The month of December begins with the anniversary reminder that it has now been more than a quarter of a century since the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941. World War II seems remote and distant, a lingering memory resurrected only at official American Legion gatherings. America's more recent wars do not enjoy the clarity of purpose necessary to mobilize a response of unified national patriotism focused upon crushing the common enemy. Nor is it any longer possible to "win" America's wars with decisive military victories. But there are frightening similarities to the mobilization of national sentiment which harken back to the World War II era.

The bombing of Pearl Harbor created a climate of national hysteria which brought openly to the surface the basic prejudice against Orientals which had always dominated the West Coast and produced the extremist solution of concentration camps, more delicately referred to as "Relocation Centers." Some 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry were rounded up immediately after Pearl Harbor when the West Coast was declared a military zone.

The Rev. S. Garry Oniki, a leading staff member of Chicago's Community Renewal Society, was interned for over a year in a Relocation Center for Japanese-Americans.

Granada, Colorado. Oniki remembers the climate of hysteria, which thrived in this country, with people seeing Japanese planes and ships off the coast with more frequency than flying saucers are sighted today. The vast majority of Japanese-Americans were sent to ordinary Relocation Centers. There were also special camps for possible top security risks: those persons who conceivably might have close ties with the Japanese government---teachers of Japanese history, language, culture, and importers. Such persons were rigorously interrogated and, if they eluded suspicion, were allowed to join their families in an ordinary Relocation Center.

It is well to remember, as our thoughts are turned to the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, that there are concentration camps in America at the present moment. They are designed to detain those who actively oppose the insane actions of our government and are fully equipped for immediate use. The camps are located at Allenwood, Pennsylvania (just four hours by car from New York City); Avon Park, Florida; El Reno, Oklahoma; Wittenburg and Florence, Arizona; and Tule Lake, California. Concentration camps in America stand as a classic symbol of this nation's preoccupation with detention of dissent rather than reform of current practices.

The McCarren Act, which has been on the books since 1950, is still the law of the land. Title II, Section 100, of the McCarren Act provides that under certain conditions, the President may, on his own judgement, proclaim the existence of a "national internal security emergency" throughout the land. He can do so if: there is a declaration of war by Congress; there is an "insurrection" within the United States; there is an "imminent invasion" of the U.S. or any of

its possessions. Upon doing so,, the President's political appointee, the Attorney General, is required immediately to "apprehend and detain any person as to whom there is reasonable ground to believe that such person probably will engage in, or probably will conspire with others to engage in acts of espionage or of sabotage." (Italics are in the emphasis of the original wording of the Act itself.) In the fall of 1962, radio station WBAI in New York City, interviewed former FBI agent Jack Levine.

Levine referred to a plan of the FBI labeled Operation Dragnet. Said Levine: "The FBI estimates that within a matter of hours every potential saboteur in the United States will be safely interned. They'll be able to do this by the close surveillance they maintain on these people and the - (the FBI) envisage that with the cooperation of the local police throughout the country, they'll be able to apprehend these persons in no time at all." Can we take comfort in the assumption that times have changed since Pearl Harbor, that World War II was totally unique and that national hysteria is now more easily held in check? Hardly, as Dr. Oniki points out. The parallel between then and now lies in the area of built-in racial prejudice. No one growing up in America escapes infection with racism---white or black. When interviewed in 1967 (by Renewal magazine), Dr. Oniki said:" ‘This disease of racial prejudice can work itself out in extreme reactionary forms. I don't feel that the fear and hostility are yet general enough in America today to produce hysterical reaction. But if the pattern of ghetto violence. .. continues, the kind of climate could develop in which extreme solutions would be called for." A lot of water has gone under the bridge since Oniki offered his personal reflections, including the waves of protest which swept the shores of Lake Michigan during the Democratic Convention in Chicago. Add to that a couple of major assassinations, a couple of alleged plots, increased disorder on the campuses of this nation and you begin to have a pretty good recipe for hysterical reaction.

We should learn from history lest it repeat itself. The McCarren Act should be repealed immediately to eliminate that tangible temptation to national psychosis. Personally, I am less concerned with those who might possibly conspire against our government than I am with those of high governmental influence who are currently conspiring to mutilate the soul of this nation. A stiff legislative attack on crime syndicates in this country is more important than retaining the McCarren Act. But America would rather permit the . existence of organized crime than endure the expression of disorganized dissent.