HI HCR160

Legislature apologizes to all Americans of Japanese ancestry for Hawaii's past actions supporting the unjust exclusion, removal, and incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II and failure to defend their civil rights.

Over 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were incarcerated in ten concentration camps following President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, resulting in loss of homes, businesses, farms, and careers.

Honouliuli Internment Camp in Hawaii held approximately 400 internees and 4,000 prisoners of war, with roughly 800 people initially detained at other facilities before the camp opened in March 1943; over 2,000 Japanese Americans from Hawaii were interned total, but none were ever convicted of sabotage, espionage, or acts against the United States.

The 1988 federal Civil Liberties Act and a 1983 Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians determined that Executive Order 9066 was not justified by military necessity but caused by racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and failure of political leadership.

A certified copy of the resolution shall be transmitted to the Governor of Hawaii.