Feminist Movement Should the Equal Rights Amendment Be Added to the Constitution? By Chris Bodenner The issue: The core tenet of the mainstream feminist movement is that women and men should be treated equally under the law. Should the Constitution—through a proposed Equal Rights Amendment (ERA)—reflect that principle of gender equality? Arguments against the Equal Rights Amendment: The ERA and the feminist movement it represents are a threat to traditional American society. Women are fundamentally different from men and should be treated under the law accordingly. The proper place for a woman is in the home, where she is best able to care for the needs of her husband and children. Ratification of the ERA will empower an already intrusive federal government to undermine local customs and enact radical policies that will completely blur the line between genders. The ERA will also sweep away decades of protective laws meant to help those women who do work outside the home. Arguments for the Equal Rights Amendment: The biological difference between men and women is incredibly small, and even the biological traits that differentiate the sexes should have little if any bearing under the law. Laws should treat women and men as individuals with varying abilities, not as indistinguishable members of a particular gender group. While state and federal leaders have passed many laws to benefit women, only an amendment to the Constitution can enshrine gender equality once and for all. And the ERA would not bring about all the radical scenarios put forth by anti-ERA activists; those people are simply trying to frighten the American people and distract them from the real issues at hand. Many of those activists are staunch traditionalists who want to perpetuate the historical oppression of women by confining them to the domestic sphere. 1 Opponents of the Equal Rights Amendment demonstrate in front of the White House. Introduction "Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex." That opening sentence to the proposed Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) to the U.S. Constitution embodied the central mission of the modern feminist movement: gender equality. Although difficult to define, the movement was a broad and diverse effort that arose in the early 1960s to achieve equal rights and opportunities for women in employment, politics and their personal lives. The campaign to ratify the ERA in the 1970s became the central battleground for feminists and their opponents. According to historians, the feminist movement of the 1960s and 1970s—also known as the "women's liberation movement," or simply the "women's movement"—was actually the second phase of a struggle to achieve equal rights for American women. The "first wave" took place in the 19th and early 20th centuries and focused on securing the right to vote. That struggle for women's suffrage began at a convention in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848 and ended in 1920 with the ratification of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, which read, "The right of citizens in the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex." Since women comprised half of the U.S. population, suffragists asserted, women's access to the ballot box—the root of political power in a democracy—would bring about gender equality in all areas of American society. 2 Alice Paul, holding the banner, emerges from the National Woman's Party headquarters in New York City to demonstrate for full and equal rights. But by the early 1960s, American women were still far short of achieving the same economic and social opportunities afforded to men, a discrepancy perpetuated by many state and federal laws. Female workers consistently earned around half of what their male counterparts earned, and many professions and educational institutions were closed to women. Female political representation was minimal; by 1961, only two out of 100 U.S. senators and 17 out of 435 U.S. representatives were women. Within popular culture, women were still typically considered to be passive, irrational, irresponsible and dependent on men for both economic support and a sense of self-worth. Simmering discontent over the status of women suddenly gained national visibility in 1963 with the publication of The Feminine Mystique, a feminist manifesto written Betty Friedan, a college-educated, suburban housewife. She and her colleagues went on to found the National Organization for Women (NOW), a rights group that publicized women's issues and lobbied for government reform. Over the next decade, NOW and other feminist organizations helped to enact a variety of federal laws centering on equal pay, equal employment opportunity and equal access to educational funding for women. 3 Betty Friedan Simultaneously, the feminist movement spurred dramatic changes in American culture regarding female sexuality, in what would become known as the "sexual revolution." Traditionally, women were taught to restrain their sexual impulses and conform to modest standards of dress and behavior. Sex was to be reserved for marriage. But the introduction of the birth control pill in the 1960s allowed women to enjoy sex more freely, causing a profound shift in sexual norms. The legalization of abortion nationwide also gave women more control over their bodies. Divorce-law and family-law reforms further transformed the ability of women to determine their own destinies. Feminist principles of female empowerment and gender equality gradually made their way into American popular culture in the 1970s. Mainstream movies and television programs began to portray strong, independent female characters. Media and advertising companies started to profit from invoking feminist attitudes and desires in their articles, programs and commercials. Academic institutions began to imbue a new generation of Americans with feminist ways of thinking. But despite all the victories of the feminist movement, the movement still failed to achieve its greatest legislative goal: a constitutional amendment guaranteeing gender equality. Although the ERA had overwhelming support in Congress and the approval of the majority of the American people, it fell just short of winning the approval of three4 quarters of the state legislatures, a prerequisite for its passage. That defeat was primarily the result of a highly organized, grassroots movement of conservative activists who argued that the feminist movement had pushed traditional standards too far. On what grounds did they oppose gender equality? Conservative opponents of the ERA maintained that the feminist movement was a grave threat to traditional American society. Notions of female autonomy distracted women from their proper role, which was to care for their husbands and children within the home, traditionalists argued. Sexual and reproductive freedom, they said, corrupted female morality. The ERA, conservative critics insisted, would unleash a series of federal laws and court decisions that would undermine local customs and continue to blur the natural distinctions between men and women. More moderate opponents of the ERA, such as union officials, contended that the amendment would sweep away many of the protective laws that had been put into place for the benefit of women over the years. Although of no lesser value than men, they argued, women had different abilities than their male counterparts and those differences had to be taken into account. Besides, many critics said, the basic rights of women were already enshrined in the Constitution, so adding the ERA was not necessary. On the other hand, feminist supporters of the ERA insisted that the Constitution did not guarantee equal rights for women, meaning that the major legislative gains of the 1960s and 1970s would always run the risk of being repealed. Only a constitutional amendment would truly ensure gender equality, they said. The vast majority of differences between men and women were a result of societal influences, not inherent traits, they claimed. Even biological differences should have no relevance before the law, they argued; individual men and women had unique qualities and thus should not be treated based on the predominant perceptions of their gender group. Proponents of the ERA asserted that the radical scenarios put forth by conservative critics—such as unisex toilets and same-sex marriage—were without legal basis and were simply being used as scare tactics. Traditional norms that confined women to the domestic sphere and inhibited their sexuality were oppressive, they insisted. Women were just as capable of succeeding in business and politics as men were, supporters said, and women were just as entitled to engage in sex outside of marriage. Legislative Victories of First Wave Feminism After the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920, feminists and their political allies went one step further by trying to amend the Constitution to guarantee gender equality across the board, not just in voting. In 1923, to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Seneca Falls Convention, the Equal Rights Amendment, authored by suffragist Alice Paul, was introduced to Congress. But when the amendment failed to secure the required two-thirds majority in both the House and Senate, the ERA was shelved, and the women's movement dropped out of the national spotlight. 5 Progressive women continued to shape the cultural landscape, however. During the socalled Roaring Twenties—a decade of economic prosperity and cultural exuberance— young women called "flappers" flouted conventional norms in dress and behavior. After the U.S. entered World War II (1939-45) in December 1941, women replaced nearly six million fighting men in U.S. factories and manufacturing plants, and even formed a national baseball league. The figure of "Rosie the Riveter" became a popular symbol of working women and their economic clout during the 1940s. At war's end, the majority of middle-class women returned to their traditional roles as mothers and homemakers. The subsequent "Baby Boom" —an unprecedented increase in the U.S. birth rate between 1946 and 1964—was a reaction to the poverty of the Great Depression of the 1930s and the hardships of World War II, an outgrowth of the national exuberance that came with a booming postwar economy. The rapidly expanding middle class focused on a renewed sense of the traditional, nuclear family. For instance, the average age at which American women got married dropped to 20, a record low. Gloria Steinem But, in the 1950s, a growing number of women, emboldened by their wartime work experience and benefiting from the proliferation of time-saving household appliances, desired careers outside the home. Furthermore, the emerging civil rights movement— 6 which sought equality of opportunity for African Americans in voting, employment and education—was beginning to undermine the traditional dominance of white males, encouraging middle-class white women to also stand up to them. Historians generally acknowledge Friedan as sparking the modern feminist movement. Although French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex (1949) had set the tone for the movement early on, Friedan's wildly popular book The Feminine Mystique became the clarion call for American middle-class women in the 1960s. Friedan—a freelance writer and housewife with several children—argued in her book that the media, advertising, psychology and other male-dominated fields tried to convince women that they could find fulfillment only in the domestic sphere. She wrote of a "problem that has no name stirring in the minds of so many American women today," a desire for something beyond their traditional roles as wives and mothers. Friedan continued: The problem lay buried, unspoken, for many years in the minds of American women. It was a strange stirring, a sense of dissatisfaction, a yearning that women suffered in the middle of the twentieth century in the United States. Each suburban housewife struggled with it alone. As she made the bed, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night—she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question—'Is this all?' In 1960, Senator John F. Kennedy (D, Massachusetts) barely defeated Vice President Richard Nixon (R) in one of the closest presidential elections in U.S. history. Having secured a solid majority of female votes in that contest, Kennedy and his administration strongly