witnessed the appearance of revisionist histories which emphasize the continuity of African and slave societies, their resiliency and vitality despite European colonialism and white overrule. Behind these histories of slave revolts and African resistance lie the basic notions that societies tend to resist externally imposed change of their institutions, that these acts of resistance are continuous and that they are e f fe~t ive .~ Nothing has been written on Japanese resistance in the camps from this point of view. One recent historian of the Japanese concentration camps detected this notable neglect and lamented that

Almost no attention or interpretation has been given the implications of such significant relocation camp phenomena as the persistence of the anti-WRA rumors, jokes about the WRA or appointed personnel, factional and bitter conflict among the evacuees themselves, and probably most important - t he extraordinary degree of nonparticipation in the WRA programs.‘

Yet even this perceptive observation was blurred by the comment: “The absence of open revolt, however, should not be interpreted

22 AMERASIA JOURNAL

as evidence of Japanese adjustment, but rather as the product of the powerlessness and dependency imposed by the conditions of concentration camp life.”s

This paper proposes that the assumptions of the revisionist histories of slave and colonized groups provide a more realistic basis for an analysis of Japanese reaction to concentration camp authority than do the older notions of Japanese “loyalty” and helplessness. It will offer two models of resistance drawn from Poston and Manzanar, attempt to place these into a larger framework of historical progression and suggest possible directions for future resistance studies.6

The Poston strike and the Manzanar riot of 1942 have traditionally been set in opposition to each other to illustrate the variable nature of resistance and the different results obtained by contrasting administrative handling of the crises. Generally the Poston strike has been typified as a more “responsible” protest, orderly and dealt with administrative restraint, while the Manzanar riot, as the appellation suggests, has been seen as an “irresponsible” protest responded to wi th adminis t ra t ive intransigence and resulting in mob action and violence. WRA accounts7 of these “incidents” provide adequate glimpses into what transpired from the administration’s point of view. These descriptions furnish us with two distinguishable types of resistance.8

Following the beating of a Kibei bachelor in Poston Unit I on November 14, 1942,B about fifty suspects were rounded up and questioned by the security police. Two of these were detained for further questioning for several days pending the arrival of the FBI. Meanwhile the family and associates of these two Kibei sought to organize opposition to the administration’s detention of the men. On two successive days, the 17th and lath, delegations from blocks representing the two men met with administration officials protesting the men’s innocence and demanding their release. These proved fruitless and a noon meeting was called on the 18th, attracting a crowd estimated at about 2,500 in front of the jail where the men were being held. At this meeting the demand for the unconditional and immediate release of the two prisoners was read to the people after which the acting project director appeared to offer administration guarantees that the men would be accorded justice under the law. Despite the administration’s appeal for patience, the community council, following popular opinion, drew up a resolution demanding the immediate release of the accused and the dropping of the charges against them completely. Following the administration’s rejection of these demands, the community council, Issei Advisory Board and block managers resigned en masse.

That night, the 18th, an “Emergency Committee of 72” consisting of two representatives from each block and its central workingcore, the “Emergency Council of 12,” were elected at a

GARY Y. OKIHIRO 23

mass meeting. This new internee governing body called for a general strike the next day exempting only essential services such as the mess halls, hospital, schools and fire department. Meanwhile the white administrators were split on their response to the strike and the internees’ demands. The hardliners favored calling in the military police to crush the dissidents while the opposing view advocated moderation, bargaining for time and some sort of honorable compromise. The resisters themselves lacked any kind of consensus on what direction the strike should take, yet outward forms of group solidarity were maintained by block-organized, round the clock vigils in front of the prison and by threats against deserters and inu.10

At the negotiations to end the strike held on the 23rd and 24th of November, it became clear that the resisters’ objectives had expanded to include the internees’ right to self-determination. These included: [a] the establishment of a Public Relations Committee to settle all “personal reputations” disputes out of court; (b) the prerogative of the people to hire and fire all internee labor in the administrative personnel and other important positions; and [c] the recognition of the legitimacy of the Emergency Council and its ability to set up, within the framework of WRA provisions, a City Planning Board which would create the internees’ administrative, legislative and economic structures. The white administration responded to the resisters’ demands by dropping all charges against one of accused in the absence of grounds for prosecution, by releasing the second prisoner pending his trial which was to be held inside the camp, and by accepting the Emergency Council’s demands for recognition and self- determination.

