Statement from Steve Finacom, past president of the Berkeley Historical Society and one of the

organizers of an event at First Congregational Church in Berkeley on April 26, Commemorating the Mass
Imprisonment of Japanese Americans in World War II
--
"Berkeley residents didn't 'protest' the Japanese American removal in the way we think of political
protests today. In April 1942, just a few months after Pearl Harbor, the United States was officially at war
and many feared imminent attack on the Bay Area by Japanese bombers or warships. Directly protesting
the actions of President Roosevelt or the military would have been highly unpopular, and gone nowhere.

"However, prominent Berkeleyans and campus figures did stand up to injustice, as they do today, and
were opposed to the removal of the Japanese American population. They did what they could to ease the
circumstances. Many found places to store the belongings or looked after the property of their friends and
neighbors. Others, like the women of First Congregational Church 'bore witness' and helped as they could
to make the departure less terrible. UC administrators worked hard to find inland universities where Cal's
Japanese American students could transfer, and gave them semester grades based on midterms.
Professor (Chiura) Obata was kept on the faculty, in absentia, and reportedly President Sproul
stored Obata's paintings in the attic at University House. There was a constant flow of 'care packages'
and supportive letters and even visitors from Berkeley to the far distant, guarded, camps. UC faculty and
researchers conducted academic studies that saved important documentation of the Japanese American
removal for later historians."

"As the fears of invasion eased by 1943 and the United States began to win the 'Pacific War', leading
Berkeleyans turned their attention, through the Committee on Fair Play, to advocating for the release of
Japanese Americans from the camps and their re-integration into the community. Among others, the
ASUC (student government) officially welcomed back Japanese American students to Cal at the end of
the war."

"Several hundred Japanese American students abruptly disappeared from the Cal population in early
1942, in large part because of prejudice and fear. They were truly among the most genuinely 'American'
of Californians, but it didn't matter because of the prejudice against their ancestry. It is sobering to think
that if the same proportion of Cal students of a specific ethnic group were removed today by Federal
government edict, more than a thousand would 'disappear' with no legal recourse, along with many
faculty and staff."

"These events were poignant and moving. We had full houses for both of the evening commemoration
events, and many eloquent participants and stories. I especially appreciated that Berkeley Mayor Jesse
Arreguin attended and spoke at the ceremony at the church."