supported the emerging feminist movement. Upon assuming office, Kennedy mandated that the U.S. government hire "solely on the basis of ability to meet the requirements of the position, and without regard to sex." He named Esther Peterson the first female head of the Women's Bureau of the Commerce Department, which oversaw women's issues in the workplace. At Peterson's behest, the President's Commission on the Status of Women was formed in 1961 to study the economic and legal rights of women. The committee—chaired by former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, the widow of President Franklin D. Roosevelt (D, 1933-45)—issued its report two years later. Although it made several significant recommendations for reforming employment policies and property and contract laws that discriminated against women, the report fell short of many feminist leaders' expectations, especially by failing to endorse the controversial ERA. [See Executive Order Establishing the President's Commission on the Status of Women (primary document)] The first major victory of the feminist movement was the passage of the Equal Pay Act of 1963, which sought to eliminate pay differentials in the workplace based on gender. At the time, women still earned around half as much as men did for doing the same work, an inequity justified by the widely held belief that a man should be his family's primary provider. That law would be challenged in the coming years, but "equal pay for equal work" was ultimately upheld in Reed v. Reed (1971) and Frontiero v. Richardson (1973), 7 two Supreme Court cases successfully argued by American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) lawyer and future Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. [See Equal Pay Act of 1963 (primary document)] But the most far-reaching legislative victory for the women's movement was the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, a broad series of measures outlawing discrimination in voting, employment and public services, based on race, color, religion, sex or national origin. Specifically, Title VII of that law addressed discrimination in private-sector employment. Initially, that section was meant to prevent discrimination in the hiring and firing of African Americans. But right before Congress was set to vote on the bill, Representative Howard W. Smith (D, Virginia)—a vocal opponent of civil rights legislation for African Americans—amended Title VII to include the word "sex." Although Smith was a long-time supporter of women's rights, his fellow Southern Democrats endorsed the amendment in the hopes that it would sabotage the bill's passage in the House. Their strategy backfired, however; the House ended up passing the bill, 290 to 130. Although Title VII banned job discrimination against women, private employers generally ignored the law. Furthermore, the federal agency formed to enforce it—the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)—failed to hold those employers accountable, focusing instead on fighting inequality on the basis of race. Feminist leaders grew steadily impatient with the U.S. government's reluctance to enforce Title VII. In October 1966, Friedan and around 300 colleagues formed NOW, a rights group that publicized women's issues and lobbied for government reform. The NOW "Statement of Purpose" pledged "to take action to bring women into full participation in the mainstream of American Society NOW, assuming all privileges and responsibilities thereof in truly equal partnership with men." Spurred by pressure from NOW and other feminist organizations, the EEOC began to take action. Its first major target was the airline industry. Since the 1950s, airlines had regularly fired female flight attendants when they married or reached the age of 32, and all efforts to reform such policies had been struck down in Congress. In 1968, however, under threat of a feminist-led strike of flight attendants, the EEOC banned such practices and forced the industry to comply. But most cases of employment discrimination were not as clear-cut; the explicit hiring or firing of employees, or failure to promote them based on gender was difficult to prove. The EEOC thus embarked on a different approach. In 1970, it filed suit against American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), ultimately forcing the company to institute an affirmative-action program. Affirmative action was a policy that had been introduced by President Lyndon B. Johnson (D, 1963-69) in 1965 to force federal agencies and contractors to take active measures to hire more African Americans. In 1967, that policy was extended to women. By 1973, the EEOC had filed nearly 150 affirmative action suits against dozens of private employers accused of gender discrimination. 8 Shirley Chisholm (left) and Barbara Jordan (right) With lobbying from groups like NOW, the feminist movement continued to achieve legislative victories in the early 1970s. Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 barred gender discrimination within "any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance." (That law's most prominent effect would turn out to be equal funding for school athletic programs.) Two years later, Congress passed the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, which prohibited creditors from discriminating against applicants on the basis of gender. [See Title IX, Education Amendments of 1972 (primary document)] Instead of merely appealing to Congress, which was overwhelmingly male, Friedan and her colleagues sought to put women directly into positions of political power. In 1971, they formed the National Women's Political Caucus (NWPC), an organization that supported women running for public office. In 1972, an unprecedented number of women were elected to Congress, including representatives Barbara Jordan (a Democrat from Texas), Pat Schroeder (a Democrat from Colorado) and New York Democrat Elizabeth Holtzman. Similarly, female representation in state legislatures jumped 28%. Representative Shirley Chisholm (D, New York), who in 1968 had been the first female African American elected to Congress, also made a serious bid for the Democratic nomination in the 1972 presidential race. That new contingent of congresswomen revived interest in the Equal Rights Amendment, which had languished in congressional committee for decades. In March 1972, a half century after it was first proposed to Congress, the ERA was finally approved by both houses of Congress; the House passed it by a vote of 354 to 24 and the Senate by a vote of 84 to 8. Congress initially set a seven-year ratification period, the customary length of time in which three-quarters of the states (38 states) had to approve the amendment. By the end of 1973, 30 of the required state legislatures had ratified the ERA. With six years left to close that gap, feminists expressed confidence that the ERA would finally succeed. 9 Sexual Liberation and Reproductive Rights The major legislative gains of the feminist movement in the 1960s and early 1970s mostly dealt with public issues such as employment, education and attainment of political office. But the movement was also intensely personal, involving the most private of realms: women's bodies and their sexuality. Such matters were not only discussed in private, or within the "consciousness raising" groups that became so widespread during that time. (Consciousness-raising groups were small, grassroots gatherings where women would discuss a variety of personal matters to enhance one another's awareness of women's issues and provide emotional support to group members.) Rather, the feminist movement thrust female sexuality to the forefront of the national debate. One of the central mottos of feminism was "the personal is the political," meaning that the oppression experienced by individual women was actually part of a wider, systemic problem that could be overcome through political action. Hippies arrive in Paris to participate in celebrating the culture of love. The sexual revolution of the 1960s was characterized by a drastic relaxation in traditional standards of sexual behavior, notably an increase in premarital sex and casual sex among single women. Although traditional society frowned upon men who engaged in casual sex, it was far less forgiving of women who did the same. A growing number of women 10 influenced by the "free love movement" approached sex as a source of personal pleasure, not merely as a means of bearing children or fulfilling a marital duty. The linchpin of the sexual revolution was the Food and Drug Administration's approval of the birth control pill in 1960. "The Pill," as it was commonly known, was far more convenient and effective than other methods of contraception, such as condom use. It encouraged many women to engage in casual sex while significantly lowering the risk of pregnancy. With that newly acquired freedom, sex outside of marriage gradually became more and more socially acceptable. That change did not happen overnight; a Gallup poll in 1969 reported that 74% of women still viewed premarital sex as wrong. But norms were steadily shifting; just a few years later, that figure had dropped to 53%. Despite its popularity, the Pill was strongly opposed in certain quarters. The Catholic Church opposed its use even by married women who only had sex with their husbands, since the only form of birth control it permitted was the "rhythm method"—the timing of intercourse to coincide with periods of low fertility during a woman's menstrual cycle. Some African Americans claimed the Pill was a ploy by the federal government to limit black population growth. Many state legislatures banned its use. However, the right of all married couples in the U.S. to use contraception was guaranteed in the Supreme Court case Griswold v. Connecticut (1965). Seven years later, in Eisenstadt v. Baird, that right was extended to unwed Americans as well. The Pill allowed women to stay single longer, largely because fewer of them became pregnant inadvertently and then felt they had to get married. As a result, marriage rates leveled off in the 1960s, and dropped dramatically in the 1970s. The feminist movement also led to an increase of women who left their marriages; between 1968 and 1972, the divorce rate in the U.S. nearly doubled. That increase was also influenced by reforms in divorce law, such as the provisions for dividing property equally between husbands and wives and the emergence of "no-fault divorce"—when either party can dissolve a marriage without having to come up with specific grievances against the other party. (The stated reason of "irreconcilable differences" is commonly invoked in no-fault divorce cases.) During that era, just as the Pill severed the link between sex and pregnancy, so did growing legalization of abortion sever the link between pregnancy and childbirth. In the late 1960s, nearly two-thirds of the states had laws banning abortion in all cases except when the mother's life was in jeopardy. To avoid prosecution, wealthy women often flew to hospitals in foreign countries where abortion was legal. Poor women, on the other hand, usually had to resort to illegal clinics or "back alley" abortionists, which carried a high risk of illness and even of death. Between 1967 and 1973, however, 13 states relaxed their restrictions on abortions, and four states—Alaska, Hawaii, New York and Washington—repealed their bans. In January 1973, the Supreme Court took the unprecedented step of legalizing abortion 11 nationwide. In the landmark case Roe v. Wade, the court overruled a Texas antiabortion statute, siding with an unmarried woman known as "Jane Roe" who wanted to terminate her pregnancy safely and legally. The Roe decision declared that all women in the U.S., as part of their constitutional right to privacy, were legally permitted to end their pregnancy in the first trimester, prior to the point of "viability"—when the fetus is able to survive outside the womb. That controversial Supreme Court decision sent shock waves through the U.S. It was immediately denounced by religious groups, particularly Catholics and evangelical Protestants. They argued that because human life began at conception, abortion was tantamount to murder. Other "pro-life" conservatives claimed that "abortion on demand" would lead to widespread promiscuity and the dissolution of the nuclear family. On the other hand, feminists hailed the Roe decision, insisting that unwanted pregnancies trapped women in the domestic sphere and prevented them from achieving success and fulfillment outside the home. Other "pro-choice" advocates maintained that a pregnant woman—not the government—had sole dominion over her body and should thus have the right to decide the fate of her unborn child. Feminism in Mainstream Culture By the early 1970s, feminist ideas of equality and empowerment began to enter the American mainstream. Ms. magazine became the leading voice of the feminist movement when the first full issue went on sale in July 1972, selling more than 250,000 copies in its first week. The magazine's creator, Gloria Steinem, was a journalist who had achieved fame in 1963 for her sensational, undercover exposé of the goings-on at a Playboy Club in New York City. She was also an outspoken supporter of the ERA. Ms.