Previous analysts of the Poston strike have drawn up two typologies of resistance from this incident, both variations of the pressure-release theory. One 11 points to the intense mental and emotional reactions of the evacuees, the fracturing of Japanese society and its instability all leading to a general feeling of insecurity. The Poston strike and the internees’ demands for self- government is thus seen as the Japanese struggle for security through recognition by the authority structure. The second12 places the strike into the authors’ “the camp as community” framework where the crisis led to a sense of community and hence to a stabilization of relationship between the internees and admin- istrators following the release of built-up pressures and a period of negotiation, communication and mutual understanding.

Rather than these, I propose an alternative Poston model of resistance, one which recognizes a preexistent, underlying layer of resistance potential, community mobilization and a n articulation of demands, the enlargement of issues stemming from preexistent resistance potential, resistance manifestations as anti-administration and upon administrative compromise and

24 AMERASIA JOURNAL indulgence of protest demands, an acceptable modus vivendi for the majority of resisters. Reduced to a schematic representation, the Poston model of resistance would be:

crisis; issue

administration

1 acceptable compromise

- interacts

Diagram 1. Poston Model of Resistance. Within a week after the settlement of the Poston Unit I strike,

on December 5,1942, at Manzanar, a well-known JACL leader was assaulted. One suspect was arrested for the beating and placed in the jail at Independence, a nearby town.13 The next day, a t a mass meeting attended by about 3-4,000 people, demands were drawn up to be presented to the project director by an appointed delegation of five men. These demands included: (a) the unconditional release of the accused; (b) an investigation by the Spanish Consul into general conditions at Manzanar; and (c) further action against the hospitalized JACL leader and the rooting out of other suspected inu.

The committee of five, followed by a crowd of about 1,000 internees, marched toward the administration building to present their demands to the director. There they were confronted by military police armed with rifles, tear gas and machine guns. This show of force had been arranged by the newly appointed director in the event of camp revolt. The project director met with the delegation, received the demands and walked among the people to listen to their grievances following which he promised the Negotiation Committee that the prisoner would be returned to camp provided that the crowd would disperse and the Committee thereafter resort to the established channels of appeal and call no more mass meetings.

The crowd disbanded but regrouped that evening at about 6 p.m. in front of the jail feeling convinced that the jailed internee was being framed by the administration and their inu and that the director’s compromise was unsatisfactory. The people demanded to speak with the project director and insisted that the commanding officer release the imprisoned internee. These demands were rejected and the officer ordered the crowd to return

GARY Y. OKIHIRO 25

to their blocks. The people refused to disperse. The soldiers fired tear gas and bullets into the crowd. As a result of this barrage, one Nisei was dead, another internee, a nineteen year old, was dying and about a dozen others lay wounded in the street. A short time later a small group confronted the soldiers again, started a car and directed it toward a machine gun emplacement. The car struck the police station and more bullets were fired, one ricocheting and injuring a military police corporal.

Throughout that night the bells tolled continuously and the people held meetings while the soldiers patrolled the camp. Despite the soldiers’ presence, more cases of inu beatings were reported that night and accused informers and their families threatened. The next morning, the 7th of December, the Negotiating Commlttee and other leaders of the revolt were arrested. Later that day a new committee of resisters faced the commanding officer who was now in charge of Manzanar under martial law and presented him with an ultimatum, threatening further violence against collaborators if the original prisoner was not released to them. These men, together with the earlier arrested leaders were sent to Moab, Utah and later to the “isolation center” near Leupp, Arizona. Suspected collaborators together with their families were likewise removed from Manzanar to avoid further group conflict.

