October 2024: If they could vote, so can you!

These are photos of Japanese Americans incarcerated in U.S. concentration camps during WWII for nothing more than their ancestry. Forcibly removed from their homes, forced to liquidate businesses and dispose of possessions, they faced an uncertain future behind barbed wire for the foreseeable future.

1) Senior Japanese American man and woman enter a barrack with a U.S. flag flying over the doorway, with barracks in the background. 2) Two Japanese American young women with papers in hand stand at a counter, waiting to cast absentee ballots. — ^{1) San Bruno, California. Entering Recreational Hall where election is being held for Councilman. A general election for five members of the Tanforan Assembly Center Advisory Council is being held on this day. The Issei have never been able to vote before because of American naturalization laws. 2) Absentee voters of Japanese descent getting ballots and having them notarized.}

Yet many still believed in this country’s democratic processes. And those who were U.S. citizens were still allowed to vote–not that it was easy¹. Jon Yatabe, a Topaz survivor, says: “My parents voted in Topaz even though they weren’t sure their vote would be counted.”

If anyone had cause for despair, they did. Eighty-two years later, we can’t let despair or apathy prevail. Please vote!

A dozen senior Japanese American women sit around a long table writing postcards. The table is strewn with colored pens, stamps, postcards, and address lists. — *^{Japanese American women (including Topaz survivors) write get-out-the-vote postcards at Sakura Kai in September, 2024.}*

Are you registered to vote? You can check here.

¹“Japanese Americans incarcerated during WWII could still vote, kind of,” by Natasha Varner. Densho.Oct. 13, 2016.

Photo credits: 1) Photographer: Dorothea Lange for the War Relocation Authority. NARA #537899. 2) Photographer: Stewart, Francis. Newell, California, War Relocation Authority photographs: Japanese-American evacuation and resettlement, BANC PIC 1967.014 v.29 DA-625–PIC, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. 3-4): Courtesy of Ruth Sasaki.

The Topaz Stories Team

Media Coverage:
Read ‘Topaz Stories’ exhibit travels Utah showing human side of WWII internment (KSL.com, May 24, 2024)
Read ‘Topaz Stories’ mines the history of a Japanese American internment camp (ParkRecord, May 18, 2024)
Read Remembering Japanese American Internment–Day of Remembrance (Rosie the Riveter Trust blog, March 24, 2024)
Read Internee’s story told with ‘Topaz Collages’ (Wheel of Dharma, Vol. 5, Issue 3, March 2023).
Watch Topaz survivors tell their stories (abc4 news, 4/22/2022)
Listen to the “In the Hive” podcast with interviews with Ann Dion, Jonathan Hirabayashi, and Topaz survivors Jeanie Kashima and Joseph Nishimura (KCPW, 4/28/2022)
Read How a Utah exhibit about Topaz Camp looks to find empathy in ‘an ugly stain on American history (ksl.com, 4/22/2022)
Read “Topaz Stories rise from the dust,” (Department of Culture & Community Engagement, 4/2022)
Listen to KQED Forum, Day of Remembrance interview with Ruth Sasaki, 2/15/2022
Listen to Max Chang and Ruth Sasaki interviewed (KRCL RadioActive, 2/9/2022
Read On Topaz Stories and ‘Authentic Voice’, the Discover Nikkei interview with Ruth Sasaki (10/14/2022)
Listen to Remembering the Japanese American Incarceration, the Topaz Stories podcast with Ruth Sasaki and Jonathan Hirabayashi (6/2/2021)

October 2024: If they could vote, so can you!

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