Japanese Immigrants In California
The United States is a nation of immigrants. Everyone in the country has heard this statement most people worldwide can tell you the same. Nowhere in the country is this more obvious than in the state of California, the nation’s most diverse state. It should be no surprise to most people that Japanese immigrants have a long history in California due to their visible presence there. My argument is that the Japanese are an integral part of California and also our country and have been instrumental in its development. During the 19th and 20th century, the Japanese made up one of the largest Asian ethnic groups immigrating into the United States. After a long-held policy of isolationism, the Emperor finally opened the country’s borders in 18681,
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Two years after that ruling, the Immigration Act of 192418 was passed, limiting the number of immigrants that could come from Japan to two percent of the Japanese living in the US. This ruling shattered the Gentlemen’s Agreement put in place seventeen years prior, slowing down Japanese immigration.
Unfortunately, this was only the beginning of the discrimination against the Japanese. After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the United States declared war on the Axis powers while the Japanese in America dealt with an entire country’s hatred. Anti-Japanese laws19 had already fostered an environment of distrust against the Japanese, and the Pearl Harbor attack only made the situation worse. A month later, California dismissed all Japanese state employees illegally, despite the fact that most were citizens …show more content…
In the most arid parts of California, they built their own communities, creating beautiful gardens and landscaping on what could only be called a desert22. They used unsuitable farmland to vitalize the rice industry in California, and their own techniques were used by Americans to make themselves a profit as well23. Even with their aptitude for agriculture, the Japanese immigrants never tried to directly compete against Americans, taking on shunned crop and making it successful while allowing the Americans use of their own
Two years after that ruling, the Immigration Act of 192418 was passed, limiting the number of immigrants that could come from Japan to two percent of the Japanese living in the US. This ruling shattered the Gentlemen’s Agreement put in place seventeen years prior, slowing down Japanese immigration.
Unfortunately, this was only the beginning of the discrimination against the Japanese. After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the United States declared war on the Axis powers while the Japanese in America dealt with an entire country’s hatred. Anti-Japanese laws19 had already fostered an environment of distrust against the Japanese, and the Pearl Harbor attack only made the situation worse. A month later, California dismissed all Japanese state employees illegally, despite the fact that most were citizens …show more content…
In the most arid parts of California, they built their own communities, creating beautiful gardens and landscaping on what could only be called a desert22. They used unsuitable farmland to vitalize the rice industry in California, and their own techniques were used by Americans to make themselves a profit as well23. Even with their aptitude for agriculture, the Japanese immigrants never tried to directly compete against Americans, taking on shunned crop and making it successful while allowing the Americans use of their own