“V-J Day” in Rhode Island: A Case of Conflicting Perceptions and Agendas

（ロード・アイランドにおける“V-J Day”―相反する認識、議題の一事例）

Steve Rabson*

SUMMARY IN JAPANESE：アメリカ人の多くは、1945年8月14日の「対日戦勝記念日（“Victory over Japan Day”= V-J Day）」と聞けば、長く破壊的な戦争が終わったことへの安堵の気持ち、そして目標が達成されたことへの満足感を連想するだろう。大統領ハリー・S・トルーマンが1946年にその名前を単に「勝利の日（Victory Day）」と短くした。その後、いくつかの州がこの「勝利の日」を法的な祝日とすることを宣言し、その中には1948年に同様の宣言を出したロード・アイランド州も含まれている。しかしながら、1975年までにはこれらの州のすべてがこの祝日を廃止してしまった。それでも、ロード・アイランドのみはその唯一の例外であった。

ロード・アイランドでは、「勝利の日」は未だに広く“V-J Day”と呼ばれており、それは新聞や“V-J Day”記念特売のための宣伝などにさえも使われている。ロード・アイランドに住む日本人、日系アメリカ人らは、祝日の名前が法制化されていること、及び名前が“V-J Day”と短く呼びやすくなっていることによってこの古く不名誉な呼び方が引き続き使われていることが促されているのであり、それによって彼らが戦時中の攻撃や虐殺に関して謂のない辱めを受け、更に日本人、他のアジア人、アジア系アメリカ人に対する中傷、暴力の元となっている、と主張している。そのような事件は実際には少数であるにせよ、ここ数年増加する傾向を見せている。おそらくは、日米間貿易での緊張の高まり、さらにはそれがメディアのセンセーショナリズム、両国の政治家が感情的な愛国論を打ち上げていることによって不必要に煽られていることがその一因であろう。

この祝日法を改定し名前を変えようと試みた法案が四つ州議会に提出されたものの、州政府に多大な影響力を持つ退役軍人組合からの執拗な圧力によってその通過は阻まれてしまった。第二次世界大戦中にはロード・アイランド出身者から多数の死傷者が出たため、祝日の名前を変えることは軍人の犠牲を軽んじることになり、さらには，「歴史の見直し」を主張している日本の右翼集団を助長させてしまっていると、彼らは主張している。しかし、多くの退役軍人は改定を支持している。そして、反核団体、在米日本人、アジア系アメリカ人、ロード・アイランド州議会黒人幹部会なども同様の態度をとっている。彼らは、日本の政治家が数度にわたりアフリカ系アメリカ人に対して備見に満ちた発言をしたことに対しては怒りを隠さないにせよ、その祝日の現在の名前は差別的であるということにおいては一致を見ているのである。

Historical Background

Many Americans who remember World War II, especially those who fought or lost loved ones in it, associate the original “V-J Day” (“Victory over Japan Day”) on August 14, 1945 with a feeling of immense relief at the end of a long and devastating conflict, and with a sense that its goals had been accomplished. For Americans today who do not personally remember the war, “V-J Day” often recalls photographs in high school history textbooks of jubilant crowds gathered in Times Square and of women enthusiastically embracing men in uniform amidst the waves of celebration that swept the nation on the day the Japanese government announced acceptance of the Potsdam declaration. To a lesser degree, “V-J Day” engenders similar memories and associations of “Victory in Europe Day” on May 8, 1945.

