[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 47 (Wednesday, March 16, 2022)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E268]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





           JAPANESE AMERICAN WORLD WAR II HISTORY NETWORK ACT

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                        HON. SHEILA JACKSON LEE

                                of texas

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, March 15, 2022

  Ms. JACKSON LEE. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 6434, the 
Japanese American WWII History Network Act to direct the Secretary of 
the Interior to establish, within the National Park Service, the 
Japanese American World War II History Network.
  We must never forget the maltreatment that these Americans endured.
  The establishment of this network would educate generations to come 
on past racial injustices in our country, in an effort to avoid future 
prejudice.
  The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, marked the 
United States' official entrance into World War II.
  Two months later, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive 
Order 9066, which ordered 120,000 people of Japanese descent to be 
forcibly removed from their homes and placed in internment camps, based 
on the widespread suspicion that they were acting as foreign agents.
  The belief was baseless, but that didn't stop the War Relocation 
Authority from rounding up more than 120,000 people--two-thirds of whom 
were U.S. citizens.
  Japanese Americans were interned and essentially treated as 
prisoners.
  After decades of pressure from the Japanese American League (JACL) 
and the Japanese American community, President Jimmy Carter opened an 
investigation to determine if the imprisonment of these people was 
justified by the government.
  The investigation found virtually no evidence of Japanese disloyalty 
and concluded that the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans was a 
product of abject racism.
  In 1988, over 40 years after the internment camps closed, President 
Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act, which offered a formal 
apology for the government's policy toward Japanese Americans and paid 
$20,000 in compensation to each of the 80,000 living survivors.
  The reparations granted to the survivors and the official apology 
were necessary for our country to move past this grave racial 
injustice.
  It must be noted that, just as our government recognized that 
reparations to the Japanese American community was necessary to 
acknowledge and move beyond that injustice, America's original racist 
tragedy must be similarly addressed.
  On July 30, 2008 the U.S. House of Representatives passed H. Res. 194 
apologizing for American slavery and subsequent discriminatory laws.
  The Senate has never passed a resolution, and no reparations have 
been granted.
  Millions of Africans and their descendants were enslaved in the 
United States from 1619 through 1865.
  Slavery in America resembled no other form of involuntary servitude 
known in history, as Africans were captured and sold at auction like 
inanimate objects or animals.
  Africans forced into slavery were brutalized, humiliated, 
dehumanized, and subjected to the indignity of being stripped of their 
names and heritage.
  In 2022, he passage of H.R. 40 is essential to solving the deep 
racial, economic, social, and cultural divides in America.
  Now more than ever, the facts and circumstances facing our nation 
demonstrate the importance of H.R. 40 and the necessity of placing our 
nation on the path to reparative justice.
  By passing H.R. 40, Congress can start a movement toward the national 
reckoning that we need in order to bridge racial divides.
  Reparations are ultimately about respect and reconciliation and the 
hope that someday, all Americans can walk together toward a more just 
future.
  We owe it to the millions of Americans who were born into bondage, 
knew a life of servitude, and died anonymous deaths, as prisoners of 
this system.
  We owe it to the millions of descendants of these slaves, for they 
are the heirs to a society of inequities and indignities that naturally 
filled the vacuum after slavery was formally abolished 154 years ago.
  Madam Speaker, the establishment of the Japanese American WWII 
History Network would represent much more than just a resource that 
will educate on inequality and brutality in America.
  It represents Americans moving past injustices and honoring those who 
were once victims of racial discrimination in our country.
  I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of H.R. 6434, the Japanese 
American WII History Network.

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