Block managers distributed black armbands and it was estimated that between two-thirds and three-quarters of the people wore these during the period of mourning for the two dead. The community analysts concluded their description of the Manzanar riot in this manner: “ . . . two evacuees were killed, and the center was shaken for weeks. Working relations were reestablished and some community equilibrium restored only after long conferences between the project director and the block leaders ,”14

One general theme has emerged from the Manzanar riot of December, 1942. Causal analyses have regarded this as a spin-off of internal evacuee tensions and conflicts, in terms of “resisters” against “collaborators” while analyses of its results have emphasized a pacified concentration camp through the healing ritual of pressure-release or through an unyielding authority and a cowed populace.15

Instead of these, I propose a second model of resistance, one which presupposes an undercurrent of counter-administration sentiment among the majority of the people, community mobilization and an articulation of demands, an enlargement of issues which underscores the wider bases for discontent, and upon administrative intransigence or noncompromise, the failure of immediate protest demands accompanied by internee rejection of the legitimacy of white overrule and its institutions, the

26 AMERASIA JOURNAL

withdrawal from these and the redirection of resistance into new forms which would be para-administration. The Manzanar model of resistance is schematically represented below:

community mobilization; __ articulation of demands - administration

t administration intransigence

unacceptable compromise;

I para-administration forms of resistance; internee withdrawal I 1

Diagram 2. Manzanar Model of Resistance.

The Poston (hereafter designated as type A) and Manzanar (hereafter designated as type B) models of resistance are not limited to chronological sequence, locality or degree of resistance. Type A, for example, operated before and after November, 1942, was not limited to Poston and operated on an individual as well as group basis. Instances of type A resistances include the peoples' demands for a Japanese menu which were met wi th administrative indulgence and the workers' demands that certain racist foremen be removed which were satisfied. Examples of type B resistances include the failure of the model communities scheme, the aborting of the coop plan and camouflage net factories, the resegregation movement at Tule Lake and the persistence of ad hoc peoples' leadership groups headed by Issei.

Two durable and pervasive examples of type B resistances operated in the areas of internee labor and self-determination. Despite the paucity of direct evidence from the Japanese themselves, i t is clear that one major premise for the deployment to their labor was its relevance to their own self-defined needs. Thus it was that Dillon Myer mourned the failure of WRA plans for making the centers' industries contribute directly to America's war effort and admitted that "The bulk of enterprises established at the centers were of the internal consumption type to meet the needs of the center residents or of the community management."16 This Japanese labor premise led to the enormously dissimilar pattern of high productivity in work projects designed for the immediate welfare of the people as in the furnishing of their own homes, the family vegetable garden, the peoples' park, their theatre, the tofu factory and so forth contrasted with the low

GARY Y. OKIHIRO 27

output in administration sponsored work projects such as land subjugation, war industries production and building basic camp necessities which many felt the administration was obliged to provide as bricks, roads and schools.

The administration’s concern with this paradox (from their point of view] was reflected in a Poston Official Information Bulletin editorial17 entitled “Let Us Cooperate.” The editorial noted that many construction projects were being delayed due to a lack of workers and argued for increased volunteer labor from a practical standpoint declaring that “whatever is constructed, planted, or built here is for our benefit.” It also appealed to Japanese pride by asking whether or not the people were lazy reminding them that “never in the history of America1 [sic] has a person of Japanese descent ever been on relief. Let us not spoil our fine record at Poston by breaking this splendid precedent.”

A Jerome community analysis report 18 on labor employment at tha t center summarized J a p a n e s e a t t i t u d e s t o w a r d s administration sponsored work by noting that: (a] overbearing white supervisors “soon run into difficulties”; (b) the low wages provide little incentive for work observing that “evacuees justify slackness on the basis that they earn their wages several times over in a month”; and (c) “there is a tendency for many evacuees to avoid hard physical labor.” The report concluded by typifying internee labor as inefficient having a low production output in relation to work capacity and by noting a trend which diverted labor away from what was perceived to be administration projects and toward self-interest projects. “Since basic necessities are provided whether or not the person works,” the report explained, “some people are not anxious to work at all. They feel that they can spend their time better in other activities.”

Analogous type B resistance patterns operating within the labor sector can be found in the struggle for internee self-determnation. WRA plans for Japanese “self-government” were initially outlined in the director’s memorandum of June 5, 1942, clarified and modified by subsequent proposals the following month and finally hammered out at a policy meeting in San Francisco in August. The administration’s objective for the program reflected their paternalistic attitude toward the Japanese. Concentration camp “self-government,” it stated, should be for “the training of the residents of the community in the democratic principles of civic participation and responsibility.” To extricate themselves from this dilemma of rhetoric and practice, “democracy” was defined as “administrative authority exercised by responsible officials of the War Relocation Authority aided and assisted by the evacuees themselves.”lg Thus, internee “self-government” was envisioned by the administration not as a substitute for, but as an adjunct to bureaucratic control.

