Press Release
February 5, 2003

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Washington, DC – The Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), the nation’s oldest and largest Asian Pacific American civil rights organization, condemns remarks made by Rep. Howard Coble, (R-NC-6) during a radio call-in program yesterday on WKZL-FM in North Carolina where he explicitly supported President Roosevelt’s decision to incarcerate the Japanese American community during World War II.

FOX News and the Associated Press reported that Rep. Coble made the comments in response to a suggestion that Arab Americans be similarly incarcerated. Rep. Coble disagreed that the Arab American community should be interned, but asserted that, while the internment of Japanese Americans was for their own protection, "Some probably were intent on doing harm to us, just as some of these Arab-Americans are probably intent on doing harm to us."

Commented JACL National President Floyd Mori, “Rep. Coble’s comments are outrageous and uneducated. To suggest that the government locked up 120,000 innocent people for their own protection is not only patronizing and offensive, but it is patently incorrect. The government has recognized and apologized for their error of sixty years ago and we expect Rep. Coble to do so as well.”

“It is astonishing that yet another political leader would publicly embrace the racist policies of the 1940s, and we are flabbergasted that a man who supports racial profiling and ethnic scapegoating chairs the House Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security,” added John Tateishi, JACL National Executive Director. “The JACL calls on the House Republican leadership to remove him immediately from this position before he does further harm.”

Groups Call on Coble for Apology

By Nick Maheras
Archdale (N.C.) Trinity News
February 7, 2003

A storm appears to be brewing over remarks made early this week by U.S. Rep. Howard Coble, R-6th, about Japanese [American] internment during World War II.

The Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), the nation's oldest and largest Asian Pacific American civil rights organization, demanded an apology from Coble. In a letter released Wednesday, the group also called on U.S. House of Representatives leadership to remove him immediately from the chairmanship of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security. In an interview on WKZL-FM's "Murphy in the Morning" show Tuesday, Coble said he agreed with Franklin D. Roosevelt's decision to intern Japanese-Americans during World War II.

Coble rejected a caller's suggestion that the U.S. put all Arabs in prison camps, but said he agreed with FDR's internment decision given the time and circumstances under which it was made.

Not only did FDR have to take national security into account, Coble said, but he also believes Roosevelt decided on internment for Japanese-Americans' own protection.

JACL condemned that reasoning as well.

"Rep. Coble's comments are outrageous and uneducated," said Floyd Mori, JACL president.

"To suggest that the government locked up 120,000 innocent people for their own protection is not only patronizing and offensive, but it is patently incorrect."

Mori noted the U.S. government since has recognized its error and apologized for it and insisted the congressman do the same. The United States has paid reparations to interned Japanese-Americans.

Coble said Thursday he intended no offense, but still believes he was right.

"I apologize if I offended anybody," he said. "I certainly did not intend to offend anybody.

"I certainly intended no harm or ill will toward anybody. I still stand by what I said ... that, in no small part, it (internment) was done to protect the Japanese-Americans themselves."

Coble said if it is proven to him that was not one of FDR's motivations, then he will apologize for that remark.

"I can see why he (FDR) made that decision," he said. "Fifty years later, looking back, maybe you would say: 'Perhaps, he shouldn't have done it.'"

He said he does not believe his comments warrant removal from his recent appointment as subcommittee chairman.

"I may give a statement (later) further clarifying," he said, "but I don't think I said anything that calls for an apology."

Jan Scott, community liaison at Coble's Greensboro office, said early Thursday her office had received only one call about the radio interview and that was in support of the congressman.

Missy Branson, Coble's chief of staff, said his Washington office has not been besieged by communications.

"We've gotten a few phone calls and more e-mails than normal," she said.

"Most people who know Howard, especially those folks in the district, know his personality and know he didn't mean anything discriminatory."

She said Coble was trying to make a point about segregation.

"We weren't as tolerant and understanding of other cultures as we are today. He was trying to make the point that the internments were as much for the Japanese-Americans own safety as for national security.

"He didn't mean it in any way discriminatory to Japanese-Americans at all. I think he's made that clear," Branson said.

Kristine Minami, JACL's Washington representative, said the group disseminated its letter widely on Capitol Hill.

"We made sure folks on the (House) Judiciary Committee, as well as members of Congress, know about this," Minami said.

Meanwhile, James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, also sent Coble a letter calling for an apology to Arab Americans as well as Japanese Americans.

Zogby said he wanted an apology because Coble had said he believed some Arabs in the United States are "intent on doing harm to us."

JACL said Coble's subcommittee chairmanship puts him in a particularly sensitive position that he should no longer be allowed to hold.

"It is astonishing that yet another political leader would publicly embrace the racist policies of the 1940s," said John Tateishi, JACL national executive director.

"We are flabbergasted that a man who supports racial profiling and ethnic scapegoating chairs the (subcommittee)."

Internment Remarks By Lawmaker Anger Peers

WASHINGTON -- WASHINGTON -- Asian American members of Congress are denouncing a House Republican who said in a recent radio interview that the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II was appropriate.

