REFERENCE: Vol. 131 No. 55

TITLE: S. 1053 -- LEGISLATION TO IMPLEMENT RECOMMENDATIONS OF COMMISSION ON WARTIME RELOCATION AND INTERNMENT OF CIVILIANS

SPEAKER: Mr. CRANSTON; Mr. GORTON; Mr. INOUYE; Mr. MATSUNAGA; Mr. MURKOWSKI; Mr. STEVENS

TEXT: Mr. MATSUNAGA. Mr. President, with my colleagues Senator Inouye of Hawaii, Senators Stevens and Murkowski of Alaska, Senator Cranston of California, Senator Melcher of Montana, Senator Denton of Alabama, Senators Gorton and Evans of Washington, Senators Riegle and Levin of Michigan, Senator Proxmire of Wisconsin, Senators Kennedy and Kerry of Massachusetts, Senators Moynihan and D'Amato of New York, Senator Burdick of North Dakota, Senator Metzenbaum of Ohio, Senator Sarbanes of Maryland, Senator Hart of Colorado, Senator Harkin of Iowa, Senators Bradley and Lautenberg of New Jersey, Senator Exon of Nebraska, Senator Simon of Illinois, and Senator Hatfield of Oregon, I am today reintroducing legislation, S. 1053, which would carry out the recommendations of the Commission on WartimeRelocation and Internment of Civilians.

The distinguished nine-member study commission, chaired by Washington attorney Joan Bernstein, was established by Congress in 1980 to examine the facts surrounding the issuance of Executive Order 9066 and the subsequent relocation and incarceration of some 120,000 Americans and residents aliens of Japanese ancestry during World War II. In addition, the Commission was mandated by Congress to examine the circumstances surrounding the evacuation of the Aleutian Islands and the relocation of Native American Aleuts. The Commission submitted its final report to Congress, entitled "Personal Justice Denied," in June 1983 and, in November of that year, I introduced S. 2116, a bill very similar to the one being introduced today. S. 2116 was the subject of extensive hearings in 1984; however, it was not reported by committee or considered by the full Senate prior to adjournment of the 98th Congress.

The new bill, S. 1053, would provide a long overdue remedy for what has become known as one of America's worst wartime mistakes: The incarceration in detention camps of some 120,000 Americans and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry from the west coast.

About 80 percent of these evacuees were native-born Americans and the remaining 20 percent were their parents -- first generation immigrants who were longtime legal residents of the United States prohibited by the Oriental Exclusion Act of 1924 from becoming naturalized American citizens. In the summer and early fall of 1942, long after the threat of an enemy invasion of the west coast had faded, they were summarily removed from their homes by U.S. Army troops attached to the Western Defense Command and sent to isolated detention camps, surrounded by barbed wire fences and armed guards, in the interior parts of this country. Without warrant, without trial or hearing, they were deprived of their personal freedom and lost their homes, farms, businesses and careers. Although the civil courts and law enforcement agencies were operating normally on the west coast, not a single one of the evacuees was ever charged or indicted for the commission of a crime, much less tried or convicted. All of them, native-born Americans and legal residents alike, were fully entitled to the protection of the United States Constitution, but their constitutional rights were summarily denied them by armed men acting under the dictates of their own Government.

This governmental action was unprecedented in American history, and in the years since the war, scholars and historians have asked "Why?" How could high-minded Americans abandon their most cherished ideals and rob fellow Americans of their inherent constitutional rights simply because they resembled our declared enemy in biological features.

The Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, through its careful review of wartime records and its extensive public hearings, found the answers to some of these questions. It has confirmed what Americans of Japanese ancestry have always known: The evacuation of Japanese Americans from the west coast and their incarceration in what can only be described as American-style concentration camps was not justified by military necessity, but was the result of racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and the failure of political leadership. Specifically, the Commission found that:

First, Lt. Gen. John DeWitt, Commanding General of the Western Defense Command, recommended exclusion of Japanese Americans to the Secretary of War on the grounds that ethnicity (or race) determined loyalty.

Second, the Federal Bureau of Investigation [FBI] and members of Naval Intelligence, who had relevant intelligence responsibility, were completely ignored when they recommended that nothing more than careful surveillance of suspected individuals was necessary.

Third, General DeWitt relied heavily on local politicians rather than on informed military judgments in reaching his conclusions as to what actions were necessary, and politicians largely repeated the prejudiced, unfounded themes of anti-Japanese factions and interest groups on the west coast.

Fourth, no effective measures were taken by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to calm the citizenry of the west coast, or to publicly refute unfounded rumors of sabotage and fifth column activity during the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.

Fifth, General DeWitt was temperamentally disposed to exaggerate the measures necessary to maintain security, and placed security far ahead of any concern for the liberty and constitutional rights of citizens.

Sixth, Secretary of War Stimson and Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy, both of whose views on race differed from those of General De-Witt, failed to insist on a clear military justification for the measures General DeWitt wished to take.

Seventh, Attorney General Francis Biddle, while contending that evacuation of the Japanese Americans was unnecessary, did not argue to the President that failure to make out a case of military necessity on the facts would render the exclusion constitutionally impermissible or that the Constitution prohibited exclusion on the basis of ethnicity, given the then prevailing facts on the west coast.

Eighth, those representing the interest of civil rights and civil liberties in Congress, the press, and other forums were either completely silent or even supported evacuation. Thus there was no effective opposition to the measures vociferously sought by numerous west coast special interest groups, politicians, and journalists.

Ninth, President Roosevelt, without raising the question to the level of Cabinet discussion or requiring careful review of the situation, and despite the Attorney General's arguments and other information before him, agreed with the Secretary of War that evacuation should be carried out.

In the light of these findings, the Commission concluded that a "grave injustice was done to American citizens and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry, who, without individual review or any probative evidence against them, were excluded, removed, and detained by the United States during World War II." In accordance with its mandate from the Congress, the Commission recommended certain remedies, including the following:

First, the establishment by Congress of a $1.5-billion fund which would be used, first, to provide a one-time per capita payment of $20,000 to each of the approximately 60,000 surviving persons of Japanese ancestry who were excluded from their places of residence, pursuant to the Federal Government's order.

Second, the establishment of a fund for humanitarian and public education purposes related to the wartime events. The remaining moneys in the $1.5-billion fund would be used for this purpose.

Third, the enactment of legislation which would officially recognize that a grave injustice was done to the evacuees and which would offer the apologies of the Nation for the wartime acts of exclusion, removal, and detention.

Fourth, the granting of Presidential pardons to individuals who were convicted of violating the wartime statutes imposing a curfew on American citizens strictly on the basis of their ethnicity and requiring ethnic Japanese to leave designated areas of the west coast to report to assembly centers.

Fifth, the "liberal review" by appropriate executive branch agencies of applications submitted by Japanese Americans for the restitution of positions, status or entitlements lost in whole or in part because of acts or events between December 1941 and 1945 (for example, the Department of Defense should be instructed to review cases of less than honorable discharge of Japanese American from the armed services during World War II).

Mr. President, as reported by the Commission, many who were either directly or indirectly involved in the mass evacuation and detention of Americans and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry during World War II have, since the war, acknowledged the wrong inflicted on the evacuees. President Roosevelt himself, in approving the induction of Japanese Americans into the U.S. Army, observed that "Americanism is a matter of the mind and heart -- not of race or ancestry." Henry L. Stimson, then Secretary of War, recognized that "to loyal citizens, this forced evacuation was a personal injustice."' Francis Biddle, then the Attorney General of the United States, expressed his belief that "the program was ill-advised, unnecessary and unnecessarily cruel." Milton Eisenhower described the evacuation and detention of Japanese Americans as "an inhuman mistake." The late Chief Justice Earl Warren, who had urged evacuation as Attorney General of California, stated, "I have since deeply regretted the removal order and my own testimony advocating it, because it was not in keeping with our American concept of freedom and the rights of citizens." Justice Tom C. Clark, who had been liaison between the Justice Department and the Western Defense Command, concluded, "Looking back on it today (the evacuation) was, of course, a mistake."

It is time the Congress, too, acknowledged the grave injustice inflicted by the Federal Government on Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II. Passage of our bill would remove a blot on the pages of our Nation's history and it would remove a cloud which has hung over the heads of Japanese Americans since the end of World War II.

Mr. President, the bill also provides for the compensation of American-Aleuts who were forced to leave their homes in the Aleutian Islands and parts of Alaska during World War II.

In 1942, Native American Aleuts were evacuated from their ancestral homes in the Aleutian and Pribiloff Islands in Alaska, then a U.S. territory. Although the evacuation was necessary because of the threat of enemy attack, it was marked by poor planning and coordination, and the Aleuts lost most of their personal possessions. They were sent to makeshift camps including abandoned canneries and mines, and, due to a lack of adequate food, clothing and medical care, about 10 percent of the evacuees died. When they were finally allowed to return to the islands, they found that their homes and community buildings had, in many cases, been destroyed.

Mr. President, I strongly urge the favorable consideration of this bipartisan measure by Congress.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the bill be printed in the Record following the statements made by Senators.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

(See Exhibit 1.)

Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleagues in offering legislation to implement the recommendations of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians.

The Commission was established pursuant to Public Law 96-317 and directed to review the facts and circumstances surrounding the relocation and internment of American Citizens and permanent resident aliens of Japanese ancestry during World War II, along with the facts and circumstances which led to the relocation and, in some cases, the detention of Aleut civilians during the same time period.

In discharging its congressional mandate, the Commission held 20 days of hearings, including 3 days of hearings in Alaska, and received the testimony of more than 750 witnesses. The Commission's staff and others conducted exhaustive research. They were able to document in irrefutable detail, from their research in the National Archives and elsewhere, the facts and circumstances of these events that occurred 40 years ago. In these remarks I will address the Aleut issues, as I understand that other Senators will address in separate remarks the tragic circumstances which led to the internment of thousands of loyal Americans of Japanese ancestry.

THE ALEUT PEOPLE

Mr. President, the Aleut people are Native Americans whose ancestors migrated from Asia about 10,000 years ago. They settled the lower Alaska peninsula and the Aleutian Islands, an archipelago that spans the North Pacific for 900 miles from the peninsula to Attu Island. The Aleut villages are among the oldest places of habitation on this continent -- the village of Nikolski, for example, has been determined to have been occupied for more than 8,000 years.

Anthropologists have estimated that 10,000 people lived on the Aleutians when the islands were occupied by Russian traders in the 18th century. Their numbers were soon reduced by massacre and disease to less than 2,000. Today there are about 3,600 Americans of Aleut ancestry, and major efforts are being made within the Aleut community to preserve the culture and traditions of this unique people.

As Solicitor of the U.S. Department of the Interior in the Eisenhower administration, I became generally aware that the Aleut communities of the Aleutians and Pribilof Islands had suffered severe dislocation and losses during the World War II. There had been no press accounts of these events at the time -- correspondence and information between Alaska and the lower-48 had been subject to censorship during the war.

Unlike the internment of Japanese-Americans, which was subject to widespread publicity, litigation, and public discussion, the Aleut recolation during the war was considered a local administrative inconvenience and scant attention was paid to its effect on the Aleut people outside the immediate area of the Aleutians and the relocation camps.

Mr. President, Congress at my request expanded the mandate of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians to include the specific treatment of the Aleuts in World War II. The findings of the Commission document the extreme hardships endured by the Aleuts, and the unjustified losses they sustained. The recommendations of the Commission include restitution for those losses -- and restitution, along the line of these recommendations, is provided in the bill we introduce today.