—whose name derived from a form of address coined by feminists opposed to the traditional labels "Miss" and "Mrs."—became a popular forum for women's issues not previously covered in the mainstream press. [See Gloria Steinem Addresses Gender Myths before the Senate (Excerpts) (primary document)] The advertising industry was quick to take advantage of the growing influence of feminism. One of the most successful ad campaigns of the 1970s was for Virginia Slims, a brand of cigarettes developed in 1968 by the Philip Morris Company and specifically aimed at, professional women. The ads often contrasted images of turn-of-the-century women with images of contemporary women, topped with the slogan, "You've Come a Long Way, Baby." By emphasizing that smoking was once considered "unladylike," the ads implied that using Virginia Slims was an act of rebellion against traditional, maledominated society. Film and television in the 1970s also were imbued with feminist themes. Box-office successes such as Julia (1977), Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) and Norma Rae (1979) all had strong, independent women as their central characters. One of the highest-rated sitcoms of the 1970s was the Mary Tyler Moore Show, whose title character was a single, careeroriented woman who had broken off her engagement and moved to a new city. (The writers had originally made her a divorcée, but they felt the subject of divorce was still too controversial for that characterization to be left in when the show aired in 1970.) 12 Another popular sitcom was Maude, which shocked audiences in its second month on the air in 1972 when its title character—a married, 47-year-old woman—decided to undergo an abortion. Despite vehement protests by pro-life groups and the refusal of many affiliates to air certain episodes, ratings for the show soared. Feminism infiltrated academia in the 1970s. Ivy League universities became coeducational. Military academies began to admit women. Female enrollment in law schools and medical schools increased steadily, so that by 1990 women earned 40% of all law degrees and one-third of all medical degrees. Liberal-arts colleges and universities became a bastion of feminist ideology, and numerous women's studies and gender studies programs were formed as a result. Books by leading feminists, such as Kate Millett's Sexual Politics (1970), Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch (1970) and Susan Brownmiller's Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape (1975), also received wide attention. One of the best-selling books of that decade was Our Bodies, Ourselves, first published by the Boston Women's Health Book Collective in 1970. A frank, informative guidebook for women's health issues and female sexuality, Our Bodies, Ourselves went through a number of editions and became a classic. But just as feminist themes were beginning to be absorbed into the American mainstream, a growing backlash against the movement was forming as well. Social and religious conservatives were disturbed by what they viewed as the excesses of the women's movement, which they said encouraged sexual licentiousness and the breakdown of the nuclear family. They were particularly distressed by the Roe decision and the passage of the ERA, two events that became successful recruiting tools for conservative leaders. The most prominent of those conservative leaders was Phyllis Schlafly, a longtime activist in the Republican Party. In 1972, she formed the National Committee to Stop ERA, a grassroots organization that publicly denounced the ERA and lobbied state legislatures to strike it down. Schlafly and other anti-ERA activists were effective at mounting opposition to the amendment. By 1979—the deadline for the ratification—the ERA was still three states short of its goal. Despite a three-year extension by Congress, not a single state added its support, and by 1982, the ERA was officially dead. Many viewed its demise as the end of the feminist movement. The Case Against the Equal Rights Amendment Opponents of the Equal Rights Amendment maintained that men and women were inherently different, and that each group warranted special consideration under the law. The ERA, they argued, threatened to wipe away all such distinctions and create a genderneutral society, which would actually be detrimental to the women it was purportedly meant to help. "We live in a world of socially prescribed differences, of fashion prejudices, of customs relating to masculinity and femininity," union official Myra Wolfgang testified in 1970 during a hearing on the ERA by the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on constitutional amendments. "To achieve equality, we must start equal by recognizing physical and biological differences. We are different, and remember, 13 different does not mean deficient," she continued. [See Union Official Myra Wolfgang Argues Against the Equal Rights Amendment (primary document)] The ERA and the feminist movement promoting it were fundamental threats to the nuclear family and traditional American society, conservative opponents insisted. Women were naturally designed to be mothers and homemakers, roles that were corrupted by feminist ideas of independence and sexual liberation, traditionalists argued. A woman's primary duty was to her husband and children, not to herself, they said. "Man is the head of the home," Ellen Campbell, Mississippi state leader of STOP ERA, declared, continuing, "In the societal order of things, he is above the woman." The ERA would codify themes of the feminist movement that were already weakening the nuclear family and blurring the distinctions between men and women, opponents asserted. The ERA was part of a radical feminist agenda, and did not represent the interests of the majority of American women, opponents of the amendment maintained. "For the most part, women who join 'liberation groups' are white, middle-class and college-oriented," Wolfgang stated, continuing, "The most active of these women, who do the work of the organizations, are those with no or grown children. Working women, like the mothers of young children, are too busy to be liberated." Mary Dennison of the Congress of Racial Equality was more succinct: "The Women's Liberation Movement is a luxury that only bored white women can afford." By eliminating protections and policies that had been put into place for the benefit of women, moderate critics argued, the ERA would actually do more harm than good. The ERA "will accomplish the exact opposite its proponents claim it will," Wolfgang insisted, adding that it "will invalidate the legislation, hundreds of pieces of it, which has been adopted over the last 100 years passed to permit a semblance of equality that was denied to women down through the ages." For instance, moderate opponents of the ERA argued, the amendment would hurt working women with families by taking away union-imposed limitations on strenuous physical labor and on working hours, which were meant to provide women with more time to tend to their homes and families. "For an example, the passage of an hours limitation law for women provided them with a shield against obligatory overtime to permit them to carry on their life at home as wives and mothers," Wolfgang testified. "While all overtime should be optional for both men and women, it is absolutely mandatory that overtime for women be regulated because of her double role in our society." As well-intentioned as the ERA might have been, moderate critics argued, the solution to female inequality was not sweeping changes to the Constitution, but rather specific laws designed to protect women in specific circumstances. The federal government did not have the ability to change entrenched cultural attitudes toward woman, they argued. "The removal of protective labor standards will not and the passage of the equal rights amendment cannot eliminate overt and subtle cultural practices," union official Ruth Miller testified before Congress. 14 Furthermore, conservative opponents argued, the ERA would open a Pandora's box of radical changes to gender-specific policies. For instance, they claimed, the ERA would lead to the repeal of alimony laws and regulations governing child support payments and Social Security benefits for dependent wives. Most dramatically, they said, the amendment would lead to compulsory military service and combat duty for women, who were not physically or emotionally equipped for the battlefield. Forty-four percent of women "can't throw a hand grenade far enough to keep from killing themselves," Schlafly joked, adding that that alone justified keeping women from serving in the army. The lack of gender distinctions would also lead to such things as unisex bathrooms and locker rooms, conservative critics of the ERA claimed. Even more drastically, they contended, preventing discrimination based on sex would provide the basis for legalizing same-sex marriage. Schlafly wrote that the "ERA would put 'gay rights' into the Constitution because the word in the amendment is 'sex,' not 'women.' Eminent authorities have stated that ERA would legalize the granting of marriage licenses to same-sex couples and generally implement the gay and lesbian agenda." All of those radical measures would be carried out by an elitist, federal judiciary out of touch with most of the American people, conservative opponents of the ERA asserted. By amending the Constitution, they argued, the ERA would allow the U.S. government to override state and local laws that reflected well-established differences between different regions of the country. The wording of the ERA was "so simple it is open to just any kind of interpretation by the courts," anti-ERA activist Peggy Rayborn stated. She continued: "The main result of the passage of the ERA would be to transfer jurisdiction of all laws pertaining to women and the family from the states to the federal government and courts. Considering the mess they make of everything, this would be catastrophic. Besides, the government has enough power and interferes too much as it is." Besides, conservative critics of the ERA contended, the basic rights of women were already sufficiently protected under the law. The 14th Amendment, they pointed out, offered equal protection to "all persons," not just men. Schlafly noted that women "have enjoyed equal opportunity since 1964," when Congress passed Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Before the Arkansas legislature, Schlafly stated: The Constitution does not say men are created equal. That is in the Declaration of Independence. Fortunately you are not amending the Declaration of Independence. We are talking about the Constitution. And the Constitution uses exclusively sex neutral terms, we the people, citizens, residents, inhabitants, president, ambassador, representative. Women have every Constitutional right that men have. The Case for the Equal Rights Amendment Proponents of the Equal Rights Amendment maintained that centuries of gender-based laws had perpetuated sexism in American society, keeping women from achieving as much freedom and success as men. "This Nation is antifemale in its laws, its expressions, its value systems, its language, everything," NOW Chairwoman Wilma Scott Heide 15 stated at a 1970 congressional hearing on the ERA. The surest way to repeal such laws and prevent further discrimination was to insert women's equality directly into the Constitution, supporters said. "We believe that one reason sex discrimination persists is that we lack a firm constitutional basis for equal rights on the basis of gender, civil