The comments by Rep. Howard Coble (R-N.C.), chairman of a House subcommittee that oversees homeland security legislation, came in response to a caller's suggestion that Arabs in the United States be imprisoned as an anti-terrorist measure.

Coble told the caller he did not agree, but that he believed President Franklin D. Roosevelt was justified in sending 120,000 people of Japanese descent to isolated camps in California and elsewhere -- in part, he said, for their own protection from potentially hostile citizens.

"We were at war," Coble said on a North Carolina radio show this week. "They were an endangered species. For many of these Japanese Americans, it wasn't safe for them to be on the street."

The comments struck a nerve at a time when Republicans are trying to patch up the damage to the party's image from remarks made by Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) on Dec. 5 that were seen as racially insensitive. The comments, which seemed to endorse racial segregation, stirred so much controversy that Lott was forced to step down from the GOP leadership.

Rep. Michael M. Honda (D-San Jose), who spent his early childhood with his family in an internment camp, said Coble's comments were especially offensive because they came just two weeks before the 61st anniversary of Roosevelt's executive order authorizing the internment.

"The need for raising the awareness of this shameful chapter in U.S. history is more apparent than ever," said Honda, who is sponsoring a resolution to recognize Feb. 19 as a "national day of remembrance" for those sent to the camps.

Rep. David Wu (D-Ore.), a Chinese American who is chairman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, said, "At a time when we should be reflecting on a historic wrong, Congressman Coble has stood history on its head. Japanese Americans were not rounded up into internment camps for their own protection.

"If we do not accurately portray the past, we risk repeating it," he said.

Rep. Robert T. Matsui (D-Sacramento) said he hoped the controversy "will serve to remind and educate" people about the lessons of history.

"In 1942, the U.S. government failed to display leadership in a time of war and crisis," said Matsui, who with Wu and Honda wrote to Coble asking him to meet with them next week. "It's critical that today's leaders do not fall into the same trap."

The National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium has called on Coble to step down as chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security.

"It is entirely inappropriate for someone who has these beliefs to be chairing such an important committee," said Karen Narasaki, president of the consortium. She said Coble's comments were as "offensive and ignorant " as Lott's implying a nostalgia for segregation.

Missy Branson, Coble's spokeswoman, said he would not consider giving up his subcommittee chairmanship over the comments. "He has apologized if these remarks offended anyone," she added.

Seeking to clarify the comments, Branson said Coble would not endorse the internment policy today, but he thought it was an appropriate decision at the time because American society was much less integrated and multicultural.

"We were much less tolerant and understanding of other cultures," Branson said.

"The emotion that surrounded the bombing of Pearl Harbor was so intense, the possibility of harm coming to Japanese Americans was very strong as a result."

Honda said his father told him as a child that it was absurd to believe internment was for their own protection.

"He said, 'Mike, if it's for your own protection, you have to wonder why you're inside barbed wire with machine guns pointed at you,' " Honda said.

Homeland Security Subcommittee Chair Defends Japanese American Internment

Associated Press
February 5, 2003

HIGH POINT, N.C. — A congressman who heads a homeland security subcommittee said on a radio call-in program that he agreed with the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.

A fellow congressman who was interred as a child criticized Coble for his comment on Wednesday, as did advocacy groups.

Rep. Howard Coble, R-N.C., made the remark Tuesday on WKZL-FM when a caller suggested Arabs in the United States should be confined.

Coble, chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security, said that he didn't agree with the caller but did agree with President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who established the internment camps.

"We were at war. They (Japanese-Americans) were an endangered species," Coble said. "For many of these Japanese-Americans, it wasn't safe for them to be on the street."

Like most Arab-Americans today, Coble said, most Japanese-Americans during World War II were not America's enemies.

Still, Coble said, Roosevelt had to consider the nation's security.

"Some probably were intent on doing harm to us," he said, "just as some of these Arab-Americans are probably intent on doing harm to us."

U.S. Rep. Mike Honda, D-Calif., a Japanese-American who spent his early childhood with his family in an internment camp during World War II, said he spoke with Coble on Wednesday to learn more about his views.

"I'm disappointed that he really doesn't understand the impact of what he said," Honda said. "With his leadership position in Congress, that kind of lack of understanding can lead people down the wrong path."

The Japanese American Citizens League called Coble on Wednesday and asked him to issue an apology, while the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee demanded that Coble explain his remarks.

It is "a sad day in our country's tradition when an elected official ... openly agrees with an unconstitutional and racist policy long believed to be one of the darkest moments of America's history," the group said in a statement.

Excerpt from the Civil Liberties Act of 1988

As the Commission documents, these actions were carried out without adequate security reasons and without any acts of espionage or sabotage documented by the Commission, and were motivated largely by racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership.

The excluded individuals of Japanese ancestry suffered enormous damages, both material and intangible, and there were incalculable losses in education and job training, all of which resulted in significant human suffering for which appropriate compensation has not been made.

For these fundamental violations of the basic civil liberties and constitutional rights of these individuals of Japanese ancestry, the Congress apologizes on behalf of the Nation.