EVACUATION OF ALEUT VILLAGES

After the conquest of Attu and Kiska Islands by Japanese forces in early June 1942, the evaucation of all Aleut villages on the Pribilof Islands and the Aleutian Islands west of Unimak Island was ordered by military authorities in Alaska. Approximately 900 Aleut civilians were evacuated in June and July 1942, and hurriedly relocated to temporary camps in southeastern Alaska.

While this evacuation suffered from poor planning and inadequate logistic support, the Commission determined that it was a rational wartime measure under the circumstances at the time. The Commission found that the Aleuts suffered extreme hardships in the camps. Housing, sanitation, and eating conditions in the camps were deplorable. There were repeated epidemics of disease, and at least 10 percent of those in the camps died. Medical care was wholly inadequate. The Government clearly failed to meet its responsibilities to those under its care.

On returning to their villages, the Aleuts found -- after an absence of 2 to 3 years -- that houses, churches, community centers, personal property, boats, and other possessions had been destroyed, converted to military use without compensation, or severely damaged. They lost most of their religious icons and family heirlooms. While some attempts were made, with severely limited funds, to provide restitution, the evidence shows without doubt that the Aleuts' losses were never fully compensated by the responsible agencies and officials.

COMMISSION RECOMMENDATIONS

After evaluating the evidence, the Commission recommended five specific measures of restitution for Aleut losses during World War II. These include a trust to be established for the beneficial use of the six surviving Aleut villages subject to relocation and for the beneficial use of surviving Aleuts and their descendants; per capita payment to each surviving Aleut evacuee; the rehabilitation of churches and restoration of church property damaged or destroyed by U.S. forces in the Aleutians; the cleanup of wartime debris left on populated islands of the Aleutians; and the rehabilitation of Attu Island for Aleut ownership and use.

The bill we introduce today would make restriction substantially in accordance with the Commission's recommendations. It includes the $5 million trust as recommended. The authorization of appropriations for the rehabilitation of chuches and church property is established at $1,399,000, while the authorization for minimum cleanup of wartime debris on the Lower Alaskan Peninsula and the Aleutians is set at $15,000,000. Although the Corps of Engineers has estimated that more than $40 million would be required to accomplish the cleanup in 1985 dollars, the smaller amount is authorized only as a supplemental program to the ongoing work in the region. Currently the Department of Defense is working on the problem through funding to the Environmental Restoration Defense Account established in appropriations acts.

While the combination of the DOD effort now underway, and the supplemental program envisioned in this bill, will not completely restore the Aleutian region, it should be adequate to eliminate hazardous debris that threatens the health and safety of the people.

Mr. President, there are three substantive differences between the Commission's recommendations and the provisions of our bill. First, those eligible for per capita payment would include not only the survivors of the evacuation by U.S. forces, but also the surviving Attuans who were held in detention on Hokkaido Island, Japan. I am informed that these people number only five survivors today. Second, our bill provides per capita payment of $12,000 to each of the some 400-500 surviving Aleuts, instead of the recommended $5,000. The legislation includes this increase in per capita payment to reflect comparability with the treatment of the surviving Japanese American internees. Third, our bill provides bidding rights to be exercised by The Aleut Corporation in lieu of conveyance of Attu Island to the Aleut people. Attu Island was designated as wilderness in the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, and therefore, is not appropriate for conveyance back to the Aleut people. The bidding rights would be exercised by The Aleut Corporation, without any preference over any other bidder, in the disposition of surplus Federal property by the General Services Administration.

Mr. President, title III of our bill, relating to the Aleuts, has been drafted in close consultation with the Aleut leadership and with the residents of the affected Aleut villages. I am pleased to join as a cosponsor and intend to work for rapid consideration of the bill by the committee of jurisdiction.

Mr. President, I ask for unanimous consent that a section-by-section summary of title III of the bill, relating to the Aleut issues, be printed in the Record.

There being no objection, the analysis was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

SECTION-BY-SECTION SUMMARY OF THE ALEUTIAN AND PRIBILOF ISLANDS RESTITUTION ACT

TITLE III -- ALEUTIAN AND PRIBILOF ISLANDS RESTITUTION

Section 301 -- Short Title

This title may be cited as the "Aleutian and Probilof Islands Restitution Act."

Section 302 -- Definition

The definitions contained in this section are those required to implement the Commission's recommendations in accordance with this title for compensation of individual Aleuts, and the Aleut community generally, for their losses and other injustices suffered during World War II.

The term "affected Aleut villages" includes the six Aleut villages which were evacuated by U.S. forces in June and July, 1942, for relocation to temporary detention camps in remote regions of Southeastern Alaska. The term also includes the Aleut village of Attu, which was not rehabilitated for Aleut occupation or other productive use following liberation of Attu Island from Japanese forces and the repatriation of Attuan citizens from Japanese detention on Hokkaido Island, Japan.

The term "eligible Aleut" includes any Aleut who is living on the date of enactment of this Act and who, as a civilian, was relocated by authority of the United States from his or her home village to an internment camp, or other temporary facility or location, during World War II. The term also includes those Aleuts who were residents of Attu on the date of Japanese occupation of the Island, and who are living on the date of enactment of this Act.

Other terms requiring no elaboration in this summary are also defined.

Section 303 -- Aleutian and Pribilof Islands Restitution Fund

Section 303(a) establishes within the Treasury of the United States a Fund to be known as the "Aleutian and Pribilof Islands Restitution Fund." This Fund will be administered by the Secretary of the Treasury, and will consist of amounts appropriated to it under this title.

Under section 303(b), the Secretary is required to report to Congress annually on the financial condition of the Fund, and on the results of Fund operations during the preceding fiscal year. All such reports will be printed as House Documents of the session of Congress to which such reports are made.

Section 303(c) through (e) establishes procedures to be followed by the Secretary in managing the assets of the Fund. The interest on any obligations held by the Fund, along with other proceeds from the sale of any obligations, will be credited to and form a part of the Fund.

Section 303(f) provides for the orderly termination of the Fund after the Secretary has accomplished the purposes of the Fund, as set out in other sections of the title. On the date the Fund is terminated, all amounts remaining in the Fund shall be deposited in the miscellaneous receipts account in the Treatury of the United States.

Section 304 -- Expenditures and Audit of Fund

Section 304(a) provides that the Secretary shall pay to the Administrator of certain specified Aleut restitution programs, as provided in appropriations acts, such sums from the Fund as are necessary to carry out the purposes of this Act.

Under section 304(b), authority is established for audits of the activities of the Administrator by the General Accounting Office, subject to such rules and regulations as may be prescribed by the Comptroller General.

Section 305 -- Administration of Certain Fund Expenditures

The detailed procedure for designation of the Administrator is established in section 305(a). Under the terms of the section, the Aleutian/Pribilof Islands Association, a nonprofit regional corporation organized under the laws of the State of Alaska for the benefit of Aleuts in the Aleut region, is designated by Congress as Administrator, subject to the terms and conditions of this title.

As soon as practicable after enactment, the Secretary of the Treasury will offer to undertake negotiations with the Association leading to execution of an Agreement setting forth the duties of the Association as Administrator. Any such Agreement entered into with the Association shall be approved by a majority of the Board of Directors of the Association. Independent annual audits of the Association's activities as Administrator are required, and a report of each such audit will be transmitted to the Secretary and to the Committees on the Judiciary of the House and Senate. Upon 30 days notice, under the terms of the required Agreement, the Secretary may terminate the Association's designation as Administrator for good cause shown.

Section 305(b) requires the Secretary of the Treasury to submit to Congress, within 15 days after approval by the parties, the Agreement specified in section 305(a). If the Secretary and the Association fail to reach an agreement within the 60 day period established for negotiations, the Secretary shall notify Congress within 75 days after enactment of such failure to reach agreement. In such circumstances, Congress would have the option of designating another Administrator, or of taking any other appropriate and necessary legislative action.

Section 305(c) provides that the Secretary shall make no expenditures to the Administrator from the Fund until Congress has reviewed for 60 days the Agreement required by section 305(a).

Section 306 -- Duties of the Administrator

Section 306(a) provides that, out of payments made from the Fund to the Administrator by the Secretary of the Treasury, the Administrator shall make restitution (as provided elsewhere in this section) for certain Aleut losses sustained in World War II, and shall take such other action as may be required by this title.

Section 306(b) directs the Administrator to establish a trust, organized under the laws of the State of Alaska, for the beneficial use of affected Aleuts and affected Aleut communities. This subsection parallels the first recommendation of the Commission for compensation of the Aleuts for losses sustained in World War II.

The principal amount of the trust established under this subsection shall be $5,000,000. It will be governed by not more than seven trustees, appointed by the Administrator from lists of prospective trustees submitted by each affected Aleut village. The trust will be apportioned into eight independent accounts. One account will be established for the independent benefit of the wartime Aleut residents of Attu and their descendants; one account will be established for the independent benefit of each of the six surviving Aleut villages evacuated by U.S. forces; and one account will be established for the independent benefit of those Aleuts who, determined by the trustees, are deserving but who will not benefit directly from the other seven accounts.

Five per centum of the principal amount of the trust will be credited initially to the latter account referenced above. The remaining principal amount will be apportioned among the other seven accounts, in proportion to the wartime population of the village for which each such account is established, as compared to the wartime population of all affected Aleut villages.

The purposes of the trust are outlined in section 306(b)(2). In general, the section authorizes the trustees to use the interest and other earnings from the trust to benefit the elderly, the disabled, the seriously ill, students in need of scholarships, and others in comparable circumstances. Additionally, the section provides that trust earnings my be used to preserve Aleut culture and historical records, to establish community centers in affected villages, and to take such other action as the trustees may determine will improve the condition of Aleut life.

Section 306(c) authorizes the Administrator to rebuild, restore, or replace churches or church property damaged or destroyed in affected Aleut villages during World War II. This subsection is consistent with the third recommendation of the Commission for compensation of Aleuts for losses sustained as a direct result of U.S. governmental actions during World War II.

Under the terms of this subsection, the Secretary of the Treasury shall pay $100,000 from the assets of the Fund to theAdministrator within 15 days after expenditures from such Fund are authorized by this title. The Administrator is required to use this payment to make an inventory and assessment of all churches and church property damaged or destroyed in affected Aleut villages during World War II. In addition the Administrator will use the payment to develop specific recommendations and detailed plans for reconstruction, restoration and replacement work to be accomplished on churches and church property.

The inventory and assessment, together with the specific recommendations and detailed plans, shall be submitted within one year after enactment to a review panel composed of the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, the Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, and the General Services Administrator. If the review panel has not disapproved the Administrator's plans and recommendations within 60 days, such plans and recommendations will be implemented as soon as practicable by the Administrator. If any part of the plans and recommendations are disapproved, the Administrator shall revise and resubmit such part to the review panel as soon as practicable.

In the event of irreconcilable differences between the Administrator and the review panel in respect of any part of the plans and recommendations, the Secretary of the Treasury is authorized and directed to submit such part to Congress, for approval or disapproval by Joint Resolution.

Under the terms of section 306(c)(3), the Administrator is required to give preference to the Aleutian Housing Authority as general contractor for work to be performed in implementing the plans and recommendations for reconstruction, restoration, or replacement of churches and church property.

This section authorizes appropriations to the Fund adequate to carry out the purposes of the section, including $1,399,000 to carry out the church rehabilitation program under section 306(c). In addition, section 306(d) authorizes the Secretary of the Treasury to reimburse the Administrator, not less often than quarterly, for all necessary and reasonable administrative and legal expenses incurred in carrying out its functions under this title.