Yet if the end of the Pacific War brought joyful relief and a feeling of accomplishment in America, the war had been a time of intense, mutual animosity between Japan and the United States, reflected in the press of both countries and thoroughly documented in John Dower’s recent book War Without Mercy.[1] Dower notes that, even half a century after the fighting ended, these animosities, which produced virulent stereotypes, “remain latent, capable of being revived by both sides in times of crisis and tension.”[2] In what was perhaps an early effort to maintain annual observance of World War II, but to remove Japan as the target of its commemoration, President Harry S. Truman shortened the designation to “Victory Day” in 1946. Several states followed up in subsequent years with official declarations of Victory Day as a legal state holiday, including Rhode Island in 1948. However, over the next three decades, every state that had legally designated the holiday repealed it, Arkansas being the last state to abolish Victory Day in l975—except Rhode Island. The problem with Victory Day in Rhode Island is that the holiday continues to be known throughout the state as “V-J Day,” despite its official designation and the claims of local veterans organizations that it is not intended to target one nation but only to commemorate the end of World War II. Local newspaper articles routinely refer to the “V-J Day” state holiday, now observed on the second Monday in August, and numerous stores publish advertisements for “V-J Day” sales. Even a member of the Rhode Island State Legislature referred to “V-J Day” in a 1989 speech on the floor of the House of Representatives, in which he listed the state’s legal holidays. Japanese in the state, the majority of whom were born after World War II, assert that this designation unfairly stigmatizes them with wartime government policies and with the aggression and atrocities committed by Imperial Japanese forces; and, that it has encouraged verbal abuse and physical violence against Japanese, other Asians, and Asian-Americans.[3] While such incidents are not common, their numbers seem to have increased in recent years, perhaps in part as a result of growing trade tensions between Japan and the United States which have been exacerbated by sensationalized press coverage and by the ill-chosen statements of politicians in both countries.[4]

Yet, despite these irritants, positive contacts between Rhode Island and Japan have developed rapidly in recent years, as noted in this op-ed article in The Providence Journal, the state’s largest-circulation newspaper.

Thanks in part to the efforts of state government, a growing number of Japanese firms are locating branches and factories here. [More] tourists from Japan are discovering the many attractions of a vacation in “the Ocean State.” Program[s] of Japanese studies at Brown [and other local universities have] grown steadily.... Japanese language and culture [are now taught] in some Rhode Island high schools.

The Black Ships Festival, commemorating Rhode Island native Commodore Matthew Perry’s historic voyage to Japan in 1853-1854, has become an annual event featuring a variety of cultural and artistic exhibitions for public enjoyment, [including sumo wrestling and Japanese kite-flying demonstrations]. A growing number of Rhode Island high school and college students are visiting Japan for a few weeks or as much as a year of study, while more Japanese students are coming here on home-stay and exchange programs, [and to attend local high schools and colleges as regular, full-time students].[5]

As for Victory Day’s observance, informal surveys show that many younger Rhode Islanders are unaware of the meaning of the holiday. The military parades organized by local veterans groups are not particularly well-attended, and most people consider the second Monday in August simply as an opportunity to take a day off from work and go to the beach or pursue some other leisure activity in a one-day extension of a summer weekend. On the other hand, many veterans from Rhode Island, the site of a major naval base, were sent to the Pacific War, and a proportionally larger number of Rhode Islanders died in World War II than residents of other states.[6] Furthermore, local veterans organizations wield considerable political power. This influence has brought hiring preferences, modest tax breaks, and even special license plates for veterans. In addition, perhaps the social lives of more Rhode Island veterans, especially the seniors, revolve around their local lodges, chapter headquarters, and legion halls, which are active in organizing more frequent military parades than are held in other states. Local officials of the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars have stated their absolute opposition to any change in the name of the holiday, although individual rank and file members of these organizations have supported a change, agreeing that the present designation results in an unfair stigmatizing of Japanese today. In contrast, officials at the state headquarters of the American Legion in Arkansas could recall no opposition among their membership to the abolishing of Victory Day there in l975; and the librarian at the Arkansas State Legislature reported that the bill for abolishment passed easily after state workers were promised another annual holiday on an alternate date.

