Robert Strupp’s Reviews > By Order of the President: FDR and the Internment of Japanese Americans > Status Update

"When FDR died, the internment had not yet ended. On April 12, 1945, approximately 18,000 people remained imprisoned at Tule Lake, and some 55,000 internees were confined to the eight remaining camps..."

"Finally, after the War Department informed the President in spring 1944 that there was no longer any conceivable military reason for exclusion, Roosevelt delayed ending exclusion and opening the camps for six additional months, until after the November elections."

Page 111: "A few days after Pearl Harbor he [FDR] told Biddle [Attorney General of the U.S.] 'I don't care about the Italians. They are a lot of opera singers. But the Germans are different. They may be dangerous."

Page 91: "On January 29 a man from Orestat, California, urged the President to get rid of the 'Japs' and send them 'back' because they could not be trusted, and also because they 'occupy all the best farm ground in California.' He complained that Japanese-American farmers worked too hard. . ."