rights leader Mary Frances Berry declared. "[I]n the absence of a formal constitutional foundation for gender equality, a hostile legislature, we know, could wipe off all the antidiscrimination laws that are now on the books." [See Mary Francis Berry Argues to Revive the Equal Rights Amendment (Excerpt) (primary document)] Men and women should not be treated differently based strictly on gender, ERA supporters maintained; the law should treat citizens as individuals. The differences between men and women in American society were not inborn, they argued, but rather stemmed from a variety of social pressures. By providing a legal foundation for the social institutions that applied those pressures, they said, government denied individuals their liberty. As Heide explained: [See NOW Statement on the Equal Rights Amendment (primary document)] Well, there are no social-psychological traits that are 'feminine' or 'masculine'.... There are only human traits. There are no men's roles or women's roles beyond the biological.... My possession of a uterus does not uniquely qualify me for child care, housework, secretarial work or nursing. Men's biology does not disqualify them for child care and housework or qualify them for leadership or scientific analysis or any particular courage. The continuation of sex-stereotyped, sex-caste laws that deny the individuality and humanity of women and men...is simply intolerable. Thus, every woman should be free to choose whatever profession, school or position in government she was best suited for, ERA supporters maintained. If a woman chose to stay at home and become a traditional homemaker, they argued, she should have every right to do that as well. Such vital decisions, they said, should be made by women and their families, not the government. So-called protective laws, however well-intentioned, still imposed criteria on women solely because of their gender, proponents of the ERA maintained. For instance, they argued, labor laws that prevented women from working overtime handicapped women who actually wanted to do so, whether or not they had families to care for. Furthermore, supporters argued, just because men were more suited for certain jobs than women did not mean that all women were less suited for such jobs than all men. Chisholm elaborated on that idea: [See Shirley Chisholm Argues in Support of the Equal Rights Amendment (primary document)] Working conditions and hours that are harmful to women are harmful to men; wages that are unfair for women are unfair for men. Laws setting employment limitations on the basis of sex are irrational.... The physical characteristics of men and women are not fixed, but cover two wide spans that have a great deal of overlap. It is obvious, I think, that a robust woman could be more fit for physical labor than a weak man. The choice of 16 occupation would be determined by individual capabilities, and the rewards for equal works should be equal. That same principle of non-gender-related assessment of people as individuals carried over into family law as well, ERA supporters contended. In Senate testimony, business leader Myra Ruth Harmon said that alimony and child custody "should be based on the individual people involved and the persons themselves and not on whether it is a man or a woman.... In regard to alimony, it may very well be that the wife should pay for alimony for the husband if he is unable to support himself or in some particular assistance needs her financial support." The ERA would not mandate unisex restrooms or locker rooms, supporters insisted. "Only actions that violate the principle of equal rights would be prohibited," Berry said in response to that claim. In fact, supporters pointed out, there already were unisex bathrooms aboard airplanes and in many business establishments, and current privacy laws were sufficient to prevent men and women from using such facilities at the same time. Other radical scenarios put forth by ERA opponents—same-sex marriage, state-funded abortions—were similarly unfounded, supporters of the ERA insisted. They argued that Schlafly and other anti-ERA activists used those claims simply to shock people into opposing the amendment. Such scare tactics, ERA supporters said, clouded the real, substantive issues of the feminist movement. One scenario put forth by Schlafly—military conscription for women—actually was a possibility, supporters conceded, but not because of the ERA; Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution already gave Congress the power to draft women, since gender was not specified. In fact, many ERA supporters maintained, if women were accorded full rights as Americans, they would be expected to defend those rights in time of war just as men were. Even so, they insisted, that did not mean that all women would be forced to fight, since many women—like many men—did not have the physical abilities required for combat. "The selective service law would have to include women, but women would not be required to serve in the Armed Forces where they are not fitted any more than men are required to serve," Chisholm stated. Supporters also rebutted claims that women's equality was already guaranteed by the Constitution. "It is assumed today by many persons that women were granted equality with the passage of the 14th amendment, ratified in 1868. Only 50 years later, however, was woman suffrage guaranteed by the ratification of the 19th amendment," Representative Margaret M. Heckler (R, Massachusetts) stated at a 1970 Senate hearing. Previous laws, while a step in the right direction, were also limited in their coverage, supporters insisted. Without the protection of a constitutional amendment, they said, all such legislation risked being revised or even repealed. Supporters of the ERA conceded that sexist attitudes and behavior in American society would not change overnight merely because of a constitutional amendment. But in time, 17 they said, the ERA would have an impact on all areas of society. "Although changes in social attitudes cannot be legislated, they are guided by the formulation of our federal laws," Heckler stated. Chisholm agreed: "The focusing of public attention on the gross legal, economic, and social discrimination against women by hearings and debates in the federal and state legislatures would result in changes in attitude of parents, educators, and employers that would bring about substantial economic changes in the long run." Legacy of the Feminist Movement The defeat of the Equal Rights Amendment signaled not only the waning influence of the feminist movement but also a general shift in American politics toward the conservative right. The administration of President Ronald Reagan (R, 1981-89), which had helped erode support for the ERA, continued to weaken the feminist movement by cutting government funding for organizations linked to it and opposing its platforms. Membership in groups such as NOW, NWPC, the Women's Equity Action League (WEAL) and the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) dropped significantly in the early 1980s. Whereas previous conservative movements in U.S. history had focused primarily on limiting government interference in the economy or fighting communism around the globe, the new era of conservatism that emerged in the 1980s increasingly shifted toward upholding traditional "family values." That new brand of social conservatism was characterized by hostility to abortion, homosexuality, affirmative action and church-state separation. The movement had strong religious overtones; among its leaders were Reverend Jerry Falwell of the Moral Majority and television host Reverend Pat Robertson, who made a bid for the U.S. presidency in 1988. The rise of the so-called Christian Right was to a large extent a backlash against the perceived excesses of feminism, particularly the Roe decision and the counterculture movement that grew out of the 1960s. Although feminism as a political movement dwindled in the 1980s, women continued to make great strides in American society. In 1981, Sandra Day O'Connor became the first female Supreme Court justice. Three years later, Representative Geraldine Ferraro (D, New York) became the first female vice presidential candidate of a major political party. In 1993, O'Connor was joined on the bench by another woman on the court, Ginsburg. By 1993, more than 1,500 women were serving either in Congress or in various state legislatures, up from around 250 in 1960. Women also figured prominently in the 2008 presidential election, making a run for the highest offices in the nation. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D, New York) ran a strong campaign for her party's presidential nomination, ultimately losing the nomination to Illinois Senator Barack Obama, who went on to win the election in November. (Clinton became secretary of state in January 2009, the third woman to hold that office.) And for the first time ever, the Republican Party selected a woman, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, as its vice presidential candidate. Although neither woman won office, their high-profile candidacies appeared to signal a greater acceptance of women at the highest levels of power. 18 Bibliography Allyn, David. Make Love, Not War : The Sexual Revolution: An Unfettered History. New York: Routledge, 2001. Buechler, Steven M. Women's Movements in the United States: Woman Suffrage, Equal Rights, and Beyond. Piscataway, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2007. Davis, Flora. Moving the Mountain: The Women's Movement in America since 1960. Champaign, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1999. Deslippe, Dennis A. Rights, Not Roses: Unions and the Rise of Working-Class Feminism, 1945-80. Champaign, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1999. Dicker, Rory Dicker and Alison Piepmeier (eds.). Catching a Wave: Reclaiming Feminism for the 21st Century. Boston, Mass.: Northeastern University Press, 2003. Freedman, Estelle. No Turning Back: The History of Feminism and the Future of Women. New York: Ballantine Books, 2003. Mansbridge, Jane J. Why We Lost the ERA. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986. Walters, Margaret. Feminism: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Watkins, Susan Alice. Introducing Feminism. New York: Totem Books, 2001. 19 Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Barbaric Tactic or Quick Way to End the War? By Jill Kauffman The issue: Should the U.S. use the atomic bomb against Japan in an attempt to end World War II? Or should the U.S. pursue another course of action to end the war? • Arguments in favor of the use of the atomic bomb: Using the atomic bomb against Japan is the most effective means of bringing World War II to an end. All indications show that Japan will fight to the very last man, so a drastic course of action is needed. The main alternative to use of the bomb—a massive invasion of the Japanese home island—would be far too costly in terms of U.S. soldiers' lives. By using the bomb, the U.S. can bring the war to a quick end and save tens of thousands, and perhaps hundreds of thousands, of U.S. lives. • Arguments against the use of the atomic bomb: The use of such a devastating weapon against a civilian population is immoral and barbaric. Also, the bombings are not necessary; indications show that Japan is pursuing peace negotiations, and the U.S. should allow more time for those negotiations to bear fruit. And in using an atomic weapon, the U.S. will spark a dangerous arms race with the Soviet Union. Nearly identical mushroom clouds loom over Hiroshima (top) and Nagasaki (bottom) after the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on these Japanese cities on August 6 and 9, 1945, respectively. Introduction On April 24, 1945, less than two weeks after Harry Truman (D, 1945-53) assumed the presidency following the death of President Franklin Roosevelt (D, 1939-45), Secretary of War Henry Stimson wrote to him: "I think it is very important that I should have a talk with you as soon as possible on a highly secret matter.... [It] has such a bearing on our present foreign relations and has such an important effect upon all my thinking in this field that I think you ought to know about it without much further delay." Stimson would inform him of the development of an atomic bomb, and less than four months later Truman would have to decide whether to use it against Japan in an