The resulting pattern of the peoples’ rejection of the Nisei Community Council and its devolution into an impotent debating

28 AMERASIA JOURNAL

society, so labelled by both administrators and internees, has been well-documented.20 The converse process of the rise of the Issei authority structures has likewise been identified and well- documented, yet few have seen the connection between this development and para- and anti-administration resistances

Internee self-determination as unfolded at Poston21 a n d paralleled elsewhere illustrates the type B resistance nature of Issei government. During the initial drive for the building of a “model community,” a City Planning Board (CPB) was formed to lay the groundwork for a Poston Community government. On June 23, 1942, the CPB presented to the project director i t s recommendations for “self-government” making no franchise or office-holding distinction between citizen and noncitizen and providing for executive, legislative and judicial branches of government. However, on June 26, the CPB was dissolved and their draft constitution annulled following the issuing of the national director’s June 5 guidelines which distinguished between citizen and noncitizen and proscribed Issei from holding elective office.

Despite the inane propaganda headlines of the Poston Official Daily Press Buffetin,Zz “Election Interest Soars,” and its reports of a “record” turnout of 99% of all eligible voters coupled with project director Haas’ optimistic comment that “the importance of the Community Council was realized by young and 01d,”z3 critical observers perceived the peoples’ underlying attitude towards the administration sponsored election. “It is incorrect to assume,” noted the WRA report cautiously, “that the residents were either entirely in favor of or vitally interested in the establishment of local government. The exclusion of Issei from office engendered some opposition. The vast majority of residents, however, remained disinterested spectator^."^^

WRA policy on internee authority structures which encouraged the Issei-Nisei cleavage was resisted by the Issei. The Nisei Community Council lacked any kind of firm community support being identified with the white administration and seen as anomalous to Japanese social custom which equated authority with age and experience. Thus the WRA institution was never accorded community legitimacy and was labelled as a “child Council” and its members as inu or “stooges.”

In September, a para-administration governing group, the Issei Advisory Board, was formed consisting of one elected Issei per block. The legitimate basis for this organization and the true place of the Issei within the Japanese community was evidenced in the prominent roles its members assumed during the Poston strike of November. The “Emergency Committee of 72,” for example, included twenty former IAB members as compared with twelve former councilmen and five block managers while the central “Emergency Executive Council of 12” excluded Nisei completely, consisting of eleven Issei and one Kibei. In this manner, the WRA

A

GARY Y. OKIHIRO 29

framework of Nisei prominence in government was reversed by the people when given a choice during a time of crisis. After having successfully negotiated the terms for the end of the strike, the reconstituted “Emergency Committee of 72,” its members now consisting of one Issei and one Nisei per block, transformed itself into “The City Planning Board of Unit I” and lay the basis for a reordered city government. Thus, Poston internee “self- government” had come full circle and the original peoples’ organization, previously disbanded and its proposals rescinded by the WRA following the June 5 memorandum, had reappeared in disregard of the administration’s system of government.

Similar type B resistance in “self-government” was manifest at the other centers. Manzanar retained its system of block manager government and rejected through plebiscite the administration’s notion of community council. Tule Lake had its Issei Planning Board while Heart Mountain and Granada proposed a bicameral system with the upper house comprised of Issei functioning in an advisory capacity. Rohwer and Jerome had Issei advisory groups, Gila River’s group of block council chairmen were all Issei and Granada’s Nisei block managers resigned en rnasse with the understanding that the administration would appoint Issei to these positions.

Other variations of type A and type B resistances no doubt existed, both within the political and economic spheres and outside of them, in other aspects of camp life as in the resurgence of Japanese cultural values and in religion.

One prominent deficiency in earlier analyses of resistance in the camps is the failure of the writers to view specific instances of resistance as ongoing processes and to place them within an historical context. Those who have attempted this have done so simplistically. They dichotomize camp life into an initial period of resistance and a later period of accommodation. In this view, resistance is seen as an early phenomenon due to administrative uncertainties and internee anxieties. Once these had been resolved, with the exceptions of times of individual crises such as during the segregation and draft periods, the internees accommodated themselves to administration control.25 This analysis, together with its explanation of the decline of resistance phenomena remain questionable.