Section 307 -- Individual Compensation of Eligible Aleuts

Section 307(a) authorizes and directs the Secretary of the Treasury to make per capita payments out of the Fund toeligible Aleuts, as defined, for uncompensated personal property losses and for other purposes. The subsection requires a payment of $12,000 to each of approximately 400 individual Aleuts who are living on the date of enactment of this Act and who are the survivors of the relocation experience during World War II. All such per capita payments shall be made within one year after enactment of this Act, and shall not be considered income for purposes of any Federal taxes or for the purposes of determining eligibility for or the amount of any benefits or assistance under any Federal program or under any State or local program financed in whole or in part with Federal funds. This section addresses the second recommendation of the Commission for compensation of Aleut losses during World War II.

Under section 307(a) (2) and (3), the Secretary of the Treasury may require the assistance of the Attorney General in locating eligible Aleuts, and the Administrator shall assist the Secretary in identifying and locating eligible Aleuts for the purpose of the section.

Section 307(b) authorizes appropriations to the Fund adequate to make the per capita payments required by the section for restitution of heretofore uncompensated Aleut wartime losses.

Section 308 -- Supplemental Cleanup of Wartime Debris

Section 308(a) recognizes the on-going program for the removal of wartime debris from the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands region. This on-going program is administered by the Department of Defense through appropriations to the Department's Environmental Restoration Defense Account. The supplemental cleanup program authorized by this section, therefore, shall be exercised only in the event that such Account is inadequate to eliminate hazardous military debris from populated areas of the Lower Alaskan Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands.

Section 308(b) authorizes and directs the Secretary of the Army, acting through the Chief of Engineers, to plan and carry out a supplemental program for the removal and disposal of live ammunition, obsolete and abandoned buildings, abandoned machinery, and other hazardous debris remaining in populated areas of the lower Alaskan peninsula and the Aleutian Islands as a result of military activity during World War II. This section is consistent with the fourth recommendation of the Commission.

Section 308(c) provides that the debris removal program shall be the "Minimum Cleanup," as recommended by the Alaska District, Corps of Engineers, in its report dated October 1976. In carrying out the program, the Chief of Engineers is required to consult with the trustees of the trust established in section 306(b), and is further required to give preference to the Aleutian Housing Authority as general contractor.

Section authorizes $15,000,000 to be appropriated to carry out the purposes of this section.

Section 309 -- Attu Island Restitution Program

Section 309(a) recognizes that Attu Island, recommended by the Commission for conveyance to appropriate Aleut corporate entities, has been designated as wilderness by section 702(1) of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act. As alternative restitution for the loss of traditional Aleut lands and village properties on Attu Island, compensation shall be made to the Aleut people in accordance with this section.

Section 309(b) directs the Secretary of the Treasury to establish an account designated The Aleut Corporation Property Account, which shall be available for the purpose of bidding on surplus Federal property. The initial balance shall be an amount reflecting the equivalent of $500 per acre for each of the 35,737 acres traditionally occupied and used by the Aleut people on Attu Island -- or the equivalent of $17,868,500.

Under procedures established in this subsection, The Aleut Corporation may bid, by using the credits in the Account, as any other bidder for surplus Federal property, wherever located, in accordance with the requirements of section 484 of title 40, United States Code. In using the bidding rights established by this section, no preference will be given by the General Services Administration to The Aleut Corporation.

In addition to the bidding rights established as compensation for The Aleut Corporation in this section, subsection (h) provides that the Secretary of the Interior may convey to the Corporation, as provided under current law, the traditional Aleut village site on Attu Island. This authority is reflected under current law at section 1613(h)(1) of title 43, United States Code. The subsection limits selections under section 1613(h)(1), however, following date of enactment of this act, to such traditional village site on Attu Island and no other site on such Island.

Section 310 -- Separability of Provisions

This section provides that if any provision of this title, or the application of any provision to any person or circumstance, shall be held invalid, the remainder of this title or the application of such provision to persons or circumstances other than those as to which it is held invalid, shall not be affected thereby.

Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleagues in introducing legislation in the 99th Congress to implement the findings of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians. Few changes have been made in this legislation since November of 1983, when it was first introduced in the Senate.

As most of my colleagues are aware, the Commission was established pursuant to Public Law 96-317 to study the facts and circumstances surrounding the evacuation and internment of thousands of American citizens and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry during World War II. In fulfilling its congressional mandate, the Commission conducted extensive hearings throughout the country in addition to exhaustive archival research over a 3-year period. In its final report entitled "Personal Justice Denied," the Commission concluded that there was no justification for the mass evacuation, relocation, and internment of 120,000 Japanese-American citizens and resident aliens.

Instead, the Commission found that the decision to intern was made solely on the basis of ethnicity, not for any valid military or security reasons. Fear and prejudice obstructed our commitment to uphold the constitutional rights of our people, and as a result, thousands of lives were disrupted immeasurably. The Commission concluded that the Japanese-American case is unique in the constitutional history of our country in that there was a total abrogation of constitutional guarantees inflicted against a single group of citizens and resident aliens solely on the basis of ethnicity.

Based on these findings that concluded that a grave injustice was done to American citizens and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry, who were excluded, removed and detained by the U.S. Government without benefit of individual review, the Commission recommended remedies which comprise the legislation we are introducing today.

In brief, the Commission recommended the establishment of a trust fund from which individual payments to the surviving internees would be made. The remainder would be used for humanitarian and public education purposes in order to preclude this event from occurring again in the future.

Second, the Commission advised the enactment of legislation to officially recognize the injustice that was committed and offer the apologies of the Nation for the evacuation, relocation, and detention.

Third, the Commission recommended the granting of pardons to those who were convicted of violating wartime statutes relating to forced curfews and evacuation on the basis of ethnicity; and finally, a liberal review of individual cases for the restitution of positions, status, or entitlements lost as a result of the evacuation, relocation, and internment.

The Commission made its recommendations after serious and thoughtful deliberation, and on the basis of what theyfelt to be the just and proper solution, not necessarily what was politically and economically expedient. We should keep in mind that the monetary payment to surviving internees represents a symbolic effort to redress a grave infraction of civil liberties. The actual loss incurred by those who suffered this injustice at the hands of their own Government, is immeasurable.

We must act quickly on this legislation to deter an event as reprehensible as the internment experience from happening again, as silence on the issue has the danger of appearing as tacit acceptance. I am proud to be a cosponsor of this measure, and I look forward to working with my colleagues to pass a bill this session.

I ask unanimous consent that the following article from the April 28 issue of the New York Times Magazine be printed in the Record. Although I was fortunate enough not to have been interned, I visited a camp in Rohwer, AR, and remember being aghast that such a place could exist in America. Mr. Oishi's article is an excellent first-hand view of what it was like to be Japanese-American and interned during World War II.

There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

THE ANXIETY OF BEING A JAPANESE-AMERICAN

(By Gene Oishi)

My base camp was the Hyatt Regency Hotel, an imposing fortresslike structure towering above downtown Phoenix. My room on the 12th floor looked south over the desert, dotted with flat-topped buttes that looked like bombed-out Mount Fujis. Somewhere out there was the site of the Gila River Relocation Center, the internment camp in which I spent an important part of my childhood during World War II.

As I looked out over the desert from my well-appointed hotel room I could feel traces of a nagging fear, and I began to sense why it had taken me nearly 40 years to revisit the scene of my wartime internment.

It was last April that I made the trip to Arizona, ostensibly to complete my research for an article dealing with the assimilation of Japanese into the American mainstream. Actually, I went there in the hope of overcoming a writer's block.

Much has been written about the internment of Japanese during World War II, and so I had not intended to dwell on that aspect of Japanese-American history. But as I began to write the article, it became clear to me that there was much more that needed to be said about the experience.

I recalled the hearings held in 1981 by the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians. The commission was created by Congress, in the wake of renewed demands for reparations, to re-examine the internment of Japanese during World War II. Hundreds of Japanese came forth to testify, and many feel that those hearings constituted the most significant event that has occurred in the Japanese community since the internment itself.

The commission concluded its work in the summer of 1983 with a list of five recommendations, including one that calls for a $1.5 billion fund to be used to provide a one-time compensatory payment of $20,000 to each of the approximately 60,000 remaining survivors of the internment. There was a bill in the last Congress -- and action on a reintroduced version is expected in the current session -- that would implement the commission's recommendations. Regardless of the fate of that bill, the commission hearings had a permanent impact on the Japanese community.

At the hearings, the usually reticent and undemonstrative nisei -- second-generation Japanese-Americans -- choked back tears or let them flow as they told their stories. Many of the spectators wept, too, as they listened, and it seemed as if a dam had burst and the community was at long last truly mourning its past. The sansei -- third-generation Japanese-Americans, most of whom were too young to have experienced the internment -- were astonished. "I never saw nisei act that way before," said a sansei afterward.

It was not what the witnesses said that was so remarkable, for most of them simply described the economic and physical hardships they endured. What was remarkable was that they spoke at all. I, too, spoke to the commission at a pre-hearing briefing seminar in June 1981. My throat and chest suddenly felt so constricted that I thought I was coming down with an attack of bronchitis. It took all the strength I had to get through my talk and to keep from breaking into tears.

The reasons for the severity of my reaction, and that of the other witnesses, long remained a mystery to me. Even in the spring of 1983, when I traveled around the country interviewing Japanese of all ages and in a wide variety of occupations, I had not yet plumbed the emotional depths of the internment experience. Nor did I start out with the intention of doing so. My plan was to flesh out what social scientists had been saying for the last two decades: that Japanese-Americans are an extraordinarily successful ethnic group.

As a group (there are about 700,000 Japanese in the United States), they are for the most part prosperous, well-educated and are rapidly joining the mainstream of middle-class life. But in the course of my interviews I began to notice in myself as well as in those I interviewed an intense discomfort with the "model minority" theme.

Chris Iijima, a teacher and politically oriented folk singer in New York, first articulated this discomfort for me in a rational way. Every stereotype, he said, has a "flip side." Hard-working can become ruthless. Resourceful and ingenious can become diabolical. Friendly can become sneaky. Dedicated can become finatical. What Iijima said struck a chord in me, for within my own lifetime I have seen the Japanese stereotype among the American public turn from negative to postive, and there are signs that as a result of economic competition with Japan it might flip again as more Americans view Japan as a threat to their livelihood.

Later, as I thought about Iijima's observation and my reaction to it, I began to understand that the reason for my near-breakdown before the Congressional commission was fear. I was speaking to a commission that represented in my mind the same type of officialdom that in 1942 could not see past the color of our skin and hair and the shape of our eyes and noses and concluded that we were actual or potential enemies.

It was in Arizona, at the scene of my wartime internment, that I began to suspect that our discomfort with stereotypes, even positive ones, was rooted in fear. For the first time, I began to get a sense of how fear had ruled much of my life and perhaps the lives of most Japanese of my generation.

I was surprised by the ease with which I found the old campsite in the Gila River Indian Reservation, about 30 miles south of Phoenix. The barracks were gone, but the concrete foundation blocks, with twisted and rusted steel flanges clinging to them, were still there, as were the large slabs of concrete that once were the floors of the mess halls. From the top of a butte I had often climbed as a child, I could see a cattle farm and greening fields of wheat in the distance. None of this had existed when I first was here. At that time, there was nothing but desert wilderness as far as the eye could see. I felt high indignation; they were ruining my desert, encroaching on that previous isolation that had provided a measure of safety for me as a child. I realized then that I had not wanted to leave the camp. The desert, with its primitive desolation and extremes of weather, can be frightening at times, but it was not as frightening to me as the uncertainties and ambiguities of the world from which I had been ejected.

