In 1915, Jukichi and Ken Harada purchased a house on Lemon Street in Riverside, California. Close to their restaurant, church, and children’s school, the house should have been a safe and healthy family home. Before the purchase, white neighbors objected because of the Haradas’ Japanese ancestry, and the California Alien Land Law denied them real-estate ownership because they were not citizens. To bypass the law Mr. Harada bought the house in the names of his three youngest children, who were American-born citizens. Neighbors protested again, and the first Japanese American court test of the California Alien Land Law of 1913—The People of the State of California v. Jukichi Harada—was the result. Bringing this little-known story to light, The House on Lemon Street details the Haradas’ decision to fight for the American dream. Chronicling their experiences from their immigration to the United States through their legal battle over their home, their incarceration during World War II, and their lives after the war, this book tells the story of the family’s participation in the struggle for human and civil rights, social justice, property and legal rights, and fair treatment of immigrants in the United States. The Harada family’s quest for acceptance illuminates the deep underpinnings of anti-Asian animus, which set the stage for Executive Order 9066, and recognizes fundamental elements of our nation’s anti-immigrant history that continue to shape the American story. It will be worthwhile for anyone interested in the Japanese American experience in the twentieth century, immigration history, public history, and law.

Shows how Japanese anxiety about overpopulation was used to justify expansion, blurring lines between migration and settler colonialism. This title is also available as Open Access.

List of transactions, v. 1-41 in v. 41.

In this important and masterful synthesis of the Chinese and Japanese experience in America, historian Roger Daniels provides a new perspective on the significance of Asian immigration to the United States. Examining the period from the mid-nineteenth century to the early 1980s, Daniels presents a basic history comprising the political and socioeconomic background of Chinese and Japanese immigration and acculturation. He draws distinctions and points out similarities not only between Chinese and Japanese but between Asian and European immigration experiences, clarifying the integral role of Asians in American history. Daniels’ research is impressive and his evidence is solid. In forthright prose, he suggests fresh assessments of the broad patterns of the Asian American experience, illuminating the recurring tensions within our modern multiracial society. His detailed supporting material is woven into a rich historical fabric which also gives personal voice to the tenacious individualism of the immigrant. The book is organized topically and chronologically, beginning with the emigration of each ethnic group and concluding with an epilogue that looks to the future from the perspective of the last two decades of Chinese and Japanese American history. Included in this survey are discussions of the reasons for emigration; the conditions of emigration; the fate of first generation immigrants; the reception of immigrants by the United States government and its people; the growth of immigrant communities; the effects of discriminatory legislation; the impact of World War II and the succeeding Cold War era on Chinese and Japanese Americans; and the history of Asian Americans during the last twenty years. This timely and thought-provoking volume will be of value not only to specialists in Asian American history and culture but to students and general historians of American life.

In 1924 America passed legislation that effectively outlined which immigrants were to be considered beneficial to the national body and which were not. Albert Johnson, a Washington State Congressman, sponsored the Act. This study examines the role of the Pacific Northwest in the change of national sentiment that led up to this legislation. Throughout the period, this region experienced massive growth in its immigrant population. Its forests and small towns were the scenes of many clashes with the alien radicals, resulting in the creation of anti-Catholic legislation and the laws against land ownership by the Japanese. Analyzing issues of race, religion, and political radicalism, Allerfeldt determines that the region was highly influential in the national debate. Most immigration studies of this era focus on the East Coast or on California, but Allerfeldt finds that Northwestern politicians and populists, responding to regional events as much as national sentiments, often set the national immigration agenda. Diverse organizations such as the APA, the Ku Klux Klan, and the IWW gained powerful local support and had significant influence on the region's attitudes towards immigrants. Rather than following California's lead in the opposition to Asian immigration, the Northwest actually set the path for its southern neighbor in many important aspects.