To Oppose Reparations to Interned Japanese-Americans Is to Miss the Point Entirely

The March 1 edition of The Times carried two letters by individuals objecting to reparations paid to survivors of American internment camps for citizens and residents of Japanese ancestry. The writers are evidently not acquainted with what actually happened, as they believe that internees were better treated than individuals in the armed forces. This is not true.

Draftees inducted into the army were not deprived of due process, reasonable bail, or speedy and public trial before imprisonment. They were not arrested in their homes and taken from their families, sometimes for years, with no opportunity to consult an attorney or appeal to the courts. Their families were not required to dispose of all their property within hours. Their parents, grandparents, wives, siblings and children were not taken out of their homes and schools, housed in stables and sent to inaccessible areas where they were forbidden to document the conditions of their imprisonment.

The internment camps were racist. No Nisei or Sansei 3-year-old declared war on the United States government or engaged in espionage, but this fact did not prevent their imprisonment solely on the basis of their ancestry. The camps were unconstitutional, and if any group can be singled out and excluded from constitutional protection, then any person of any national origin, religion, language or other membership can likewise be singled out and excluded. Failure to protect constitutional rights in one case sets a precedent for ignoring them in another case. Your failure to protect my rights makes you vulnerable to the same injustice.

HELEN JASKOSKI, Fullerton