For the first nine years of my life my home had been Guadalupe, a small farming community in California's Santa Maria Valley. My father, who was a prominent farmer and civic leader in the Japanese community, was arrested early in the morning on Dec. 8, 1941, within 24 hours after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Though he was never charged with any crime, he thought he was going to be executed and so he wrote a letter of farewell to his family from a cell in the Santa Barbara County Jail.

Although my father and other community leaders arrested with him were not killed, many of the older Japanese feared they were being sent to exterminationcamps as the general "evacuation" began on the West Coast several months later. These fears I learned of much later, but I got a hint of them at the time from my mother's perpetually furrowed brow, from the sound of her crying at night and from her hair, which seemed to have turned gray overnight.

The roots of the fear went back to the late 19th century, when Japanese first started coming to this country in significant numbers. Like the Chinese before them, Japanese were subjected to intense racial hatred and vilification. Every effort was made to keep them from becoming woven into the social and economic fabric. They were not allowed naturalization privileges. Most Western states passed laws forbidding Asians from owning land. Antimiscegenation and other racially discriminatory laws were enacted. There was pressure put on Congress to stop further immigration from the Far East. In 1882, immigration from China was stopped, and in 1924 the ban was extended to Japan.

With the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, racial animosity flared with renewed ferocity. It was a time when racism was not universally condemned as it is today publicly, and members of Congress and newspaper columnists and editors openly expressed racial hatred for the Japanese. Ultimately, in February 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which enabled the Government to remove 110,000 Japanese -- 71,000 of them American citizens -- from the West Coast and to place them in internment camps in the interior.

The first camp we were sent to was an "assembly center" built at the county fairgrounds in Tulare, Calif. My memories are of heat, dust and a pervasive, sickening smell of the tar paper with which the barracks were covered. There were two barbed-wire fences surrounding the camp. This was not simply an "assembly center"; it was a prison. Soldierswith fixed bayonets patrolled the area between the two fences, and if you had any further doubts about what this camp was, there were guard towers along the perimeter, each equipped with a machine gun and searchlight.

Tulare was a hateful place, and I suppose anyone who spent time there would find his own reasons for finding it so. Mine never had any coherent pattern. First of all, my mother got sick and I had the feeling that she had deserted me. The food tasted tinny, maybe because it was served on metal trays. Juices from the canned vegetables, canned frankfurters and melting Jell-O flowed together to form a tepid, mildly sweet soup. The latrines were dirty and smelly and swarmed with flies. I still have unpleasant dreams about toilets filled and smeared with human feces. The barracks were crowded and noisy. Our family of six was assigned one small compartment that was barely large enough to hold our cots. The couple in the next compartment were always quarreling, and you could hear every word, even those they whispered.

During the day, I roamed with a band of children who resembled a pack of domestic dogs gone wild. We tried to make friends with the soldiers patrolling the camp, but they were sullen, even a little hostile, so we gave up. I don't know about the other children, but I never held it against the soldiers. Instead, I began to resent the Japanese they were guarding.

The camp in Arizona had no fence. None was needed, situated as we were in the middle of the wilderness. I recall being inordinately afraid of rattlesnakes. I was afraid to go out of the barracks at night for fear that one would come slithering out of the crawl space under the building. It is only in recent years that I have begun to realize that the state of panic in which I lived during the first few months in Arizona was in some way connected with being a Japanese. At the weekly movie, an American war film played that ended with the sinking of a Japanese battleship. As American bombs began exploding on the deck of the ship, Japanese sailors began to panic and leap into the sea. The children and young adults in the audience began to giggle, and as the battleship sank they broke into cheers and applause. I cheered and applauded, too, knowing full well that our parents in the crowd were deeply pained that their children were turning against Japan and perhaps even against them. By late 1943, those who had pledged their loyalty to the United States were allowed to leave. Most of those who remained were children -- or older folk who had been born in Japan and who, under the law, were not allowed to become citizens. They knitted, sculptured ironwood, grew morning glories, built rock gardens, or sat in the shade, fanning themselves and squinting against the heat. Life remained pretty much that way until the war ended and we were told to leave.

I recall the first words spoken to me when I met a former schoolmate upon our return to Guadalupe. He had been a friend before the war and I had often gone to his house to play. "Hi, Norman," I said. "Remember me? I'm Gene." Norman stared for some time. I waited for a smile of recognition that never came. Instead, he titled his head back a little and asked with a sniff, "All you Japs coming back?"

I eventually got over Norman's rude welcome. I graduated from high school, served in the Army, went to college, got married to a Swiss woman, moved to the East Coast and began a career as a newspaper reporter. I lived in a white neighborhood, had white friends and for long stretches of time would forget I was Japanese. I would feel extremely uncomfortable when inevitably I would be reminded of it.

For years I thought I was unusual in my reactions, but as I interviewed Japanese around the country, I discovered I was more typical than not of the generation of so-called nisei who grew up in the 1930's and 40's and were interned with their immigrant parents.

Dwight Chuman, a Los Angeles journalist and sansei, or third-generation Japanese, called the nisei "confused young men who succeeded by selling their self-hatred and disappearing into the mainstream mentality." It is difficult to be lectured by a member of the younger generation, but I found myself agreeing with Chuman and with most of the sansei activists I interviewed.

Feelings of self-hatred and shame are well documented among victims of aggression and abuse, such as raped women, abused children and prisoners of war. But until recently, I had not thought of myself as a victim and had not allowed myself to feel fear or anger about the internment. As I interviewed Japanese around the country, I found others who were better able to articulate their feelings.

Bebe Toshiko Reschke, a psychiatric social worker at an adult outpatient clinic in California, was a child during the internment. She recalled that while in camp three military policemen came into her family's compartment to search for contraband.

"I had such a feeling of being violated," she said. "I still have a problem with that, of trusting authority ... That anyone can have such control over you, and it can happen so fast."

"When I read these stories dealing with Japan," she continued, referring to coverage of Japanese competition with the United States, "I still get that emotional reaction. I think, 'Oh my God, the American public is turning against us again.' This time I'm not going. That's my line. This time I'm going to fight. I've joined the American Civil Liberties Union. That's my way of coping with my fears about what happened."

Her comment is an indication of the anger suppressed by many nisei that is only now beginning to bubble to the surface. The more fortunate Japanese-Americans, in my view, are those who in one way or another expressed their anger at the time. Minoru Yasui, a lawyer and former executive director of the Denver Community Relations Commission, is one of them.

A trim elegant man with a lively twinkle in his eyes, Yasui does not strike one as a stubborn fighter. In fact, as a young lawyer in Portland, Ore., in 1942, he had no intention of turning himself into a test case. ''But we couldn't find anyone else to do it," he said. "You were laying your career, your life, your record on the line.... It was scary. If you were convicted, you didn't know whether you were going to come out of prison alive."

Despite his fear, Yasui refused to obey a curfew imposed on Japanese-Americans after the outbreak of World War II and refused to leave his home voluntarily when ordered to evacuate. He was arrested and served nine months in the Multnomah County Jail in Portland. Yasui appealed his conviction all the way to the Supreme Court, which upheld it.

Yasui and others who fought for their constitutional rights in court were the exceptions. The Japanese American Citizens League, which assumed leadership within the Japanese community in 1942, discouraged even legal challenges and urged cooperation with the authorities. After an initial protest, league leaders accepted the position of the authorities that the evacuation of all Japanese from the West Coast was a military necessity. They cooperated with the authorities in getting Japanese into camps. Once they were there, the league lobbied Washington successfully to allow nisei to volunteer for the armed forces and to be subject to the draft. At one point, Mike Masaoka, a league leader, was reported to have urged the formation of an all-Japanese "suicide battalion." Masaoka today says he does not recall having used the words "suicide battalion," and goes on to say that even if he had he did not have in mind anything like the kamikaze units formed later in the war by the Japanese enemy.

Passions were whipped raw during the first months of internment. In some camps, Japanese American CitizensLeague leaders were attacked and beaten. But on the whole, the league position was supported. About 75 percent of Japanese-American males responded "yes" to a loyalty questionnaire that made them subject to the draft. Ultimately, more than 33,000 Japanese-Americans, including women, volunteered or were drafted into the armed forces during the war. In the Pacific, they served as interpreters and translators; and in Europe, the all-Japanese 100th Battalion and the 442d Regimental Combat Team were two of the most decorated and bloodied units of the war.

Thus, Japanese in the United States paid with blood the price of acceptance as Americans. But there are many of us who feel that we are continuing to pay a price.

Amy Iwasaki Mass, a nisei who is a clinical social worker and an instructor at Whittier College, in Whittier, Calif., has worked with many nisei as a therapist and concludes that the internment experience continues to be "a real attack on our sense of well being and our self esteem."

The reaction of many nisei, she said, was much like that of some hostages who start to identify with their captors. "Identification with the aggressor makes us feel safer and stronger," she said.

She observed, as others have, that some nisei have shed their ethnic identity and have merged into the white mainstream. "What is sacrificed is the individual's own self-acceptance," she said. "It places an exaggerated emphasis on surface qualities, such as a pleasant nonoffensive manner, neat grooming and appearance, nice homes, nice cars and well behaved children."

A further misfortune, she said, is that many nisei have passed on their basic insecurity to their sansei children.

Some Sansei, however, have managed to break out of such a nisei mold. One of them is Steve Nakajo, a familiar figure on the streets of San Francisco's Japantown. His generous girth decked out in jeans and sneakers, he walks the streets with a swagger reminiscent of a sumo wrestler. He founded Kimochi Inc. to help the people of Japantown. One of the first projects was a movie escort service. Sansei, wearing yellow andblack happi coats, walked or drive issei -- first-generation immigrants -- to and from Japanese movie theaters. This proved to be a popular service because of the old people's fear of street crime. Later, the Kimochi (which means "feeling") Lounge was opened, where issei could congregate, find reading materials, take up handicrafts and receive counseling for social services. A nutrition program was started as part of the federally financed meal program. Kimochi's crowning achievement, so far, is a $1.3 million, 20-bed facility for elderly Japanese. It was built entirely with private contributions, mostly from individuals, but with some corporate and foundation grants.

There are those who say that the internment benefited the Japanese by dispersing them throughout the country and making them more familiar and acceptable to other Americans. Such people ignore the damage done to the Japanese sense of family and to generational ties that sansei like Nakajo are trying to restore.

I am one of those whose trauma was real, and in recent years I have struggled with the thought of my father's humiliation and downfall. After coming to this country in 1903 at the age of 19, he established himself as a successful farmer in Guadalupe. A flamboyant man, he drove a big Buick, wore tailored suits, smoked cigars and sent two sons to Stanford University. With his arrest by Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and the internment of his family, he lost everything he had worked for and achieved in 40 years.

When we returned to Guadalupe after the war, he and my mother went to work as field laborers. Contrary to the Japanese stereotype, my father was a man who freely vented his feelings. A devotee of the Kabuki theater, he would be moved to tears by tales of death, sacrifice and downfall. Yet he never complained about his own economic ruin and loss of status. He carried on as if none of that really mattered. It is only in recent years, long after his death, that I have grown to appreciate his courage and to understand that if the authorities indeed wanted to emasculate him, they did not succeed. When I am able to accept that, perhaps my long night of fear will finally come to and end.