attempt to end World War II (1939-45). Truman did decide to use the bomb, perhaps one of the most momentous decisions in U.S. history. On August 6, 1945, at 8:15 a.m. (local time), the crew of the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb over the city of Hiroshima. The bomb detonated 2,000 feet above the center of Hiroshima, destroying 60% of the city (four square miles), and killing an estimated 70,000 to 100,000 people immediately. After the bombing, Truman described the attack as "only a warning of things to come." Development of the atomic bomb began under Franklin D. Roosevelt (top), and was completed under the administration of Harry S. Truman (bottom). Indeed, three days later, a B-29 dropped a second atomic bomb over Nagasaki. The bomb exploded 1,540 feet above the city, killing an estimated 40,000 people and destroying two square miles of the city. Many more people in both Hiroshima and Nagasaki subsequently died of radiation-related illnesses. Altogether, an estimated 242,000 people died as a result of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. The day after the Nagasaki bombing, Japan offered its surrender, and on August 14 Truman announced to the nation that Japan had surrendered. The treaty was formally signed in early September, bringing an end to World War II, during which the U.S. had suffered roughly one million casualties. At the time, it was widely accepted that the bomb was a necessary means to end the war and save the lives of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, of U.S. soldiers. In a December 1945 Fortune magazine poll, just 5% of respondents said the U.S. should not have used the bomb, while 54% approved of what had been done and another 23% said they wished the U.S. had dropped more atomic bombs on Japan before its surrender. However, there were some dissenting voices at the time. In the military, the atom bomb had not been unanimously viewed as the best way to end the war; alternative proposals for ending the war had included large-scale invasion of Japan, continued bombing of cities with conventional explosives, and continuation of a naval blockade to starve Japan into submission. In retrospect, several historians have challenged the need to drop the bomb, as well as the bomb's role in Japan's surrender. Should Truman have made the decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Or should he have followed another course of action to end the war? Were the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings immoral or necessary? Supporters of the bombing say that it was the best course of military action. Although Japan was essentially defeated, they argue, all of the indications showed that the Japanese planned to fight to the last man. They point to heavy U.S. losses in battles in the months leading up to Japan's surrender. They also contend that Japan's surrender was unlikely because the allies were demanding unconditional surrender, including the removal of Emperor Hirohito from the throne. Japan had categorically refused to surrender if the emperor—who was accorded godlike status by the Japanese—was not allowed to remain on the throne. Furthermore, proponents note, the main alternative to use of the atomic bomb being considered at the time was a mass invasion of the Japanese home islands. They contend that such an invasion would have been very costly in terms of U.S. lives. In using the bomb, supporters say, the U.S. brought the war to a quicker end, saving the lives of perhaps hundreds of thousands of U.S. soldiers. Critics of the atomic bombing, on the other hand, argue that it was immoral and barbaric to use such a destructive weapon against a civilian population. They also contend that it was unnecessary because Japan was on the verge of defeat. Evidence shows that in the months leading up to the Hiroshima bombing, Japan was trying to get third parties involved in peace negotiations, opponents assert. Japan would have soon surrendered if the U.S. had kept up with more conventional warfare and allowed time for those peace overtures to bear fruit, they argue. Others criticize the U.S. for being the first to use an atomic weapon in warfare, ushering in the nuclear age. They argue that, in using the bomb, the U.S. sparked a dangerous nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union for most of the rest of the 20th century. World War II and the Quest for Peace The U.S. entered World War II in 1941, two years after France and Britain jointly declared war against Nazi Germany. The war eventually expanded to include many other nations, including German allies Italy and Japan. The U.S. had resisted becoming militarily involved, but declared war on Japan on December 8, the day after a Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor naval base on the Hawaiian island of Oahu killed some 2,300 people. The war in Europe ended with Germany's surrender on May 7, 1945, but although Japan's navy and air force were largely defeated, Japan refused to surrender. For much of 1945, the U.S. was involved in several costly battles. In the fight on the Japanese island of Iwo Jima in February and March 1945, some 20,000 U.S. soldiers were killed, wounded or missing in action; 41,000 Americans were either killed or wounded during the battle of Okinawa, which took place from April to June; and 31,000 troops were killed or injured in the battle of Luzon (in the Philippines) during the summer of that year. The battles were even more costly for the Japanese; at Luzon, the Japanese suffered five casualties for every U.S. casualty. As the war in the Pacific continued into the later half of 1945, the U.S. military was planning a large-scale invasion of Japan's home islands as a final push to end the war. Some 767,000 U.S. troops were scheduled to land on the southern island of Kyushu in November 1945 (in "Operation Olympic"). They would make Kyushu an air base for the second stage of the invasion ("Operation Coronet") —invading the main island of Honshu in March 1946 if Japan had not yet surrendered. However, Truman and other officials were also weighing the possibility of using newly developed atomic bombs against Japan to force its surrender. The U.S. had begun a program to develop an atomic bomb after learning of Germany's efforts to do so in 1939. The U.S. accelerated those efforts after entering the war against Japan, and on July 16, 1945, the first U.S. atomic bomb was successfully tested. In July 1945, Truman, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin met for a conference in Potsdam, Germany, to discuss post-war Europe and military options in Japan. While attending the Potsdam conference, Truman was informed of the successful test of the atomic bomb. On July 25, Truman and Stimson approved a written order for the use of the bomb against Japan. The following day, the allies issued the Potsdam Declaration; while not specifically mentioning the atomic bomb, the declaration demanded that Japan surrender immediately or face "prompt and utter destruction." The allies insisted on Japan's unconditional surrender, which—although not specifically mentioned in the declaration— would include the removal of Hirohito, which the allies saw as necessary to end Japanese militarism. In a picture dated August 1945, the crew of the B-29 bomber Enola Gay stands before their plane. This plane dropped the bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. Japan immediately rejected any surrender that would not leave the emperor on his throne. Less than two weeks later, the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima. "It was to spare the Japanese people from utter destruction that the ultimatum of July 26 was issued at Potsdam," Truman said in a statement following the Hiroshima attack (but before the Nagasaki bombing). "Their leaders promptly rejected that ultimatum. If they do not now accept our terms, they may expect a rain of ruin from the air the likes of which has never been seen on this earth." Following the Hiroshima bombing, there was no sign that the Japanese would surrender. On August 9, the U.S. dropped a second atomic bomb over the city of Nagasaki, one of southern Japan's largest sea ports. The target had actually been the nearby city of Kokura, but due to cloud cover over that city, the pilots decided to drop the bomb over Nagasaki instead. The same day, the Soviets invaded Manchuria, entering the war against the Japanese. Japan and the Soviet Union in 1941 had signed a neutrality pact, but at a meeting near Yalta, Ukraine, in February 1945, the Soviets had agreed to join the war against Japan within three months following the end of the war in Europe. Japan offered its surrender following the Nagasaki bombing, and the official surrender was announced August 14. While the fate of the emperor had been an obstacle to peace leading up to Japan's surrender, in the end it was agreed that Hirohito would remain on the throne as long as he was subject to the authority of the commander of the Allied occupying force, U.S. General Douglas MacArthur. Although Japan surrendered soon after the Nagasaki bombing, debate still exists over whether it was the bombings or other factors, such as the Soviet entrance into the war, that brought about Japan's surrender. The debate is intensified when moral considerations about the use of atomic weapons enter into it. The Case for the Atomic Bombing Supporters portray the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings as a necessary means of ending the war with the fewest American lives lost. By shocking and demoralizing the Japanese troops and government through use of the bomb, they reason, the U.S. brought about a quicker surrender than would have occurred through conventional warfare. "Having found the bomb, we have used it. We have used it to shorten the agony of young Americans," Truman stated after the Hiroshima bombing. Indeed, upon hearing about Hiroshima, 2nd Lt. Paul Fussell, a 21-year-old who had been serving in France at the time and was anticipating being sent to Japan for final invasion, remarked, "We were going to live. We were going to grow up to adulthood after all." Fussell later became a well-known author. A scene of the devastation immediately after the U.S. dropped its first atomic bomb, on Hiroshima. Supporters at the time estimated that ending the war through the use of the atomic bomb would save thousands--perhaps even hundreds of thousands--of American lives by eliminating the need for a large-scale invasion of the Japanese homeland. Truman's military planners estimated that as many as 50,000 U.S. troops would be killed and more than 100,000 wounded in the first 30 days of such an invasion, with the total number of American deaths possibly surpassing 100,000. Truman later put that estimate at half a million troops, while Churchill said the lives of one million troops had been saved. But it was not just the lives of U.S. soldiers that were spared, proponents note. They contend that the Japanese civilian death toll would also have been higher if Truman had instead decided to continue with the conventional bombing of Japanese cities and/or a naval blockade, which was causing starvation. They say that it also brought quicker liberation to people being held by Japan in concentration camps, including hundreds of thousands of Westerners. Saving lives was not the only reason the U.S. needed to bring the war to a quick conclusion, some supporters say. They contend that it was important to end the war to prevent the Soviets from expanding their influence in the region. The Soviet Union was developing a growing sphere of influence, and some worried that, through entering the war against Japan and having a say in the partitioning of the defeated territories, the Soviets could gain a large foothold in the region. "I was not willing to hand over to the Russians the fruits of a long and bitter and courageous fight, a fight in which they had not participated," Truman wrote in his diary. Using the atomic bomb ended that threat, and also served as a show of U.S. strength to the Soviet Union, supporters assert. Nagasaki also was devastated after the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb. The ruins of the Roman Catholic cathedral of Nagasaki can be seen in the background. Supporters also dispute assertions that Japan was close to surrendering. In fact, they say, the indications were that Japan was preparing to fight to the end. They refer to fierce Japanese resistance