Condescending Advice for Internment Camp Parolees
When You Leave the Relocation Center
Publication: [Washington, D.C.?]: [War Relocation Authority], [1944].
Notes: An informational pamphlet for Japanese Americans who were paroled (given indefinite leave) from internment camps during the Second World War.
While this publication provides basic information about leaving the camps, having stored property shipped at government expense, working, and the draft, it is also a classic example of what would now be called gaslighting. The pamphlet suggests that the forced internment of 110,000 Japanese immigrants and their US citizen descendants was just one example of the all-American tradition of migration around the country:
"The demand for wartime workers has prompted the movement of thousands of families to new communities, where these grandchildren of pioneers have displayed an ability to meet new conditions that would have done credit to their ancestors. So the resettlement of American citizens and long-time residents of Japanese ancestry is paralleled by the movement of other groups of the population and is a sequel to the pioneering of the Issei who brought thousands of acres of western land into production. In this newest, great movement of which you are a part, the War Relocation Authority and other agencies of the government...are ready to assist."
Among the advice offered to those internees lucky enough to find work away from the West Coast, is a warning not to work for less than the prevailing wage, but also not to ask for too much. "Public sentiment is not likely to be friendly toward strangers who try to break prevailing wage scales by demanding more money."
Perhaps the most useful advice is the reminder to non-citizens that if they deposit money into a bank account after leaving the camps it will be seized by the government as a Japanese asset unless permission to open a bank account is first obtained from Washington.
9 pages. 5 by 8 inches. Pamphlet C-1656.
This is one of several pamphlets with the same name. There was an earlier 8-1/2 by 11 inch version, probably mimeographed; the present example (seemingly OCLC 32274861 or similar); one from 1945 with 7 pages; and another, also possibly 1945 (8-1/2 by 11 inches) with 13 pages.
SOURCE: Another book from the new arrivals list of one of the first booksellers I ever made substantial purchases from.
Edition + Condition: A near fine example.
Item No: #319410
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