Mr. CRANSTON. Mr. President, I am delighted to sFupport the legislation introduced today by my very good friend from Hawaii [Mr. Matsunaga] for redress of one of our Government's greatest acts of injustice.

As we look back with regret on this painful period of injustice -- 43 years ago -- we must reaffirm our pledge that this kind of injustice must never recur.

Enactment of this legislation will help to prevent a recurrence.

And it will help us to look forward with hope to a brighter future of full participation by Asian Americans in the American dream.

My involvement in opposing the relocation of Japanese Americans dates back to the very beginning.

I believe that our Government's action in this case was a terrible affront to the ideals for which our Nation stands.

Shortly after Pearl Harbor, I was assigned to the Office of War Information. There I worked closely with Eleanor Roosevelt and Archibald MacLeish trying to dissuade President Roosevelt from forcefully evacuating Japanese-Americans from the west coast and interning them in so-called relocation camps.

Unfortunately for 120,000 Japanese-Americans -- and for the good name of our Nation -- military authorities prevailed, and the orders for internment were issued.

More than two-thirds of the internees were American citizens. The rest were legal U.S. residents.

After the internment process began, I visited two of the camps, Tule Lake in California and Heart Mountain, WY. Recently, the children of internees visited Heart Mountain trying to sense what their parents had felt. In part, I can tell them.

For 4 days in the cold, snow-covered camp at Heart Mountain, I spent my time round the clock inside the barbed-wire camp, talking to internees and visiting with a number of boyhood friends from Los Altos.

We ate meals together, talked over old times, walked around in the bitingly cold weather, played poker -- in wanton violation of camp rules -- and cheered at a football rally.

My friends and former classmates justifiably felt themselves robbed of their citizenship. They were distressed at the racial prejudice behind their internment. They were anxious for their Government to prove its own adherence to democracy and to the very ideals for which we were then at war.

President Roosevelt himself proclaimed, "In vindication of the very ideals for which we are fighting this war it is important to us to maintain a high standard of fair, considerate and equal treatment for the people of this minority as for all other minorities."

But this standard was not upheld.

The mere presence of Japanese blood in loyal American citizens was believed to be enough to warrant removal and exclusion from places they otherwise had a right to go.

The argument that they were removed for their own good, because of possible vigilante attacks, was not persuasive. Most, if not all, Japanese Americans would rather have faced the risk of being killed by individuals than deprived of their liberties by their own American Government. And given the choice to remain interned or fight in the war, most enlisted and served.

One of my most poignant memories is of an intelligent and progressive-minded mother who was still managing -- with much difficulty -- to conceal from her 4-year-old that they were prisoners in what most inmates considered a racial internment camp.

It was ironic to see American Nisei soldiers, home on furlough and clad in uniform, wandering around inside a fenced-in camp. These Nisei soldiers returned from the battlefields of Europe as the most distinguished and decorated combat unit of the war, and from the Pacific theater as loyal soldiers and as officers in military intelligence. I have never forgotten these impressions.

In 1980, I was cosponsor of the legislation establishing the Relocation Commission. The Commission report issued in 1983 amounted to our Government's official apology -- 41 years overdue -- to the internees and their families.

It confirms what a great many conscientious Americans have long believed: these Americans of Japanese descent were clearly mistreated, and their basic civil liberties violated.

The ACLU singled out the internment and related abuses at the time "the worst single wholesale violation of civil rights of American citizens in our history."

As one commentator on the period said, "Japanese-Americans were the immediate victims of the evacuation. But larger consequences are carried by the American people as a whole. Their legacy is the lasting one of precedent and constitutional sanctity for a policy of mass incarceration under military auspices. This is a result of the process by which the evacuation was made. That process betrayed all Americans."

Since those tragic events took place, a number of the participants have had changed hearts and minds. Henry L. Stimson, who was Secretary of War, realized that "to loyal citizens this forced evacuation was a personal injustice." Former Attorney General Francis Biddle reiterated his belief that "the program was ill-advised, unnecessary and unnecessarily cruel." Justice William O. Douglas, one of the Supreme Court majority in the Korematsu decision holding the evacuation constitutionally permissible, later said the case "was ever on my conscience." And Chief Justice Earl Warren, who as California's attorney general had urged evacuation, afterward said, "I have since deeply regretted the removal order and my own testimony advocating it, because it was not in keeping with our American concept of freedom and the rights of citizens."

On February 17, 1942, Attorney General Francis Biddle wrote to Secretary Stimson opposing the proposed exclusion order, stating that the War Department and the FBI had found no danger of imminent attack or evidence of planned sabotage. Biddle especially objected to removal from their homes of 60,000 American citizens who happened to be of Japanese descent. He refused to let the Justice Department participate in any way with the exclusion policy.

Not a single documented act of espionage, sabotage, or fifth column activity was committed by the Nisei or by resident Japanese aliens on the west coast. Yet their lives were disrupted, fortunes were lost, and loyal citizens and legal residents incarcerated.

The victims of this policy were held collectively guilty, and collectively punished.

Moreover, the Government's attitude toward these innocent people fostered suspicions that often led to violence against them. Many were attacked when they attempted to return to their homes 3 years later.

The legislation I'm cosponsoring today redresses this mass violation of civil liberties and compensates internees for their suffering.

While the loss of liberty and the personal stigma attached to internment can never be erased, Federal reparations are a justifiable response to the legitimate financial losses incurred. An independent study done for the Commission found the economic losses alone to evacuees between $2.5 and $6.2 billion in today's dollar values, including interest for the past 40 years. Many consider this a conservative estimate of the real economic losses of homes and other property, stores and businesses. And these estimates do not begin to measure the personal hardships suffered.

The Commission found the cause of the exclusion and internment policies to be "race prejudice, war hysteria and a failure of political leadership."

On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066. Shortly afterward, all American citizens of Japanese descent were barred from living, working, or traveling on the west coast. The same exclusion applied to a whole generation of Japanese immigrants residing at that time in the United States who, because of Federal law, were not permitted to become U.S. citizens.

After the initial plan for "voluntary" exclusion failed, these American citizens or legal residents were forcibly removed by the Army, first to assembly centers" -- makeshift quarters in fairgrounds and racetracks -- and then to "relocation centers." These latter camps, located in desolate western areas, were surrounded by barbed wire and guarded by military police.

The U.S. Government carried out its policy without reviewing individual cases or providing due process of law, and continued its policy virtually without regard for individuals who demonstrated loyalty to the United States.

Congress made it a crime to violate Executive Order 9066. The U.S. Supreme Court -- in one of its most agonizing decisions -- held the removal constitutionally permissible because of the war. Interestingly, since that decision a number of Justices from the majority -- enough to have reversed the 5-4 decision -- have written that on hindsight, they would have voted differently. The Supreme Court in a related case struck down imprisonment of these admittedly loyal American citizens. But long after the fact.

The Commission found that the main impetus leading to the exclusion order was the mistaken notion that individuals of Japanese descent would be loyal to Japan, not to the United States, and groundless fears of fifth column activity even though no evidence of such activities could be uncovered. The Commission stated that "the record does not permit the conclusion that military necessity warranted the exclusion of the ethnic Japanese from the west coast."

After exclusion became official policy, the War Relocation Authority [WRA] -- the civilian agency charged with supervising the relocation -- assumed that the vast majority of evacuees were loyal and should be allowed to resettle outside of the west coast. But because of harsh objections from certain mountain State politicians, a consensus plan for detention of the evacuees emerged. The WRA gave up on its idea of resettlement, and accepted a program of confinement. Despite WRA's belief that evacuees should be returned to normal productive life, it had, in effect, become their jailer. Since there was no military justification for detention, the WRA instead contended that the program was for the evacuees' own safety.

The history of life during the evacuation and in the relocation camps is one of suffering and deprivation. On the average, families received only 1 or 2 weeks notice of evacuation to an unknown destination. They could take with them only what could be carried. All else was lost or sold for cut-rate prices. Life in the relocation camps was spartan, with shoddy and crowded buildings, defective facilities, faulty heating, inadequate health care, and limited education programs. Privacy was impossible. Families and individuals alike lost their identities and became known only by identification numbers.

Because the Western Defense Command opposed individual loyalty reviews -- for fear of weakening the blanket exclusion -- no opportunity for individual review was created in the assembly centers. The War Department favored conducting loyalty reviews, but did not act on this until the end of 1942. Although these reviews eventually permitted some to leave relocation centers, it didn't end the exclusion from the west coast. Moreover, even this belated process was offensive, since it treated Japanese Americans as guilty until proven innocent.

In the spring of 1943, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, Assistant Secretary of War John McCloy, and Gen. George C. Marshall reached the conclusion that the loyalty reviews eliminated any justification for exclusion from the west coast. They kept their views private, however, and General DeWitt repeatedly opposed ending exclusion until he left the Western Defense Command in late 1943, as did west coast anti-Japanese factions. Secretary Stimson finally put the recommendation before the Cabinet in May 1944. But no action was taken until December 7, 1944, while confinement continued for the great majority of Japanese Americans.

The exclusion and removal of Japanese-Americans resulted from a long history of anti-Japanese-American agitation and legislation on the west coast. By contrast, in Hawaii, where the military commander restrained plans for radical measures and treated the ethnic Japanese as loyal residents -- absent evidence to the contrary -- only 2,000 ethnic Japanese were taken into custody. The policy developed was in sharp contrast to Government actions against enemy aliens or citizens of non-Japanese descent. For example, the United States never ordered a mass exclusion or detention against American citizens of German or Italian descent.

This episode in American history should never have happened. It's the Government's responsibility to set the record straight and to try, at least, to recognize and partially compensate for past injustices, although the tarnish on our Constitution can never be completely removed.

Our purpose is to recognize and redress the injustices and violations of civil liberties against U.S. citizens and U.S. residents of Japanese and Aleut ancestry by the United States and to discourage similar injustices and violations of civil liberties in the future.

Those eligible are people of Japanese or Alaskan Aleut ancestry excluded from the west coast between December 7, 1941, and June 30, 1946, or deprived of liberty or property as a result of a series of Executive orders, proclamations, laws, Armed Forces directives, or other Federal actions resulting in exclusion, relocation, and/or detention of individuals on the basis of race.

This act is a just and fair redress to those individuals who were excluded and/or interned without justification, in gross violation of their civil liberties as American citizens and residents. I urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I join my colleagues today in support of legislation to redress the grave wrong done to those Americans of Japanese ancestry who were interned by the U.S. Government during World War II. As a country with a deep-seated commitment to basic human rights, we must vigorously confront this injustice of our past.

It has been almost 2 years since the recommendations of the Commission on Wartime Relocation were published expressing in graphic detail, the inhumanity imposed on this group of Americans in our country only 40 years ago. As the Commission's report documents, unsubstantiated fears about a few were used to rationalize the widescale incarceration of loyal Americans and legally admitted aliens. I can find no justification for the wrongs perpetrated against approximately 120,000 persons of Japanese birth or descent between 1942 and 1945.

The United States did not intern citizens of German and Italian ancestry, though the same logic applied to Japanese-Americans could have been applied to those of European heritage as well. Notably, however, people of German and Italian descent do not have physical characteristics and cultural traditions which could be used to distinguish them easily from the bulk of American society. In my view, this clearly demonstrates that the relocation and internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II was a prejudicial violation of their civil rights.

Residents of Washington State were particularly affected by the Executive Order 9066. Many residents living in and around Seattle were forced quickly to move to an assembly center near Puyallup, WA, and then further inland to relocation centers and internment camps. The subhuman conditions which existed at these centers and camps cannot be fully appreciated by those of us who were not rounded, shipped off to a relocation center or internment camp, and labeled "dangerous to society."