at Okinawa just weeks before the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. They also point to statements by Japanese militarists in power that Japan would fight to the last man. For instance, Kantaro Suzuki, who was appointed premier in 1945, stated that his government intended to "fight to the very end...even if it meant the deaths of one hundred million Japanese." Furthermore, proponents assert, despite being on the verge of defeat, Japan refused to accept unconditional surrender because that would entail the removal of the emperor from his throne, overturning centuries of tradition. At Potsdam, the Allies had made clear that they would accept no less than unconditional surrender, proponents note. Supporters point to intercepted and decoded diplomatic and military communiques to show that Japan would not have accepted unconditional surrender. They say that in one such communique, Japan's ambassador to the Soviet Union, Naotake Sato, wrote to Soviet foreign affairs commissar Vyacheslav M. Molotov, "The Pacific War is a matter of life and death for Japan, and as a result of America's attitude, we have no choice but to continue the fight....It has now become clearly impossible for Japan to submit. Japan is fighting for her very existence and must continue to fight." Some critics of the bombing also point to the communiques to support their arguments, claiming that they show evidence of peace overtures. But despite some communiques showing such overtures by civilian leaders, supporters note, any peace agreement had to be approved by the Japanese cabinet, which was filled with militarists who categorically rejected unconditional surrender. Richard Frank, a World War II historian, notes that while the messages showed Japanese officials making peace overtures, "not a single one of these men...possessed actual authority to act for the Japanese government." Supporters of the use of the atomic bombs also note that the decoded military communiques showed an increased buildup on Kyushu, the site of the allied invasion planned for November. The buildup proves that despite being on the verge of defeat, Japan would continue to put up fierce resistance, which would have resulted in the loss of many American lives, they argue. The prospect of heavy resistance at Kyushu also made the invasion option untenable, proponents of the atomic bombing say. Some people, including some Japanese, have suggested that the bombings helped bring about the end of the war by giving the Japanese a way to surrender unconditionally without losing face. The Japanese government could tell the people that Japan simply could not defeat an enemy with nuclear weapons, they note. Hisatsune Sakomizu, Japan's chief cabinet secretary in 1945, called the bombing "a golden opportunity given by heaven for Japan to end the war." Others point out that, compared with other damage done during the war, the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings were not so devastating. They note that 600,000 Germans and 200,000 Japanese had been killed in Allied air raids prior to Hiroshima. Furthermore, some proponents contend, the U.S. did not target "civilians" with the bombs, as critics claim. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were military targets, they assert, because of bases and military factories located there. They also note that Japan fought a "total war," in which everyone in Japan was involved in the war effort, whether fighting or working in factories and military facilities. "It seems logical to me that he who supports total war in principle cannot complain of war against civilians," wrote Father John Siemes, a philosophy professor at Tokyo Catholic University, in his personal account of the Hiroshima bombing. Overall, supporters say, deadly though it was, bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the best possible option. Theodore Van Kirk, navigator on the Enola Gay during the Hiroshima mission, addressed the question of how he felt about his role in the bombing in a 2005 interview with the German magazine Der Spiegel. "I'm not proud of all the deaths it caused, and nobody is," he said. "But how do you win a war without killing people?" The Case Against the Atomic Bombing Critics of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings say that it is barbaric and a crime against humanity to target civilians with such a devastating weapon. They note that 95% of the people who were killed in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings were civilians. According to Japanese estimates in the wake of the bombing, some 75% of those immediately killed died as a result of burns, either from "flash burns" caused by the heat of the blast or from burns from fires sparked by the blast. Many more died later from effects of the radiation, including radiation sickness (also called acute radiation syndrome) and cancer. A man in Hiroshima (top) shows the photographer the flash burns he received from the dropping of the atomic bomb. Hiroshima, in another view (bottom), is virtually destroyed, with the exception of an odd building or two. "My own feeling was that in being the first to use it, we had adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages," Admiral William Leahy, Truman's chief of staff, said. "I was not taught to make war in that fashion, and wars cannot be won by destroying women and children." Some argued that the U.S. could have achieved the same result by dropping the bomb on less-populated areas, demonstrating its power without the loss of life. Critics also accuse the U.S. of having a double standard— its government, they say, would have condemned as immoral the use of an atomic bomb by any adversary. "If the Germans had dropped atomic bombs on cities instead of us, we would have defined the dropping of atomic bombs on cities as a war crime, and we would have sentenced the Germans who were guilty of this crime to death at Nuremberg and hanged them," said Leo Szilard, a scientist who played a major role in the creation of the atomic bomb but who was a vocal critic of using atomic bombs against Japan. Many critics also say that the bombings were not necessary. They point out that by 1945, Japan was already militarily devastated, and was putting up token resistance by midyear. "In April we knew they were beginning to try to surrender. They were already defeated in every sense. We were bombing their cities without any opposition. The Japanese were making airplane gasoline out of acorns. So we knew that they were on their last legs," says historian Gar Alperovitz. General Dwight Eisenhower, who succeeded Truman as president, held a similar view. "The Japanese were ready to surrender and it wasn't necessary to hit them with that awful thing," he said in a 1963 interview with Newsweek. Opponents also point to a 1946 report by the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, requested by Truman to study the damage done by U.S. air attacks. The report stated that Japan had made the decision to end the war much earlier in the year. The survey concluded: It cannot be said...that the atomic bomb convinced the leaders who effected the peace of the necessity to surrender. The decision to seek ways and means to terminate the war, influenced in part by the knowledge of the low state of popular morale, had been taken in May 1945 by the Supreme War Guidance Council. Like supporters of the bombings, critics point to decoded communiques to bolster their arguments. They say the decoded messages showed that as early as April and May 1945, Japan was in the process of going through a neutral mediator to make peace overtures, and argue that the U.S. should have given those efforts a chance to succeed. They also point out that in the months leading up to the bombings, Japan was trying to get the Soviet Union—which, before entering the war against Japan, had maintained a neutral stance with that country—to participate in peace negotiations. Even the Emperor supported peace at any price, critics of the bombing contend. "We have heard enough of this determination of yours to fight to the last soldiers. We wish that you, leaders of Japan, will strive now to study the ways and the means to conclude the war," Hirohito said at a June 22 meeting of the Supreme War Council. And even if Japan were not on the verge of surrendering, critics say, there were other means to bring an end to the war. Some argued for the planned mass invasion of the Japanese home islands to proceed. Others argued in favor of continuing the naval blockade, "Operation Starvation," and disrupting supply lines. "The effective naval blockade would, in the course of time, have starved the Japanese into submission through lack of oil, rice, medicines and other essential materials," said Admiral. Ernest King, U.S. chief of naval operations. Some critics argued for continued conventional air raids. They said that the air raids, more than any other military tactic, had devastated Japan. Mark Weber, director of the Institute for Historical Review, points out that on March 9-10, 1945, 300 B-29s bombed Tokyo, killing 100,000 people and burning 16 square miles of the city; further raids by U.S. B-29s later in May obliterated 56 square miles of Tokyo (one half the total area of the city). Former Japanese Premier Fumimaro Konoye noted, "Fundamentally, the thing that brought about the determination to make peace was the prolonged bombing by the B-29s." Others say that it was the entry of the Soviet Union, which had the largest army in the world, into the war against Japan—not the atomic bombings—that finally convinced Japan that they could not win. "Japanese die-hards...had acknowledged since 1941 that Japan could not fight Russia as well as the United States and Britain," historian Ernest May wrote in a 1995 article in Pacific Historical Review. Yet other critics say that Japan would have readily surrendered if the allies had only agreed that the emperor would remain on the throne, which is what was agreed to in the end anyway, they note. Former U.S. President Herbert Hoover (1929-33) suggested to Truman, "I am convinced that if you, as president, will make a shortwave broadcast to the people of Japan—tell them they can have their emperor if they surrender, that it will not mean unconditional surrender except for the militarists—you'll get a peace in Japan—you'll have both wars over." Other critics were concerned with the ramifications of using an atomic bomb in battle. Szilard warned that dropping the bomb would spark an arms race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Szilard said he was concerned "that by demonstrating the bomb and using it in the war against Japan, we might start an atomic arms race between America and Russia which might end with the destruction of both countries." Finally, some accuse the U.S. of ulterior motives in dropping the bomb. Some cite revenge for the Pearl Harbor attack, while others claim racism against the Japanese. Yet others say it was done for political reasons; either to justify the $2 billion ($20 billion in 1990 dollars) spent on the project to develop the bomb, or as the only way to obtain Japan's unconditional surrender, because the political cost of accepting anything less was too high. Hiroshima Bombing Ushers in The Nuclear Age Sixty years after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the debate over whether the bombings were necessary remains unresolved. But there is little dispute over the wider impact of the use of the atomic bomb: With the bombing of Hiroshima, the U.S. ushered in the nuclear age. However, while the use of the bomb helped spark a nuclear arms race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, analysts point out that Hiroshima and Nagasaki also served as a lesson about the devastation nuclear weapons can cause, serving as a deterrent to the use of such weapons. Newsweek magazine points out that since the Nagasaki bombing, roughly 525 above-ground nuclear explosions have taken place, and not one was an act of war. "One president after another and one leader of the Soviet Union after another looked at the destructive force of these weapons [after the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings] and made a private decision that there is no context in which they could ever be used," Atomic weapons historian Richard Rhodes writes. But some warn that the lessons will eventually be forgotten, increasing the nuclear risk as states begin to reverse decades-long efforts toward nuclear disarmament. "I worry that the memory of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is beginning to fade," says Mohamed ElBaradei, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency. "I worry also about the nuclear arsenal of democratic states, because as long as these weapons exist there is no absolute guarantee against the catastrophic consequences of theft, sabotage or an accident." However, only time will tell whether the lessons of Hiroshima and Nagasaki will linger or be forgotten in an increasingly nuclear world. Bibliography Alperovitz, Gar. "Hiroshima: Historians Reassess." Foreign Policy, Summer 1995, 15. Donnelly, Thomas. "Bearing the Burden." Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, July/August 2005, 55. Frank, Richard. "Why Truman Dropped the Bomb." Weekly Standard, August 8, 2005, 20. "I'm Not Proud of All the Deaths It Caused." August 5, 2005, Der Spiegel, www.spiegel.de. Kennedy, David. "Crossing the Moral Threshold." Time, August 1, 2005, 50. Krieger, David. "Remembering Hiroshima & Nagasaki." WagingPeace.org, August 1, 2003, www.wagingpeace.org. Kristoff, Nicholas. "Blood on Our Hands?" New York Times, August 5, 2003, A15. Kross, Peter. "The Decision to Drop the Bomb." World War II, July/August 2005, 40. "Living Under the Cloud." Time, August 1, 2005, 36. MacEachin, Douglas. "The Final Myths of the War With Japan: Signals Intelligence, U.S. Invasion Planning, and the A-Bomb Decision." Center for the Study of Intelligence, December 1998, www.odci.gov/csi. "President Truman Did Not Understand." U.S. News & World Report, August 15, 1960, 68. Roberts, Jeffrey. "Peering Through Different Bombsights." Airpower Journal, Spring 1998, 66. Weber, Mark. "Was Hiroshima Necessary?" Journal of Historical Review, May-June 1997, 4. Wiegrefe, Klaus. "My God, What Have We Done?" Der Spiegel, August 1, 2005, www.spiegel.de. "Wisdom of the Bomb." New York Post, August 6, 2003, 28. Japanese American Internment Preservation of National Security or Violation of Japanese Americans' Rights? By Jennifer Dunham The issue: Is the relocation of Japanese Americans from the West Coast during World War II (1939-45) needed to ensure U.S. security during the war against Japan? Or is such a measure an unnecessary violation of Japanese Americans' rights? Arguments for internment: The Japanese attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor in 1941 destroyed many of the battleships that would have protected the West Coast, leaving it vulnerable to Japanese attack. There is a risk that Japanese Americans might place their allegiance with Japan, forming a "fifth column" that could assist Japan with an invasion of the U.S. Internment camps are necessary because the government, particularly in a time of war, does not have the time to determine the loyalty of each individual of Japanese descent. Arguments against internment: Interning Japanese American citizens without any evidence that they have committed or intend to commit a crime—based solely on their race—violates the Constitution's Fifth Amendment guarantee that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. It also violates the 14th Amendment, which gives all persons, regardless of race, equal protection under the law. Put simply, loyalty cannot be judged on race. 1 This barren, isolated relocation center, located in Heart Mountain, Wyoming, was typical of the camps built to house Japanese Americans during World War II. Introduction On December 7, 1941, Japan launched a surprise aerial attack on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, on the Hawaiian island of Oahu. In the attack that day, which U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt (D, 1933-45) described as a "date which will live in infamy," nearly 200 Japanese bombers severely crippled the U.S. Pacific Fleet, which was based at Pearl Harbor. Several U.S. battleships and hundreds of aircraft were destroyed, and more than 2,300 U.S. military personnel were killed. The next day, Congress declared war on Japan, marking the U.S.'s entry into World War II (1939-45). The U.S. joined the "Allied" nations—Britain and France—in a war against the "Axis" powers of Germany, Italy and Japan. At the time, there were more than 125,000 people of Japanese descent living on the U.S. mainland, around two-thirds of whom had been born in the U.S. In addition, there were more than 155,000 ethnic Japanese living in Hawaii, which was then a U.S. territory. The vast majority of Japanese Americans on the mainland—about 110,000—lived in California, Oregon and Washington State. The attack on Pearl Harbor sparked widespread fears among the American public and some members of the government that Japan's next move would be to attack the U.S. West Coast, which at the time was poorly defended. Persons of Japanese ancestry, especially first-generation Japanese immigrants, known as Issei, came to be viewed 2 suspiciously. By as early as December 11, 1941, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had detained 1,370 Japanese Americans classified as "dangerous enemy aliens." In subsequent months, the public's fear of disloyalty and sabotage by Japanese Americans was stoked by the press and politicians on the West Coast. Moments after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, rescue parties rushed into the flaming waters to search for survivors. Two and a half months after the Pearl Harbor attack, Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which authorized the secretary of war to define military areas "from which any or all persons may be excluded as deemed necessary or desirable." As a result of that order, all persons of Japanese descent in the western U.S., more than 60% of whom were U.S. citizens, were transferred to internment camps away from the Pacific Coast. Persons of Italian and German ancestry were not placed in the camps, though they were ordered away from some ports on the West Coast. Only Japanese Americans were forced to leave their homes and possessions behind and move to camps in remote locations in the interior. As the wartime hysteria faded, the majority of internees were allowed to leave the camps by 1945, with the last departing in early 1946. Select groups of internees deemed not to be a threat were released as early as May 1942. 3 Objections to internment at the time were not widespread, but there were some strong critics. In four separate instances, children of the first-generation Japanese immigrants— who were U.S. citizens—challenged the policy in court cases that reached the U.S. Supreme Court. To the dismay of civil-rights activists, the Supreme Court sided with the U.S. government in three of the four cases. Was the fear of Japanese Americans' sympathy for the enemy justified in a time of war? Or was the internment a racist policy that violated the constitutional rights of loyal U.S. citizens and residents? Supporters of internment, including local politicians and influential journalists on the Pacific Coast, argued that any violation of the rights of Japanese Americans was justified by the need to protect the security of the country in wartime. Some warned about the existence of a "fifth column"—Japanese Americans who supported the enemy and who would aid Japan in an invasion or commit acts of sabotage on military or civilian facilities. To protect the country, they said, the government had to act quickly to counter the possible threat posed by the Japanese Americans. There was not time to determine the loyalty of each person on a case-by-case basis, they asserted. Opponents—the most vocal of whom came from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), a Quaker group— countered that singling out a particular group for internment was an unconstitutional infringement of their right to liberty. The government was giving in to anti-Japanese prejudice on the West Coast, critics charged. They asserted that supporters of the policy had exaggerated the threat posed by Japanese Americans, and claimed that it did not warrant violating the constitutional rights of loyal U.S. citizens. They also noted the differing experience of ethnic Japanese in Hawaii, who for the most part remained free during the war, and pointed to the fact that there was no subversive activity in Hawaii as evidence that interning Japanese Americans on the U.S. mainland was unnecessary. Background to Internment Asian immigrants to the U.S. had been subject to discriminatory laws since the late 1800s. The U.S. Constitution originally defined naturalization as available only to "free, white persons." In the aftermath of the Civil War (1861-65), the Naturalization Act of 1870 extended the right of naturalization to "persons of African nativity or descent," to include former slaves. At the same time, Asians were defined as "aliens ineligible to citizenship." The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 barred immigration by Chinese laborers—a result of a perception that Chinese immigrants were taking jobs away from Americans. 4 Japanese Americans were already well established in California before the great earthquake of 1906 in San Francisco. This photo dates from that time and shows a prosperous Japanese store. Japanese began immigrating to the U.S. mainland in large numbers at the beginning of the 20th century, after Chinese immigration was limited. In 1900, according to U.S. Census data, there were 24,326 Japanese Americans in the U.S. (excluding Hawaii). The population increased to 72,157 in 1910; 111,010 in 1920; and 138,834 in 1930. The vast majority lived on the Pacific Coast, primarily in California. Japanese workers had migrated to Hawaii, which became a U.S. territory in 1900, beginning in the 1880s, and faced a very different environment there because there were needed as laborers. Japanese immigrants to the U.S. mainland faced a similarly hostile reception as the Chinese. As a result, they lived mainly in isolation, having little interaction with the majority white population. The Issei (who under the 1870 Naturalization Act could not become U.S. citizens) formed communities called Nihonmachi, or "Japan towns," with their own cultural and religious institutions. That served only to foster hostility and misunderstanding toward Japanese Americans by whites. Nisei-children of the Issei who were born in the U.S. and who were U.S. citizens-were split between two worlds. Many attended U.S. schools, spoke English and were 5 continually exposed to American culture. But they also sought to preserve their Japanese heritage, by attending Japanese language schools and cultural events. Some Nisei, referred to as Kibei, were sent back to Japan for their education, and therefore formed strong ties with that country. Given that Japan was a relatively strong world power compared with China, the passage of legislation excluding Japanese laborers was considered not to be feasible. Nevertheless, anti-Japanese sentiment on the West Coast continued to rise, fueled by sensationalistic media articles and the racist rhetoric of local politicians. The situation escalated into the 1906 "San Francisco School Board affair," in which the school board of San Francisco ordered ethnic Japanese students to go to a segregated school in the city's Chinatown section that was attended by Chinese pupils. The government of Japan protested, and President Theodore Roosevelt (R, 1901-09) intervened. His administration entered into talks with Japan that resulted in the Gentlemen's Agreement of 1907-08. Under that agreement, the U.S. pledged not to enact legislation specifically against Japanese immigrants, and agreed to allow divided Japanese families to be reunited in the U.S. (That part of the agreement eventually resulted in the immigration of tens of thousands of Japanese women and children.) In return, Japan agreed to stop issuing passports to laborers to travel to the U.S. By the time of the internment, Japanese Americans were a significant factor in California agriculture. 