The pressure-release theory of resistance forwards the view that the early proliferation of “incidents” released pent-up emotions leading to equilibrium and stability. An extension of this argument includes the notion of hopelessness and dependency encouraged by concentration camp paternalism and the administrations’ unlimited means for coercion. The “pro- Fascist” troublemaking minority theory attributes decreasing resistance to the rooting out and isolation of these elements from the majority of internees.

30 AMERASIA JOURNAL

In opposition to the above, I propose that the general decline of resistance was in fact illusory, that some aspects of resistance potential indeed decreased through type A responses in achieving an acceptable modus vivendi through compromise, however type B responses led to a submergence of the traditional indices of resistance and a rechannelling into more complex resistance phenomena. Thus a graph plotting this proposition is not merely of the classical Poisson distribution type but Poisson with an ascending tangent at the joint of the tail. Japanese resistance over time is seen as resistance potential predating actual internment, type A resistance as resulting in a lower level of resistance than previously suspected while type B resistance as surpassing the traditional apogee of resistance and continuing on into the period of resettlement. Resistance potential a s predat ing ac tua l internment is seen as Japanese reaction to white racism, the hostile anti-Japanese campaign and the early stages of the “evacuation” process. The median of the descending Poisson and the ascending tangent of types A and B indicates consistently high level of Japanese resistance against the white administration throughout the entire concentration camp experience.

INSTANCES OF

RESISTANCE

\ //’ \

pre- internment \ resistance type A

resistance

I ! I I I 1942 1943 1944 1945

I TIME

Graph 1. Resistance Distribution: the Historical Context.

As a resultof this submergence and rechannelling characteristic of type B resistance, the traditional indices of resistance are inadequate to identify them. Admittedly type B responses are difficult to identify. The data need to be re-examined and new qualitative indices must be defined. Various aspects of the

GARY Y. OKIHIRO 31

administration’s “colonization” of the Japanese community require examination. One of these which awaits definition is Japanese parental resistance to administrative efforts to win over the minds of their childern. WRA intentions included the “Americanization” of the Japanese to make them “assimilable” into white America. Thus, anything which emphasized traditional Japanese roots was to be discouraged. The administration’s failure to successfully combat the “regressive tendency” of the Issei in this battle for the “possession of the children’s minds and habits” was lamented by Poston’s community management division in a report26 which noted that the children’s English vocabulary had slipped four full grades since the fall of 1942. The same report mentioned another area in which Japanese values persisted, that of internee preference for traditional herbal and chiropractic medicine despite administration prohibitions against these health practices.

From these examples, it is reasonable to conclude that the proliferation of Japanese cultural societies and clubs and sports organizations following the peak period of traditional forms of protest can be viewed in terms of type B responses. In addition to these new manifestations of type B resistance, type A category indices require redefinition for as observed by one community analyst at “the use of subtle and indirect methods of getting concessions from the administration” was employed by the internees.

During an interviewz8 conducted by the Jerome community analyst quoted above, held after the segregation issue, a Buddhist priest explained his peoples’ plight, their underlying fears and resistance potential. He observed:

Actually, most of the Issei feel a stronger loyalty to Japan than to America, since evacuation. Before, they were pro-American. Many would have liked to declare loyalty to Japan, but they did not do so for practical reasons. They felt that they might be punished or treated more severely in the center. Others had property which they feared they would lose. Those who asked for repatriation had the courage of their convictions, or they answered the question ‘no’ for practical reasons too. Since the registration form was called ‘Application for Leave Clearance,’ they thought if they answered ‘Yes’ they would have to go out of the center. They wished to remain here. Many are repatriating because they feel the prejudice against them in America is too strong. And they believe the same thing may happen again in 25 years. I do not want my son to be subjected to such treatment.

Given the implicit trust accorded to priests by the people,*g the significance of the above statement is apparent. The fallacies of the loyal-disloyal conclusions drawn from questions 27 and 28 have been exposed, still its legacy continues. The issues of loyalty or disloyalty can not be equated with the processes of accommo-

32 AMERASIA JOURNAL

dation or resistance. At the same time, the earlier analyses of resistance are inadequate to account for the persistence of the traditional matrices of Japanese insti tutions, values and relationships. Beyond the visible forms of resistance, between the occasional petition, strike or riot, is the true nature of Japanese resistance to white control. It has been the contention of this paper that therein lies the real history of the Japanese reaction to imprisonment and colonization in America’s concentration camps.