Life for the internees after their return to society was not easy. Discrimination and harassment continued after the war. The lives of the internees had forever been disrupted and scarred. Nothing can fully compensate the victims for the actions of the U.S. Government. Past attempts at compensation for the harm sustained, such as trauma, deprivation of personal freedoms, and economic loss experienced during relocation and internment, have been incomplete.

Picking an appropriate way of providing such compensation is a difficult task indeed. The legislation introduced today will implement the recommendations of the Commission on Wartime Relocation. I support many of the recommendations made by the Commission. The proposal to make monetary reparations to the internees, however, poses a number of serious questions. I am concerned about the source of the substantial sums necessary to make the recommended payments. I am also concerned about the implications of, and precedents which would be set by, making lump-sum payments to World War II internees, but not to others who have suffered equally serious civil rights violations.

Nonetheless, I am pleased to be a cosponsor of this legislation in order to facilitate thoughtful discussion of this deeply emotional issue. I look forward to working with my colleagues today to redress the wrong that occurred 40 years ago.

Mr. MURKOWSKI addressed the Chair.

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Kasten). The Senator from Alaska.

Mr. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I should like to speak in behalf of the statement which has been presented by the junior Senator from Hawaii [Mr. Matsunaga].

I am pleased to join Senator Matsunaga, Senator Inouye, and my senior colleague, Senator Stevens, in authorizing this bipartisan bill to implement the recommendations of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians. Senator Matsunaga has already outlined in eloquent detail the merits of those Japanese Americans who were interned in concentration camps throughout our country, so I will confine my remarks to the injustices done to the Aleut Americans residing in my State of Alaska.

As my colleagues will recall, the independent Commission was established by act of Congress in 1980 to investigate the circumstances surrounding the relocation and internment of Japanese Americans and Aleut citizens during World War II. The Commission's reports were presented to Congress in January and June 1983. Those reports document fully the injustices suffered by those who were relocated to camps far from their homes in early 1942 for the duration of the war.

Mr. President, I recall, as a small child, observing on the outskirts of Ketchikan, AK, the Aleut camp where the Aleuts were confined. It was a very isolated area at the end of the road along side a creek that flowed into a lake, a heavily timbered area. While there was available care from the U.S. Department of Public Health with regard to their medical needs, it was an area that was prone to some of the exposure of the outdoors in Alaska, which at times can be quite severe.

I recall my mother mentioning that many of those interned had an extraordinary high rate of tuberculosis.

There were areas throughout southeastern Alaska where camps were established, mostly in areas where there had been an abandoned cannery.

In the case of the Aleuts, who inhabited a number of small, remote villages on the Aleutian Island chain and the Pribilofs, the Commission determined that the military decision to relocate the people were justified under the circumstances. The Japanese enemy forces captured Attu and Kiska in early June 1942, and about 881 Aleut villagers were removed from their home villages by Army and Navy forces within the following 60 days.

Unfortunately, the relocation of the Aleuts to abandoned fish canneries and mining camps in southeastern Alaska resulted in disease and death among some of the residents of the camps.

The Commission found on examination that indeed medical care was inadequate and, as Senator Matsunaga indicated, there were a number of those Aleut people who died in their internment, shelter and food were below standard, and sanitary facilities were poor. At least 10 percent of all Aleuts relocated to camps perished before their villages were restored on the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands.

Upon their return, after an extended period of time of 2 to 3 to 4 years in camp, the Aleuts were returned to their villages in the western part of Alaska, the Alaska Peninsula, the Aleutian Islands.

The Aleuts found their personal and community property had been converted without compensation for military use, destroyed, or taken by those who occupied villages in the Aleuts' absence. They were never fully compensated for these losses. In addition, some of their churches were burned or were desecrated, or stripped of invaluable religious icons dating from 18th and 19th century Imperial Russia. There was never any effort by our Government to replace or rehabilitate the churches and church properties destroyed or severely damaged while under U.S. control during the war.

Mr. President, the populated areas of the Lower Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutians are still littered with the debris and abandoned structures from the U.S. military occupation of the islands. In recent years at least one child, who lived with his family in Cold Bay, lost the use of his hand when a World War II fuse exploded. He had been playing in an area where live ammunition still litters the lands outside thevillage. The Commission has recommended that this debris be cleaned up, as the debris from World War II has been cleaned up in Japan, Europe, and elsewhere, often with substantial American assistance.

Mr. President, our legislation implements the five recommendations of the Commission to provide restitution to the Aleut people for the losses they suffered as a consequence of Government operations during the war years. In addition the bill implements the Commission's recommendations for restitution of Japanese-American losses. I know that Senators Matsunaga and Inouye will be addressing the Japanese-American issues in connection with the introduction of this legislation. Thus I have limited my remarks to the Aleut issues at this time.

Mr. President, 40 years and more have passed since the Aleuts were relocated to unimaginably inadequate camp facilities in southeastern Alaska. A number of those who suffered the most are quite elderly -- an even greater number have already passed away. I urge the Senate to consider this legislation promptly, as substantial justice to the Aleut people as compensation for losses sustained as a result of U.S. Government activities in World War II. The restitution provided in our bill should not be unreasonably delayed any longer.

Again, I thank Senator Matsunaga for his very eloquent statement, and I am very pleased to be with him.

Mr. MATSUNAGA. Mr. President, will the Senator from Alaska yield?

Mr. MURKOWSKI. I yield.

Mr. MATSUNAGA. I wish to thank him for the leadership he has shown in this matter and for joining me and 24 others in cosponsoring this measure.

I thank the Senator.

Mr. MURKOWSKI. I very much appreciate the comments of my colleague from Hawaii.

EXHIBIT 1

S. 1053

BE IT ENACTED BY THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA IN CONGRESS ASSEMBLED,

FINDINGS AND PURPOSE

Section 1. (a) Findings. -- The Congress finds that --

(1) the findings of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, established by the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians Act, accurately and completely describe the circumstances of the exclusion, relocation and internment of in excess of 110,000 United States citizens and permanent resident aliens of Japanese ancestry and the treatment of the individuals of Aleut ancestry who were removed from the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands;

(2) the internment of individuals of Japanese ancestry was carried out without any documented acts of espionage or sabotage, or other acts of disloyalty by any citizens or permanent resident aliens of Japanese ancestry on the west coast;

(3) there was no military security reason for the internment;

(4) the internment of the individuals of Japanese ancestry was caused by racial prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership;

(5) the excluded individuals of Japanese ancestry suffered enormous damages and losses, both material and intangible, and there were incalculable losses in education and job training, all of which resulted in significant human suffering;

(6) the basic civil liberties and constitutional rights of those individuals of Japanese ancestry interned were fundamentally violated by that evacuation and internment;

(7) as documented in the Commission's reports, the Aleut civilian residents of the Pribilof Islands and the Aleutian Islands west of Unimak Island were relocated during World War II to temporary camps in isolated regions of Southeast Alaska where they remained, under United States control and in the care of the United States, until long after any potential danger to their home villages had passed;

(8) the United States failed to provide reasonable care for the Aleuts, and this resulted in widespread illness, disease, and death among the residents of the camps; and the United States further failed to protect Aleut personal and community property while such property was in its possession or under its control;

(9) the United States has not compensated the Aleuts adequately for the conversion or destruction of personal property caused by the United States military occupation of Aleut villages during World War II;

(10) the United States has not removed certain abandoned military equipment and structures frominhabited Aleutian Islands following World War II, thus creating conditions which constitute potential hazards to the health and welfare of the residents of the islands;

(11) the United States has not rehabilitated Attu village, thus precluding the development of Attu Island for the benefit of the Aluet people and impairing the preservation of traditional Aleut property on the island; and

(12) there is no remedy for injustices suffered by the Aleuts during World War II except an Act of Congress providing appropriate compensation for those losses which are attributable to the conduct of United States forces and other officials and employees of the United States.

(b) Purposes. -- The purposes of this Act are to --

(1) acknowledge the fundamental injustice of the evacuation, relocation, and internment of United States citizens and permanent resident aliens of Japanese ancestry;

(2) apologize on behalf of the people of the United States for the evacuation, relocation, and internment of the citizens and permanent resident aliens of Japanese ancestry;

(3) provide for a public education fund to finance efforts to inform the public about the internment of such individuals so as to prevent the reoccurrence of any similar event;

(4) make restitution to those individuals of Japanese ancestry who were interned;

(5) make restitution to Aleut residents of the Pribilof Islands and the Aleutian Islands west of Unimak Island, in settlement of United States obligations in equity and at law, for --

(A) injustices suffered and unreasonable hardships endured while under United States control during World War II;

(B) personal property taken or destroyed by United States forces during World War II;

(C) community property, including community church property, taken or destroyed by United States forces during World War II; and

(D) traditional village lands on Attu Island not rehabilitated after World War II for Aleut occupation or other productive use.

TITLE I -- RECOGNITION OF INJUSTICE AND APOLOGY ON BEHALF OF THE NATION

Sec. 101. The Congress accepts the findings of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians and recognizes that a grave injustice was done to both citizens and resident aliens of Japanese ancestry by the evacuation, relocation, and internment of civilians during World War II. On behalf of the Nation, the Congress apologizes.

TITLE II -- UNITED STATES CITIZENS OF JAPANESE ANCESTRY AND RESIDENT JAPANESE ALIENS

DEFINITIONS

Sec. 201. For the purposes of this title --

(1) the term "eligible individual" means any living individual of Japanese ancestry who --

(A) was enrolled on the records of the United States Government during the period beginning on December 7, 1941, and ending on June 30, 1946, as being in a prohibited military zone; or

(B) was confined, held in custody, or otherwise deprived of liberty or property during the period as a result of --

(i) Executive Order Numbered 9066 (February 19, 1942, 7 Fed. Reg. 1407);

(ii) the Act entitled "An Act to provide apenalty for violation of restrictions or orders with respect to persons entering, remaining in, leaving, or committing any act in military areas or zones" and approved March 21, 1942 (56 Stat. 173); or

(iii) any other Executive order, Presidential proclamation, law of the United States, directive of the Armed Forces of the United States, or other action made by or on behalf of the United States or its agents, representatives, officers, or employees respecting the exclusion, relocation, or detention of individuals on the basis of race;

(2) the term "Fund" means the Civil Liberties Public Education Fund established in section 204;

(3) the term "Board" means the Civil Liberties Public Education Fund Board of Directors established in section 206;

(4) the term "evacuation, relocation, and internment period" means that period beginning on December 7, 1941, and ending on June 30, 1946; and

(5) the term "Commission" means the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, established by the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians Act.

CRIMINAL CONVICTIONS

Sec. 202. (a) Review. -- The Attorney General shall review all cases in which United States citizens and permanent resident aliens of Japanese ancestry were convicted of violations of laws of the United States, including convictions for violations of military orders, where such convictions resulted from charges filed against such individuals during the evacuation, reloation and internment period.

(b) Recommendations. -- Based upon the review required by subsection (a), the Attorney General shall recommend to the President for pardon consideration those convictions which the Attorney General finds were based on a refusal by such individuals to accept treatment that discriminated against them on the basis of race or ethnicity.

(c) Pardons. -- In consideration of the findings contained in this Act, the President is requested to offer pardons to those individuals recommended by the Attorney General pursuant to subsection (b).

