Square Deal for the Japanese

One man whose voice commanded respectful attention spoke out courageously last week. His subject: Are most Japanese in the U.S. bad? His verdict: No. The speaker: patrician Joseph Clark Grew, 63, who knows Japan from ten years there as U.S. Ambassador, and whose hatred for Japanese militarism is unquestioned.

Ambassador Grew, now special assistant to the Secretary of State, spoke in New York City. But his words were meant for the Pacific Coast, where 16,000 disloyal Japs, concentrated at Tule Lake, rioted a fortnight ago. Their troublemaking, compounded by sensationalized news reporting, had stirred bitter feeling up & down the coast against all U.S. Japanese. Yet many Japanese-Americans were in the U.S. Army; some were fighting ably in Italy; thousands of others have been cleared by the FBI, are now trying to begin life anew.

Said forthright Ambassador Grew:

“I do know that like the Americans of German descent, the overwhelming majority of Americans of Japanese origin are wholly loyal to the United States. . . . It does not make for loyalty to be constantly under suspicion when grounds for suspicion are absent. I have too great a belief in the sanctity of American citizenship to want to see these Americans of Japanese descent penalized and alienated through blind prejudice. I want to see them given a square deal.”