Japanese American Redress
Scope and Contents
Senator Daniel Inouye was a lead sponsor of the Redress Commission Bill (S. 1647) introduced on August 2, 1979, and signed by Jimmy Carter into law on July 21, 1980. This was the start of reparations towards the Japanese American families interned during World War II. The Civil Liberties Act of 1988, signed by Ronald Reagan on August 10, 1988, mandated an apology and payment of $20,000 to an estimated 60,000 Japanese American survivors of the World War II interment and establishment of an education fund. Redress was restricted to US citizens and permanent residents of Japanese ancestry at time of internment. Japanese Latin Americans were excluded from legislation, because they were considered “illegal aliens” and not US citizens.
Dates
- From the Series: Creation: 1942-2010, bulk 1970-2010
Conditions Governing Access
Access restrictions apply to certain records in the papers that have been determined to contain sensitive personal or government information. Series assessed to contain sensitive information will remain closed until 2028 with the exception of Constituent Services Case Work, which contains high levels of personal identifiable information. Constituent Services Case Work will be available to requesting individuals upon review and approval of the archivist or librarian managing the Property. Individual files or records assessed to contain sensitive information may also carry restrictions. Series assessed with medium risk may be made available to the researcher after the files are reviewed for sensitive information or formats. Series assessed to be of low risk of disclosing sensitive information may be open and available to researchers.
Low risk: The following series pose little risk of revealing sensitive information and could be made available to the public with little harm: Administrative Files, Campaign Files, Constituent Services(Correspondence and Projects), House Records, Kaho’olawe, Native Hawaiian Issues, Japanese Latin American Internment, Personal, Political Affairs, Speeches, Scheduling Files, Medal of Honor, Legislative Files, Photographs, Public Relations, Books, and Subject Files.
Medium risk: ABSCAM, Staff Files, Born-Digital (format-based), Microfilm.
Series with sensitive information: Constituent Services (Case Work), Watergate, Iran-Contra, and subseries containing records related to military and defense appropriations.
This collection may be accessed in the John Troup Moir Jr. and Gertrude M.F. Moir Archives Reading Room on the fifth floor of the Hamilton Library addition. Reading room hours and policies can be found on the archives website: https://manoa.hawaii.edu/library/research/collections/archives/visiting-us/. If you have questions, please contact the archives by email: archives@hawaii.edu or phone: (808) 956-6047.
Repository Details
Part of the University of Hawaii at Manoa Libraries Repository