6 Under the 1913 California Alien Land Law (amended in 1920), "aliens ineligible to citizenship" were prohibited from owning, and later, leasing, agricultural land in California. That prevented most Issei from owning or leasing land, but did not apply to the Nisei. As a result, many of the Issei were able to retain their land by putting it in the names of their children. The Immigration Act of 1924 established immigration quotas for each nation based on the number of its citizens living in the U.S. in 1890, but also barred all immigration by "aliens ineligible to citizenship." That effectively ended all immigration by Japanese, and sparked mass protests in Japan. According to census and immigration data, there were 126,948 people of Japanese descent living in the U.S. in 1940, of whom 112,353 lived on the West Coast. Many Japanese Americans lived in rural areas, and more than half of adult males were employed in the agriculture, forestry or fishing industries. Others worked in wholesale or retail trade—mainly in Japanese-owned small businesses—or were servants or worked in the service industry. The Issei therefore remained isolated from the larger U.S. population in Japanese enclaves, maintaining traditional cultural values. Meanwhile, their children were exposed to mainstream American culture by attending public schools where, for the most part, they excelled, a result of the great emphasis that ethnic Japanese placed on education and hard work. However, despite their educational success, they were denied opportunities to succeed in mainstream society due to rampant discrimination against Asians. In 1939, the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) was founded by Nisei living on the West Coast. They hoped that by asserting their loyalty to the U.S. and sharply distinguishing themselves from the Issei, who were not allowed to join the JACL, they would be treated more fairly. In 1940, as the Imperial Japanese Army was continuing to conquer China and other parts of Asia, the U.S. Congress passed the Alien Registration Act (also known as the Smith Act, after its author, Representative Howard Smith [D, Virginia]). The act required all adult resident aliens to register annually with the government, have their fingerprints taken and report to the government any change of address. That allowed the government to keep track of ethnic Japanese aliens who were already coming under suspicion for loyalty to the land of their birth. President Roosevelt in 1941 ordered journalist John Franklin Carter, who ran a secret White House intelligence unit, to commission a report on Japanese Americans living on the West Coast. The report, written by businessman Curtis Munson, found that the vast majority of Japanese Americans were loyal to the U.S. However, it warned that a few were capable of sabotage, and that essential infrastructure on the West Coast, such as dams, bridges and power plants, was vulnerable. Then came the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. In its aftermath, the Justice Department rounded up around 3,000 "enemy aliens"—Japanese, German and Italian non-citizens— that it had identified as dangerous. Half of those aliens were ethnic Japanese, mainly community leaders. Also, the Treasury Department froze the U.S. bank accounts of all 7 enemy aliens, and the Justice Department closed all U.S. land borders to people of Japanese ancestry, whether they were aliens or U.S. citizens. The Western Defense Command (WDC), led by Lieutenant General John DeWitt, was created on December 11, 1941, and was charged with defending the West Coast from a potential attack by Japan. In the months between the attack on Pearl Harbor and the promulgation of Executive Order 9066, anti-Japanese sentiment was stoked by the press and politicians on the West Coast. Sensationalistic reports of imminent attacks by the Japanese navy and acts of spying or sabotage by Japanese Americans were featured in many newspapers, creating near-hysteria among the public. Also at that time, U.S. forces suffered several defeats in the Pacific, as Japan continued its march through Southeast Asia. Reports of atrocities committed by the Japanese army in Southeast Asia sparked fear that Japan could invade the Western U.S. and inflict similar treatment on Americans. The hysteria, fear and anger that gripped the nation, and especially the West Coast, after the Pearl Harbor attack shook the corridors of power in Washington, D.C. Despite assertions of loyalty by the JACL, anti-Japanese public opinion became more prevalent, and discussions began at high levels of the government and military about whether to move Japanese Americans away from the West Coast. Interning Japanese Americans, it was believed, was one of the few actions the government could take to reassure the public. Evacuations and Life in the Camps Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, authorizing the military to designate "military areas" from which "any or all persons may be excluded." Although it did not specifically say so, the order in practice applied only to ethnic Japanese, and made no distinction between Japanese aliens and those who were U.S. citizens. No U.S. citizens of Italian or German descent were ordered to leave the military areas, though about 2,000 German-born aliens and hundreds of Italian-born aliens were sent to camps run by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). 8 The first mass evacuation of Japanese Americans was carried out on February 25, 1942, when the Navy ordered all ethnic Japanese residents of Terminal Island, near Los Angeles, to leave within 48 hours. On March 2, 1942, DeWitt issued Public Proclamation No. 1, which created Military Areas Nos. 1 and 2. The first area comprised the coastal areas of California, Oregon and Washington State, as well as part of Arizona; the second area included the rest of those states. Roosevelt, with Executive Order 9102, created the civilian War Relocation Authority (WRA) some two weeks later. That agency would 9 "provide for the removal from designated areas of persons whose removal is necessary in the interests of national security." A copy of the relocation order for Japanese Americans living in Los Angeles County issued by the Western Defense Command under the leadership of Lieutenant General John DeWitt. The WRA soon began issuing "Civilian Exclusion Orders," which divided the military areas into 108 districts. The first district to be evacuated was Bainbridge Island, in Washington State's Puget Sound. Throughout the spring of 1942, the government systematically removed all ethnic Japanese—more than 110,000 people—from the remaining 107 districts, completing the evacuation by early June 1942. 10 Ethnic Japanese in those districts were given little advance notice of their removal, and thus had only a few days to get their affairs in order. Since they could take with them only what they could carry, they were forced to quickly sell or otherwise dispose of their homes, businesses, vehicles and other possessions. They were forced to give up valued personal possessions such as heirlooms brought from Japan and family pets. Many Americans took advantage of their plight; ethnic Japanese relocated from the West Coast are estimated to have lost about $400 million in property and income by the end of World War II. After leaving their homes, Japanese Americans were required to gather at "assembly centers" in their communities to await transportation to one of 10 "relocation centers"— the government's official name for the internment camps—in the interior of the U.S. Those makeshift assembly centers, run by the Army, were often former fairgrounds or racetracks—for example, Japanese Americans removed from the Los Angeles area were taken to Santa Anita racetrack, where they were housed in horse stalls and tents. Some waited for months at those centers before being sent to internment camps. Japanese Americans gathered on Van Ness in San Francisco, with two suitcases each (the most allowed under evacuation orders), for busing to official "assembly areas". Once at these assembly areas, they were registered and transported to "relocation centers"—the government's official name for internment camps. 11 There was little disobedience by the Japanese Americans as they were forced out of their homes. For the most part, they did not need to be rounded up, but instead went dutifully to the assembly centers, and then on to the internment camps. The few instances of resistance, in which Japanese Americans were arrested for violating curfews imposed on all ethnic Japanese living in the military areas prior to their removal or refusing to obey orders to leave a military area, were later used as test cases to challenge the constitutionality of the exclusion orders and internment. The 10 internment camps were all in remote locations, including some Native American reservations. They were located in Amache, Colorado; Gila River, Arkansas.; Heart Mountain, Wyoming; Jerome, Arkansas; Manzanar, California; Minidoka, Idaho; Poston, Arizona; Rohwer, Arkansas; Topaz, Utah; and Tule Lake, California. (see map above) The accommodations at the camps were sparse; internees were housed in hastily constructed, barracks-style buildings. Families lived in one-room apartments, with the only furnishings being cots, blankets and a light bulb. The internees shared communal toilet, bathing, laundry and dining facilities. Eventually, schools were opened for the younger children, and the internees were able to grow some of their own food. The camps were staffed by armed guards and surrounded by barbed wire. A number of Japanese Americans were killed in the camps, either by guards or in disputes with other internees. In 1943, Ansel Adams, America's best-known photographer, documented the Manzanar War Relocation Center in California. Not long after the evacuation of Japanese Americans from the West Coast was completed, the WRA began arranging for some internees to leave the camps. With the help of the AFSC, a group founded by the Quakers that promoted peace and social justice, the 12 National Student Council Relocation Program was established. Under that program, about 4,300 Japanese American students by the fall of 1942 were released from the camps to attend colleges and universities outside the military areas. Another group that was allowed to leave the camps was farm workers. Beginning in May 1942, they were released to perform desperately needed work on sugar beet farms in southeastern Oregon. Eventually, as many as 10,000 people were freed from the camps to work on farms during harvest time, although most were required to return. Other Japanese Americans were freed to work as linguists for the Army's language school. In early 1944, the government declared that all ethnic Japanese who were U.S. citizens could again become eligible for the draft (they had been disqualified from military service after the start of World War II). In an attempt to determine the loyalty of the internees, every person in the camps over the age of 17 was required to fill out a "loyalty questionnaire." They were asked questions including: "Are you willing to serve in the armed forces of the United States on combat duty, wherever ordered?" and "Will you swear unqualified allegiance to the United States of America and faithfully defend the United States from any or all attack by foreign or domestic forces, and foreswear any form of allegiance to the Japanese emperor, to any other foreign government, power or institution?" Most residents of the camps answered "yes" to each question; however, few volunteered for the draft, and only 800 left the camps to join the U.S. military. Those who answered "no"—either out of loyalty to Japan or out of resentment over their treatment by the U.S. government—were sent to the Tule Lake camp, and "loyal" Japanese Americans were transferred from Tule Lake to other camps. Tule Lake became a hotbed of pro-Japanese activity, and was the site of near-constant unrest. Supreme Court Considers Internment Four legal challenges to the treatment of Japanese Americans reached the U.S. Supreme Court. All four—Hirabayashi v. U.S., Yasui v. U.S., Korematsu v. U.S. and ex parte Endo—were filed by Nisei, and, in general, challenged the U.S.'s government's right to treat certain U.S. citizens differently solely based on their race. The cases of Gordon K. Hirabayashi and Minoru Yasui challenged the curfews imposed on all ethnic Japanese. Both Hirabayashi and Yasui had been arrested for violating those curfews. In Hirabayashi, the Supreme Court in June 1943 ruled, 9-0, that a curfew targeting one racial group was justified in a time of war. The Yasui case, which dealt with the same issue, was sent back to a lower court for further consideration in light of the Hirabayashi decision. 13 In 1944, the U.S. government sent those Japanese Americans of "questionable" loyalty to Tule Lake Camp...
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