FOOTNOTES 1. Washington, D.C., 1946, 48. Cf. ibid., 50; Carey McWilliams, Prejudice, Boston, 1944, 171-79; Alexander H. Leighton, The Governing of Men, Princeton, New Jersey, 1945, 177-78, 232-44; Dorothy Swaine Thomas and Richard S. Nishimoto, The Spoilage, Berkeley, California, 1946; Edward H. Spicer, et.al., Impounded People, Tucson, Arizona, 1969, 22-23, 133-34, 138-39; Paul Bailey, City in the Sun, Los Angeles, 1971, 135; and Dillon S. Myer, Uprooted Americans, Tucson, Arizona, 1971.62.

2. Leonard J. Arrington, The Price of Prejudice, Logan, Utah, 1962, 19-20. See also, Bailey, City, 124, 129; WRA, United States Department of the Interior, Legal and Constitutional Phases of hhe WRA Program, Washington, D.C., 1946, 33-34; Allan R. Bosworth, America’s Concentration Camps, New York, 1967; Bill Hosokawa, Nisei: The Quiet Americans, New York, 1969; McWilliams, Prejudice; and the various camp newspapers. 3. See, e.g., Herbert Aptheker, American Slave Revolts, New York, 1963; Nicholas Halasz, The Rattling Chains, New York, 1966; Winthrop D. Jordan, White Over Black, Kingsport, Tenn., 1968; Stanley M. Elkins, Slavery: A Problem in American Institutional and Intellectual Life, Chicago, 1968, second edition; and William F. Cheek, Black Resistance Before the Civil War, Beverly Hills. California, 1970.

4. Douglas W. Nelson, Heart Mountain; The History of an American Concentration Camp, an unpubl. MA thesis, University of Wyoming, 1970, 89. Cf. Roger Daniels, Concentration Camps U.S.A.: fapanese Americans and World War 11, New York, 1971; and “The Relocation of the Japanese Americans: A Reappraisal,” an unpubl. paper presented to the American Historical Association, December, 1970. Daniels has drawn heavily from Nelson’s findings. Both Daniels and Nelson, Daniels’ former student, have attempted a reassessment of resistance in the camps, yet their analyses do not go far enough. Both demonstrate the existence of what Daniels terms the “left opposition,” i.e. “patriotic” Japanese Americans who resisted. Still, resistance is seen in terms of the bankrupt “loyals” vs. “disloyals” dichotomy and both do not suggest any definitions or give a broad rigorous framework of resistance. 5. Nelson, Heart Mountain, 89. Another example of the powerlessness-dependence thesis is seen in Matthew Richard Speier, Japanese-American Relocation Camp Colonization and Resistance to Resettlement: A Study in the Social Psychology of Ethnic Identity under Stress, an unpubl. MA thesis, U.C. Berkeley, 1965. 6. Several terms employed in this paper require definition: [a) anti-administration resistance - resistance in direct conflict with the administration, its function, role or structure, and may be symbolized as:

( h ) para-adminis t ra t ion resis tance - resis tance w h i c h i g n o r e s t h e administration, its function, role or structure and seeks i ts own resolution, symbolized as: - (e) administration - collective agency through which the interning and colonizing of the Japanese during World War I1 was carried out. The administration’s “colonizing” role includes i ts paternalistic treatment of the internees, i ts attempts to control lapanese political and economic activities and its

-- -

GARY Y. OKIHIRO efforts to replace traditional Japanese institutions and relationships with their “American” counterparts, encouraging the ”colonized” to mimic the “colonizer.” See, e.g., Albert Memmi, The Colonizer and the Colonized, Boston, 1965; and Franz Fanon, Black Skins White Masks, New York, 1967.

(d) resistance - behavior which is para- and/or anti-administration. (e) potential for resistance - the causal conditions of resistance. Its theoretical framework has been discussed in Gary Y. Okihiro, “Dysrhythmy in Political Systems: the Example of Guinea,” an unpubl. seminar paper, UCLA, 1968, revised, 1972.

