View source for Executive Order 9102

{{Short description|1942 United States executive order}}
{{Use American English|date=January 2025}}
{{more citations needed|date=March 2012}}
{{Infobox U.S. Presidential Document
| executiveorder   = 9102
| longtitle        = ''Establishing the War Relocation Authority in the Executive Office of the President and Defining Its Functions and Duties''
| name             = 
| othershorttitles = 
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| depiction        = 
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| signeddate       = {{Start date|1942|03|18}}
| signedpresident  = Franklin D. Roosevelt
| summary          = Establishes the [[War Relocation Authority]]
| type             = Executive Order
| documentnumber   = 
| publicationdate  = 
| documentcitation = 
}}

'''Executive Order 9102''' is a [[United States president]]ial [[Executive order (United States)|executive order]] creating the [[War Relocation Authority]] (WRA), the US civilian agency responsible for the forced relocation and [[Japanese American internment|internment of Japanese-Americans]] during [[World War II]]. The executive order was signed by President [[Franklin Roosevelt]] on March 18, 1942, and it officially expired on June 30, 1946. The Director reported directly to the president of the United States.  Like his [[Executive Order 9066]], Roosevelt did not specifically mention Japanese Americans anywhere in the text, referring only to "persons whose removal is necessary". In contrast, the numerous exclusion orders signed by General [[John L. DeWitt]] specifically stated that those to be removed were "persons of Japanese ancestry".  <ref>{{cite book | last=Beito | first=David T. | title=The New Deal's War on the Bill of Rights: The Untold Story of FDR's Concentration Camps, Censorship, and Mass Surveillance | edition=First | pages=177–178| location=Oakland | publisher=Institute | year=2023 | isbn=978-1598133561}}</ref>

==Leadership==
[[Milton S. Eisenhower]], previously an official of the [[United States Department of Agriculture]], was chosen to head the WRA.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1985/05/03/us/milton-s-eisenhower-dies-at-85-served-as-adviser-to-president.html |date=3 May 1985 |title=Milton S. Eisenhower Dies at 85: Served as Adviser to President |newspaper=The New York Times |access-date=8 February 2018}}</ref> Eisenhower stepped down as the Director of the WRA in June 1942 to take a position as [[Elmer Davis]]'s deputy at the [[Office of War Information]],<ref name=DSM-1970>{{cite interview |url=https://www.trumanlibrary.org/oralhist/myerds3.htm |title=Oral History Interview with Dillon S. Myer |date=7 July 1970 |interviewer=Helen S. Pryor |subject=Dillon S. Myer |publisher=Harry S. Truman Presidential Library & Museum |access-date=8 February 2018}}</ref>{{rp|183}} and [[Dillon S. Myer]] was appointed in his place. Myer asked Eisenhower if he should accept, and according to Myer, Eisenhower advised him "Dillon, if you can sleep and still carry on the job my answer would be yes. I can’t sleep and do this job. I had to get out of it."<ref name=DSM-1970 />{{rp|184}}&nbsp;<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1987/02/22/books/can-you-do-the-job-and-sleep-at-night.html |title=Can you do the job and sleep at night? |author=Washburn, Patrick S. |date=22 February 1987 |newspaper=The New York Times |access-date=8 February 2018}}</ref>

{{blockquote |text=When Milton said that he couldn’t sleep he meant literally that because he was very disturbed about the whole WRA concept. He found the situation that he was facing most difficult, with the antagonisms on the part of much of the American public against the Japanese because we were at war with Japan and many people did not differentiate between the Japanese Americans and the Japanese with whom we were at war. At the same time the problems of moving people from assembly centers on the West Coast into temporary relocation centers I’m sure got on his nerves very badly, and he was practically ill. |author=[[Dillon S. Myer]] |source=1970 interview with Helen Pryor<ref name=DSM-1970 />{{rp|184}} }}

By the time Myer was appointed Director of the WRA on June 17, 1942, plans for the complete relocation of Japanese-Americans had already been announced.<ref name=DSM-1970 />{{rp|187}} Myer later recalled that he soon discovered after his appointment that "most of the reasons [for the evacuation and [[John L. DeWitt|General DeWitt]]'s actions] were phony and many of the rumors which were used to justify the evacuation which came out of the attack on Hawaii were proven to be completely untrue".<ref name=DSM-1970 />{{rp|185}} Myer also stated that influential figures were backing the evacuation, including "Earl Warren, [who] was Attorney General of California but looking forward to being candidate for governor in the fall of 1942 which he was and he favored the evacuation" and "[Col. [[Karl Bendetsen]]] was a prime mover in recommending to General DeWitt that he carry out the evacuation. As a matter of fact after the evacuation order was issued here on the mainland he tried for weeks to get a large group of people evacuated from Hawaii with the idea I am sure of justifying their West Coast evacuation."<ref name=DSM-1970 />{{rp|186}}

Within nine months, the WRA had opened ten facilities in seven states, and transported over 100,000 people from the WLCA facilities of whom 64 percent were [[American citizen]]s.{{citation needed|date=March 2012}} Over the course of the next 19 months, approximately 120,000 Japanese-Americans were removed from the Pacific coast and placed in internment camps.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/japanese_internment/index.php?action=bg |title=The War Relocation Authority & the Incarceration of Japanese-Americans During World War II |publisher=Harry S. Truman Presidential Library & Museum |access-date=8 February 2018}}</ref>

==See also==
{{Wikisource|Executive Order 9102}}
*[[Internment of Japanese Americans]]
*[[Executive Order 9066]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* [http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=16239#axzz1oyXFVV9p Executive Order 9102 Establishing the War Relocation Authority. March 18, 1942, the American Presidency Project (UCSB).]
 
{{Franklin D. Roosevelt}}
{{Japanese American internment camps|state=expanded}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Legal history of the United States]]
[[Category:Executive orders of Franklin D. Roosevelt|9066]]
[[Category:1942 in American law]]
[[Category:Internment of Japanese Americans]]
[[Category:Civil detention in the United States]]