CONSIDERATION OF COMMISSION FINDINGS

Sec. 203. Departments and agencies of the United States Government to which eligible individuals may apply for the restitution of positions, status or entitlements lost in whole or in part because of discriminatory acts of the United States Government against such individuals based upon their race or ethnicity and which occurred during the evacuation, relocation, and internment period shall review such applications for restitution of positions, status or entitlements with liberality, giving full consideration to the historical findings of the Commission and the findings contained in this Act.

TRUST FUND

Sec. 204. (a) Establishment. -- There is hereby established in the Treasury of the United States the Civil Liberties Public Education Fund, to be administered by the Secretary of the Treasury. Amounts in the Fund shall be invested in accordance with section 9702 of title 31, United States Code, and shall only be available for disbursement by the Attorney General under section 205, and by the Board of Directors of the Fund under section 206.

(b) Authorization. -- There are authorized to be appropriated to the Fund $1,500,000,000.

RESTITUTION

Sec. 205. (a) Location of Eligible Individuals. -- (1) The Attorney General, with the assistance of the Board, shall locate, using records already in the possession of the United States Government, each eligible individual and shall pay out of the Fund to each such individual the sum of $20,000. The Attorney General shall encourage each eligible individual to submit his or her current address to the Department of justice through a public awareness campaign.

(2) If an eligible individual refuses to accept any payment under this section, such amount shall remain in the Fund and no payment shall be made under this section to such individual at any future date.

(b) Preference to Oldest. -- The Attorney General shall endeavor to make payment to eligible individuals who are living in the order of date of birth (with the oldest receiving full payment first), until all eligible individuals who are living have received payment in full.

(c) Non-Residents. -- In attempting to locate any eligible individual who resides outside the United States, the Attorney General may use any available facility or resources of any public or nonprofit organization.

(d) No Set Off for Administrative Costs. -- No costs incurred by the Attorney General in carrying out this section shall be paid from the Fund or set off against, or otherwise deducted from, any payment under this section to any eligible individual.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Sec. 206. (a) Establishment. -- There is hereby established the Civil Liberties Public Education Fund Board of Directors which shall be responsible for making disbursements from the Fund in the manner provided in this section.

(b) Disbursements From Fund. -- The Board of Directors may make disbursements from the Fund only --

(1) to sponsor research and public educational activities so that the events surrounding the relocation and internment of United States citizens and permanent resident aliens of Japanese ancestry will be remembered, and so that the causes and circumstances of this and similar events may be illuminated and understood;

(2) to fund comparative studies of similar civil liberties abuses, or to fund comparative studies of the effect upon particular groups of racial prejudice embodied by Government action in times of national stress;

(3) to prepare and distribute the hearings and findings of the Commission to textbook publishers, educators, and libraries;

(4) for the general welfare of the ethnic Japanese community in the United States, taking into consideration the effect of the exclusion and detention on the descendants of those individuals who were detained during the evacuation, relocation, and internment period (individual payments in compensation for loss or damages shall not be made under this paragraph); and

(5) for reasonable administrative expenses, including expenses incurred under subsections (c) (3), (d), and (e).

(c) Membership and Terms of Office. -- (1) The Board shall be composed of nine members appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, from persons who are not officers or employees of the United States Government. At least five of the individuals appointed shall be individuals who are of Japanese ancestry.

(2) (A) Except as provided in subparagraphs (B) and (C), members shall be appointed for terms of three years.

(B) of the members first appointed --

(i) five shall be appointed for terms of three years; and

(ii) four shall be appointed for terms of two years; as designated by the President at the time of appointment.

(C) Any member appointed to fill a vacancy occurring before the expiration of the term for which his predecessor was appointed shall be appointed only for the remainder of such term. A member may serve after the expiration of his term until his successor has taken office. No individual may be appointed to more than two consecutive terms.

(3) Members of the Board shall serve without pay, except members of the Board shall be entitled to reimbursement for travel, subsistence, and other necessary expenses incurred by them in carrying out the functions of the Board, in the same manner as persons employed intermittently in the United States Government are allowed expenses under section 5703 of title 5, United States Code.

(4) Five members of the Board shall constitute a quorum but a lesser number may hold hearings.

(5) The Chair of the Board shall be elected by the members of the Board.

(d)(1) The Board shall have a Director who shall be appointed by the Board and who shall be paid at a rate not to exceed the minimum rate of basic pay payable for GS-18 of the General Schedule under section 5332(a) of title 5, United States Code.

(2) The Board may appoint and fix the pay of such additional staff personnel as it may require.

(3) The Director and the additional staff personnel of the Board may be appointed without regard to section 5311(B) of title 5, United States Code and may be appointed without regard to the provisions of such title governing appointments in the competitive service, and may be paid without regard to the provisions of chapter 51 and subchapter III of chapter 53 of such title relating to classification and General Schedule pay rates, except that the compensation of any employee of the Board may not exceed a rate equivalent to the rate payable under GS-18 of the General Schedule under section 5332(a) of such title.

(e) Support Services. -- The Administrator of General Services shall provide to the Board of Directors on a reimbursable basis such administrative support services as the Board may request.

(f) Donations. -- The Board may accept, use, and dispose of gifts or donations or services or property for purposes authorized under subsection (b).

(g) Annual Report. -- Not later than twelve months after the first meeting of the Board and every twelve months thereafter, the Board shall transmit a report describing the activities of the Board to the President and to each House of the Congress.

(h) Sunset for Board. -- The Board shall terminate not later than the earlier of ninety days after the date on which an amount has been obligated to be expended from the Fund which is equal to the amount authorized to be appropriated to the Fund or ten years after the date of enactment of this Act. Investments shall be liquidated and receipts thereof deposited in the Fund and all funds remaining in the Fund shall be deposited in the miscellaneous receipts account in the Treasury.

TITLE III -- ALEUTIAN AND PRIBILOF ISLANDS RESTITUTION

SHORT TITLE

Sec. 301. This title may be cited as the "Aleutian and Pribilof Islands Restitution Act".

DEFINITIONS

Sec. 302. As used in this title, the term --

(1) "Administrator" means the person designated under the terms of this title to administer certain expenditures made by the Secretary from the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands Restitution Fund;

(2) "affected Aleut villages" means those Aleut villages in Alaska whose residents were evacuated by United States forces during World War II, includingAkutan, Atka, Nikolski, Saint George, Saint Paul, and Unalaska; and the Aleut village of Attu, Alaska, which was not rehabilitated by the United States for Aleut residence or other use after World War II.

(3) "Aleutian Housing Authority" means the nonprofit regional native housing authority established for the Aleut region pursuant to AS 18.55.995 and the following of the laws of the State of Alaska;

(4) "Association" means the Aleutian/Pribilof Islands Association, a nonprofit regional corporation established for the benefit of the Aleut people and organized under the laws of the State of Alaska;

(5) "Corporation" means the Aleut Corporation, a for-profit regional corporation for the Aleut region organized under the laws of the State of Alaska and established pursuant to section 7 of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (Public Law 92-203);

(6) "eligible Aleut" means any Aleut living on the date of enactment of this Act who was a resident of Attu Island on June 7, 1942, or any Aleut living on the date of enactment of this Act who, as a civilian, was relocated by authority of the United States from his home village on the Pribilof Islands or the Aleutian Islands west of Unimak Island to an internment camp, or other temporary facility or location, during World War II; and

(7) "Secretary" means the Secretary of the Treasury.

ALEUTIAN AND PRIBILOF ISLANDS RESTITUTION FUND

Sec. 303. (a) Establishment. -- There is established in the Treasury of the United States a Fund to be known as the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands Restitution Fund (hereinafter referred to as the "Fund"). The Fund shall consist of amounts appropriated to it, as authorized by sections 306 and 307 of this title.

(b) Report. -- It shall be the duty of the Secretary to hold the Fund, and to report to the Congress each year on the financial condition and the results of operations of such Fund during the preceding fiscal year and on its expected condition and operations during the next fiscal year. Such report shall be printed as a House document of the session of Congress to which the report is made.

(c) Investment. -- It shall be the duty of the Secretary to invest such portion of the Fund as is not, in his judgment, required to meet current withdrawals. Such investments may be made only in interest-bearing obligations of the United States. For such purpose, such obligations may be acquired --

(1) on original issue at the issue price, or

(2) by purchase of outstanding obligations at the market price.

(d) Sale of Obligations. -- Any obligation acquired by the Fund may be sold by the Secretary at the market price.

(e) Interest on Certain Proceeds. -- The interest on, and the proceeds from the sale or redemption of, any obligations held in the Fund shall be credited to and form a part of the Fund.

(f) Termination. -- The Secretary shall terminate the Fund six years after the date of enactment of this Act, or one year after the completion of all restoration work pursuant to section 306(c) of this title, whichever occurs later. On the date the Fund is terminated, all investments shall be liquidated by the Secretary and receipts thereof deposited in the Fund and all funds remaining in the Fund shall be deposited in the miscellaneous receipts account in the Treasury.

EXPENDITURES AND AUDIT

Sec. 304. (a) Expenditures. -- As provided by appropriation Acts, the Secretary is authorized and directed to pay to the Administrator from the principal, interest, and earnings of the Fund, such sums as are necessary to carry out the duties of the Administrator under this title.

(b) Audit. -- The activities of the Administrator under this title may be audited by the General Accounting Office under such rules and regulations as may be prescribed by the Comptroller General of the United States. The representatives of the General Accounting Office shall have access to all books, accounts, records, reports, and files and all other papers, things, or property belonging to or in use by the Administrator, pertaining to such activities and necessary to facilitate the audit.

ADMINISTRATION OF CERTAIN FUND EXPENDITURES

Sec. 305. (a) Designation of Administrator. -- The Association is hereby designated as Administrator, subject to the terms and conditions of this title, of certain specified expenditures made by the Secretary from the Fund. As soon as practicable after the date of enactment of this Act the Secretary shall offer to undertake negotiations with the Association, leading to the execution of a binding agreement with the Association setting forth its duties as Administrator under the terms of this title. The Secretary shall make a good-faith effort to conclude such negotiations and execute such agreement within sixty days after the date of enactment of this Act. Such agreement shall be approved by a majority of the Board of Directors of the Association, and shall include, but need not be limited to --

(1) a detailed statement of the procedures to be employed by the Association in discharging each of its responsibilities as Administrator under this title;

(2) a requirement that the accounts of the Association, as they relate to its capacity as Administrator, shall be audited annually in accordance with generally accepted auditing standards by independent certified public accountants or independent licensed public accountants; and a further requirement that each such audit report shall be transmitted to the Secretary and to the Committees on the Judiciary of the Senate and House of Representatives; and

(3) a provision establishing the conditions under which the Secretary, upon thirty days notice, may terminate the Association's designation as Administrator for breach of fiduciary duty, failure to comply with the provisions of this Act as they relate to the duties of the Administrator, or any other significant failure to meet its responsibilities as Administrator under this title.

(b) Submission to Congress. -- The Secretary shall submit the agreement described in subsection (a) to Congress within fifteen days after approval by the parties thereto. If the Secretary and the Association fail to reach agreement within the period provided in subsection (a), the Secretary shall report such failure to Congress within seventy-five days after the date of enactment of this Act, together with the reasons therefor.

(c) Limitation on Expenditures. -- No expenditure may be made by the Secretary to the Administrator from the Fund until sixty days after submission to Congress of the agreement described in subsection (a).

DUTIES OF THE ADMINISTRATOR

Sec. 306. (a) In General. -- Out of payments from the Fund made to the Administrator by the Secretary, the Administrator shall make restitution, as provided by this section, for certain Aleut losses sustained in World War II, and shall take such other action as may be required by this title.