7. For example, WRA A Story of Humon Conservation, 47-51; WRA, United States Department of the Interior, Community Government in War Relocation Centers, Washington, D.C., 1946, 29-33. Cf. Myer. Uprooted, 61-65; Leighton, Governing, 162-210; Spicer, et. al., Impounded, 129-39; Bailey, City, 119-41; and Thomas and Nishimoto, The Spoilage, 45-52.

8. It seems that a typology of camp resistance which views the “incident” a s part of an ongoing process or interaction is more valid than one postulated on a qualitative description of types a s in Norman Richard Jackman, Collective Protest in Relocation Center, an unpubl. PhD dissertation, U.C. Berkeley, 1955; and Norman R. Jackman, “Collective Protest in Relocation Centers,” in The American Journal of Sociology, LXIII, 3 (November, 1957). 264-72.

9. Description of the Poston strike was taken eclectically from the sources cited above in footnote 7.

10. The terms, inu, stooge, collaborator, etc., a s used in this paper, are not meant to be pejorative. Rather they are employed merely as terms used by the internees themselves. 11. Leighton, Governing. 232-44. A “pro-Fascist’’ explanation was given by the Poston project director. Poston Official Daily Press Bulletin, VII, 8 (November 24. 1942).

12. Spicer, et. al., Impounded, 133-34; and Jackman, Collective Protest, 1955, 154- 59.

13. Description of the Manzanar riot was taken eclectically from, Jackman, Collective Protest, 1955, 178-83; Spicer, et. al., Impounded, 135-37; Thomas and Nishimoto, The Spoilage, 49-52; WRA A Story of Human Conservation, 49-51; WRA, Community Government, 31-33: and WRA, Legal and Constitutional, 33-34.

14. Spicer, et. al., Impounded, 137.

15. Jackman, Collective Protest, 1955, 182-83; Spicer, et. al., Impounded, 138-39; and WRA A Story of Human Conservation, 46-47, 50. A similar analysis has been made for Tule Lake in Thomas and Nishimoto. The Spoilage. 16. Uprooted, 43. Cf. WRA, Community Government, 3-5.

17. 11, 7 (rune 19, 1942).

18. Community Analysis Section, Jerome Relocation Center, Denson, Arkansas, Aug. 5, 1943. Field Report No. 10, mss. UCLA research library, U. S. Relocation Centers, microfilm D 17, reel 6.

19. WRA, Community Government, 11.

20. See, e.g. WRA, Community Governmen t , 22-24; WRA, Legal a n d Constitutional, 32; Report on a Developing Community, mss. included in the Carr Papers, JARP Collection 2010, UCLA reserach library, box 57, folder 2; Nelson, Heart Mountain, 38; and Community Analysis Section, Jerome Relocation Center, Denson, Arkansas, June 10. 1943. Interview with an Issei block manager, mss. UCLA research library, U. S. Relocation Centers, microfilm D 17, reel 6.

21. Description of “self-government” a t Poston w a s taken from, Leighton. Governing, 94-95, 110-25; Spicer, et. al., Impounded, 129-35.

22. II,27 (July 12, 1942).

23. Poston Official Daily Press Bulletin, 11.35 (July 22, 1942).

24. WRA, Community Government, 22. See also, Spicer, et. al., Impounded, 129.

34 AMERASIA JOURNAL 25. As, for example, in Thomas and Nishimoto, The Spoilage: Spicer, et. al., Impounded: WRA publications: Nelson, Heart Mountain: a n d Daniels , Concentration Camps. 26. Family Welfare Orientation Program, mss. included in the Barnhart Papers, JARP Collection 2010, UCLA research library, box 49, folder 5.

27. Edgar C. McVoy, “Social Processes in the War Relocation Center,” in Social Forces, vol. 22, no. 2 (December, 1943). 189. 28. Community Analysis Section, Jerome Relocation Center, Denson, Arkansas. Interview of the Jerome Daijo Buddhist temple priest, conducted by Edgar C. McVoy on June 21, 1943. U. S. Relocation Centers, UCLA Research library, microfilm D 17, reel 6.

29. Community Analysis Section, Jerome Relocation Center, Denson, Arkansas. Interview of a n Issei block manager, conducted by Edgar C. McVoy on June 10, 1943. U. S. Relocation Centers, UCLA research library, microfilm D 17, reel 6.