Japanese internment in Canada

Japanese-Canadian Internment was the removal and detainment of Japanese Canadians from the British Columbia coast following the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong and Malaya and attack on Pearl Harbor, and the subsequent Canadian declaration of war on Japan during World War II. This forced relocation subjected many Japanese Canadians to government-enforced curfews and interrogations, job and property losses, and forced repatriation to Japan.

Beginning after the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and lasting until 1949 (four years after World War II had ended), Canadians of Japanese heritage were removed from their homes and businesses and sent to internment camps in the B.C. interior, and to farms and internment camps across Canada. The Canadian government shut down all Japanese-language newspapers, took possession of businesses and personal property. In order to fund internment, property belonging to Japanese Canadians was sold, including fishing boats, motor vehicles, houses, and personal belongings.

In August 1944, Prime Minister Mackenzie King announced that Japanese Canadians were to move east out of B.C. The official policy stated that Japanese Canadians must move east of the Rocky Mountains or be repatriated to Japan following the end of the war. However, by 1947 many Japanese Canadians had been granted exemption to this enforced no-entry zone, but it was not until April 1, 1949 that Japanese Canadians were granted freedom of movement and could re-enter the "protected zone" along B.C.'s coast. On September 22, 1988, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney delivered an apology, and the Canadian government announced a compensation package.

Tension between Canadians and Japanese immigrants to Canada existed long before the outbreak of World War II. Starting as early as 1858 with the influx of Asian immigrants during the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, negative beliefs and fears about Asian immigrants began to affect the populace in British Columbia. Canadian sociologist Forrest La Violette reported in the 1940s that these early sentiments had often been "organized around the fear of an assumed low standard of living [and] out of fear of Oriental cultural and racial differences". Both Japanese and Chinese immigrants were feared to be taking jobs from white Canadians. Because of this, Canadian academic Charles H. Young concluded that many Canadians argued that "Oriental labour lowers the standard of living of White groups". It was also argued that Asian immigrants were content with a lower standard of living. The argument was that many Chinese and Japanese immigrants in British Columbia lived in unsanitary conditions and were not inclined to improve their living space thereby proving their inferiority and their unwillingness to become truly Canadian. These ideas were often refuted with the argument that, while Japanese and Chinese immigrants did often have poor living conditions, both groups attempts to assimilate were hindered by the difficulty they had in finding steady work at equal wages.

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