Reparations Victory Called ‘Bittersweet’
Japanese-Americans interned in U.S. camps during World War II celebrated the signing of federal legislation to fund reparations Wednesday but called it “a bittersweet victory” because so many former prisoners died without receiving the benefits.
“The mass imprisonment of American citizens and residents solely because of their Japanese ancestry has finally been redressed,” Frank Emi, a former internee, said at a news conference at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center in downtown Los Angeles.
President Bush signed a measure Tuesday guaranteeing reparations for the estimated 60,000 survivors of the internment camps, with payments beginning in October, 1990. Though then-President Ronald Reagan signed a redress bill authorizing payments of $20,000 for each living survivor in August, 1988, no funds were set aside for payments until now.
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