Italian American internment
| Date | 1941–44 |
|---|---|
| Location | United States |
The internment of Italian Americans refers to the government's internment of Italian nationals in the United States during World War II, similar to that of the Internment of Japanese Americans and Internment of German Americans. As was customary after Italy and the US were at war, they were classified as "enemy aliens" and some were detained by the Department of Justice under the Alien and Sedition Act. But in practice, the US applied detention only to Italian nationals, not to US citizens, or long-term US residents. Italian immigrants had been allowed to gain citizenship through the naturalization process during the years before the war, and by 1940 there were millions of US citizens who had been born in Italy. Ethnic Italians were the largest group in the United States among nationals and ethnic descendants of the three peoples represented by the three Axis powers.
In 1942 there were 695,000 Italian immigrants in the United States. Some 1881 were taken into custody and detained under wartime restrictions; these were applied most often by the War Relocation Authority to diplomats, businessmen, and Italian nationals who were students in the US, especially to exclude them from sensitive coastal areas. In addition, merchant seamen trapped in US ports by the outbreak of war were detained. Italian labor leaders lobbied for recognition as loyal (and not enemy aliens) those Italian Americans who had initiated naturalization before the war broke out; they objected to blanket classification of Italian nationals as subversives.
In 2001 the US Attorney General reported to Congress on a review of treatment by the Department of Justice of Italian Americans during World War II. In 2010, the California Legislature passed a resolution apologizing for US mistreatment of Italian residents during the war.
The term "Italian American" does not have a legal definition. It is generally understood to mean ethnic Italians of American nationality, whether Italian-born immigrants to the United States (naturalized or unnaturalized) or American-born people of Italian descent (natural-born U.S. citizens).
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