(b) Trust Established. -- (1) The Administrator shall establish a trust of $5,000,000 for the benefit of affected Aleut communities, and for other purposes. Such trust shall be established pursuant to the laws of the State of Alaska, and shall be maintained and operated by not more than seven trustees, as designated by the Administrator. Each affected Aleut village, including the survivors of the Aleut village of Attu, may submit to the Administrator a list of three prospective trustees. In designating trustees pursuant to this subsection, the Administrator shall designate one trustee from each such list submitted.

(2) The trustees shall maintain and operate the trust as eight independent and separate accounts, including --

(A) one account for the independent benefit of the wartime Aleut residents of Attu and their descendants;

(B) six accounts, each one of which shall be for the independent benefit of one of the six surviving affected Aleut villages of Atka, Akutan, Nikolski, Saint George, Saint Paul, and Unalaska; and

(C) one account for the independent benefit of those Aleuts who, as determined by the trustees, are deserving but will not benefit directly from the accounts established pursuant to subparagraphs (A) and (B).

The trustees shall credit to the account described in subparagraph (C), an amount equal to five per centum of the principal amount credited by the Administrator to the trust. The remaining principal amount shall be divided among the accounts described in subparagraphs (A) and (B), in proportion to the June 1, 1942, Aleut civilian population of the village for which each such account is established, as compared to the total civilian Aleut population on such date of all affected Aleut villages.

(3) The trust established by this subsection shall be administered in a manner that is consistent with the laws of the State of Alaska, and as prescribed by the Administrator, after consultation with representative eligible Aleuts, the residents of affected Aleut villages, and the Secretary. The trustees may use the accrued interest, and other earnings of the trust for --

(A) the benefit of elderly, disabled, or seriously ill persons on the basis of special need;

(B) the benefit of students in need of scholarship assistance;

(C) the preservation of Aleut cultural heritage and historical records;

(D) the improvement of community centers in affected Aleut villages; and

(E) other purposes to improve the condition of Aleut life, as determined by the trustees.

(4) There are authorized to be appropriated $5,000,000 to the Fund to carry out the purposes of this subsection.

(c) Restoration of Church Property. -- (1) The Administrator is authorized to rebuild, restore or replace churches and church property damaged or destroyed in affected Aleut villages during World War II. Within fifteen days after the date that expenditures from the Fund are authorized by this title, the Secretary shall pay $100,000 to the Administrator for the purpose of making an inventory and assessment, as complete as may be possible under the circumstances, of all churches and church property damaged or destroyed in affected Aleut villages during World War II. In making such inventory and assessment, the Administrator shall consult with the trustees of the trust established by section 306(b) of this title and shall take into consideration,among other things, the present replacement value of such damaged or destroyed structures, furnishings, and artifacts. Within one year after the date of enactment of this Act, the Administrator shall submit such inventory and assessment, together with specific recommendations and detailed plans for reconstruction, restoration and replacement work to be performed, to a review panel composed of --

(A) the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development;

(B) the Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts; and

(C) the Administrator of the General Services Administration.

(2) If the Administrator's plans and recommendations or any portion of them are not disapproved by the review panel within sixty days, such plans and recommendations as are not disapproved shall be implemented as soon as practicable by the Administrator. If any portion of the Administrator's plans and recommendations is disapproved, such portion shall be revised and resubmitted to the review panel as soon as practicable after notice of disapproval, and the reasons therefor, have been received by the Administrator. In any case of irreconcilable differences between the Administrator and the review panel with respect to any specific portion of the plans and recommendations for work to be performed under this subsection, the Secretary shall submit such specific portion of such plans and recommendations to the Congress for approval or disapproval by joint resolution.

(3) In contracting for any necessary construction work to be performed on churches or church property under this subsection, the Administrator shall give preference to the Aleutian Housing Authority as general contractor. For purposes of this subsection, "churches or church property" shall be deemed to be "public facilities" as described in AS 18.55.996(b) of the laws of the State of Alaska.

(4) There are authorized to be appropriated to the Fund $1,399,000 to carry out the purposes of this subsection.

(d) Administrative and Legal Expenses. -- The Administrator is authorized to incur reasonable and necessary administrative and legal expenses in carrying out its responsibilities under this title. There are authorized to be appropriated to the Fund such sums as may be necessary for the Secretary to compensate the Administrator, not less often than quarterly, for all such reasonable and necessary administrative and legal expenses.

INDIVIDUAL COMPENSATION OF ELIGIBLE ALEUTS

Sec. 307. (a) Payments to Eligible Aleuts. -- (1) In accordance with the provisions of this section, the Secretary shall make per capita payments out of the Fund to eligible Aleuts for uncompensated personal property losses, and for other purposes. The Secretary shall pay to each eligible Aleut the sum of $12,000. All payments to eligible Aleuts shall be made within one year after the date of enactment of this Act.

(2) The Secretary may request, and upon such request, the Attorney General shall provide, reasonable assistance in locating eligible Aleuts residing outside the affected Aleut villages. In providing such assistance, the Attorney General may use available facilities and resources of the International Committee of the Red Cross and other organizations.

(3) The Administrator shall assist the Secretary in identifying and locating eligible Aleuts pursuant to this section.

(4) Any payment made under this subsection shall not be considered income or receipts for purposes of any Federal taxes or for purposes of determining the eligibility for or the amount of any benefits or assistance provided under any Federal program or under any State or local program financed in whole or part with Federal funds.

(b) Authorization. -- There are authorized to be appropriated to the Fund such sums as are necessary to carry out the purposes of this section.

SUPPLEMENTAL CLEANUP OF WARTIME DEBRIS

Sec. 308.(a) The Congress finds that the Department of Defense has implemented an on-going program for the removal and disposal of live ammunition, obsolete buildings, abandoned machinery, and other hazardous debris remaining in populated areas of the Lower Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands as a result of military activities during World War II. Such program is being accomplished pursuant to Acts making Appropriations for the Department of Defense, in accordance with Congressional statements of purpose in establishing and funding the Environmental Restoration Defense Account. The authority contained in this section shall be supplemental to the authority of the Secretary of Defense in administering the Environmental Restoration Defense Account, and shall be exercised only in the event that such Account is inadequate to eliminate hazardous military debris from populated areas of the Lower Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands.

(b) Clean Program. -- Subject to the terms and conditions of subsection (a), the Secretary of Army, acting through the Chief of Engineers, is authorized and directed to plan and implement a program, as the Chief of Engineers may deem feasible and appropriate, for the removal and disposal of live ammunition, obsolete buildings, abandoned machinery, and other hazardous debris remaining in populated areas of the Lower Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands as a result of military construction and other activities during World War II. The Congress finds that such a program is essential for the futher development of safe, sanitary housing conditions, public facilities, and public utilities within the region.

(c) Administration of Program. -- The debris removal program authorized under subsection (a) shall be carried out substantially in accordance with the recommendations for a "minimum cleanup" contained in the report prepared by the Alaska District, Corps of Engineers,entitled "Debris Removal and Cleanup Study: Aleutian Island and Lower Alaska Peninsula, Alaska," dated October 1976. In carrying out the program required by this section, the Chief of Engineers shall consult with the trustees of the trust established by section 7(b) of this Act, and shall give preference to the Aleutian Housing Authority as general contractor.

(d) Authorization. -- There are authorized to be appropriated $15,000,000 to carry out the purposes of this section.

ATTU ISLAND RESTITUTION PROGRAM

Sec. 309. (a) In accordance with subsection (3) of the Wilderness Act (78 Stat. 892), the public lands on Attu Island, Alaska within the National Wildlife Refuge System are designated as wilderness by section 702(1) of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (94 Stat. 2417). In order to make restitution for the loss of traditional Aleut lands and village properties on Attu Island, while preserving the present designation of Attu Island lands as part of the National Wilderness Preservation System, compensation to the Aleut people in lieu of Attu Island conveyance shall be provided in accordance with this section.

(b) The Secretary of the Treasury shall establish an account designated The Aleut Corporation Property Account, which shall be available for the purpose of bidding on Federal surplus property. The initial balance of the account shall be $17,868,500, which reflects an entitlement of $500 for each of the 35,737 acres within that part of eastern Attu Island traditionally occupied and used by the Aleut people for subsistence hunting and fishing. The balance of the account shall be adjusted as necessary to reflect successful bids under subsection (c) or other conveyances of property under subsections (f) and (g).

(c) The Corporation may, by using the account established in subsection (b) bid, as any other bidder for surplus property, wherever located, in accordance with the requirements of section 484 of title 40, United States Code. No preference right of any type will be offered to the Corporation for bidding for General Services Administration surplus property under this subsection and no additional advertising shall be required other than that prescribed in section 484(e)(2) of title 40, United States Code.

(d) The amount charged against the Treasury account established under subsection (b) shall be treated as proceeds of dispositions of surplus property for the purpose of determining the basis for calculating direct expenses pursuant to section 485(b) of title 40, United States Code.

(e) The basis of computing gain or loss on subsequent sale or other disposition of property conveyed to the Corporation under this section for purposes of any Federal, State or local tax imposed on or measured by income, shall be the fair value of such property at the time of receipt. The amount charged against the Treasury account established under subsection (b) shall be prima facie evidence of such fair value.

(f) The Administrator of General Services may, at the discretion of the Administrator, tender to the Secretary of the Treasury any surplus property otherwise to be disposed of pursuant to section 484(e)(3) of title 40, United States Code, to be offered to the Corporation for a period of 90 days so as to aid in the fulfillment of the Secretary of the Treasury's obligations for restitution to the Aleut people under this section: PROVIDED, That prior to any disposition under this subsection or subsection (g), the Administrator shall notify the governing body of the locality where such property is located and any appropriate state agency, and no such disposition shall be made if such governing body or State agency within ninety days of such notification formally advises the Administrator that it objects to the proposed disposition.

(g)(1) Notwithstanding any provision of any other law or any implementing regulation inconsistent with this subsection, concurrently with the commencement of screening of any excess real property, wherever located, for utilization by Federal agencies, the Administrator of General Services shall notify the Corporation that such property may be available for conveyance to the Corporation upon negotiated sale. Within fifteen days of the date of receipt of such notice, the Corporation may advise the Administrator that there is a tentative need for the property to fulfill the obligations established under this section. If the Administrator determines the property should be disposed of by transfer to the Corporation, the Administrator or other appropriate Federal official shall promptly transfer such property.

(2) No disposition or conveyance of property under this subsection to the Corporation shall be made until the Administrator of General Services, after notice to affected State and local governments, has provided to them such opportunity to obtain the property as is recognized in title 40, United States Code and the regulations thereunder for the disposition or conveyance of surplus property.

(3) As used in this subsection, "real property" means any land or interests in land owned or held by the United States or any Federal agency, any improvements on such land or rights to their use or exploitation, and any personal property related to the land.

(h) The Secretary of the Interior may convey to the Corporation the traditional Aleut village site on Attu Island, Alaska pursuant to the authority contained in section 1613 (h)(1) of title 43, United States Code: PROVIDED, That following the date of enactment of this section, no site on Attu Island, Alaska other than such traditional Aleut village site shall be conveyed to the Corporation pursuant to such section 1613(h)(1) of title 43, United States Code.

SEPARABILITY OF PROVISIONS

Sec. 310. If any provision of this title, or the application of such provision to any person or circumstances, shall be held invalid, the remainder of this title or the application of such provision to persons or circumstances other than those as to which it is held invalid, shall not be affected thereby.