No legislation has yet been introduced in Rhode Island that would abolish this holiday, but four bills proposing to change its name failed to receive passage in the state legislature. The first bill was submitted in 1985, when State Representative Elizabeth Morancy proposed to rename the holiday “World Peace Day.” On April 9 her bill passed the House Committee on Labor, but was defeated in a 63-20 vote of the full House on April 25. The following year similar legislation died April 3 in the House Committee on Labor. In 1989 Representative Linda J. Kushner submitted a bill proposing the alternative of “Remembrance Day.” The debates over the Morancy and Kushner bills were heated, with some opponents hurling verbal abuse at supporters. In the 1985 hearing before the full House, individuals employed disruptive tactics, cat-calling denunciations of Representative Morancy as a “traitor” and a “Communist.” Among opponents to the 1989 bill, some of whom wore the uniforms of the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars, there were individuals who shouted aspersions at “Japs” and waved photographs of Pearl Harbor from the visitors’ chairs during the hearing before the House Committee on Special Legislation. Testimony was offered in support of the bill by people from Rhode Island’s Japanese community, a spokesman for the anti-nuclear movement, and several American veterans of World War II and subsequent conflicts, including a former marine and retired United States ambassador, now living in Rhode Island, who was held captive by the Japanese military when he served as a diplomat at the U.S. Legation in Bangkok during the Pacific War.[7] Nevertheless, Representative Kushner’s bill could not win enough support that day even to bring it out of committee. The unofficial suggestion of previous Governor Edward J. DiPrete, widely rumored to favor legal redesignation, that the holiday be called “Bay Day,” celebrating the scenic and recreational benefits of Narragansett Bay, was sharply attacked by members of veterans organizations. A fourth bill, submitted in 1992, proposed to change the legal designation to “Rhode Island Veterans Day.” It was sponsored by State Senator Rhoda E. Perry and Representative Paul W. Crowley, and had the official, public support of Governor Bruce Sundlun.

In the meantime, after the failure of three legislative efforts, Jennifer L. Wood, a Rhode Island attorney experienced in civil rights cases, and Philip Tajitsu Nash, a New York lawyer with the Asian-American Legal Defense and Education Fund, offered their services pro bono to file litigation that would require a change in the name of the holiday through court action. After studying legal documents, including the state Constitution and statutes, they concluded that the designation of this holiday (a shortening of “V-J Day” that encourages continued use of the former name) causes “injuries and wrongs [to the] character” of Japanese and Japanese-Americans in the state in violation of the Rhode Island Constitution (Article I, Section 3). A post-card survey in 1990 of the approximately 150-member Rhode Island Japan Society showed that a majority of respondents (66-17) favored such litigation. A follow-up announcement in English and Japanese, published in the Society’s newsletter, explained that free legal service was available and appealed for volunteers to be plaintiffs. To this date, no one has volunteered.

This reluctance can be traced in part, I believe, to the far less frequent use of lawsuits to settle disputes in Japan than in the United States, and to feelings of embarrassment and intimidation experienced by local Japanese regarding this issue. Although every incident of verbal abuse and violence at the time of the holiday cannot be attributed with absolute certainty to its designation, a number have occurred in recent years. In August of 1988, for example, a Brown student reported that, while waiting at a bus stop, she was approached by a man who asked if she were Vietnamese. When she replied that she was from Japan, he grabbed her by the blouse and shook her, shouting anti-Japanese epithets. The following year an Asian food store in Providence was broken into and vandalized on the night of Victory Day. Windows were smashed, merchandise was strewn over the floor, and a sign written in a foreign language was cut into small strips which were piled outside the front door. The store is owned by Koreans and the sign had been in Korean. At the store manager’s request, I wrote to the Providence Police Department regarding this incident. A few days later a Providence Police detective visited my office and claimed that the attack had not been racially motivated, but was rather part of an ongoing neighborhood dispute between the store manager and youths who had been permitted to hang out there in the past when the store was under previous ownership. He said that as yet no arrests had been made, but promised to increase police protection for the store, which was subsequently provided. Late in July of the following summer, 1990, a glass beer bottled was hurled from a passing car at a Japanese and a Korean woman walking together along a main Providence street. The bottle smashed on the pavement a few feet from them. And last year a Brown student who is Japanese-American reported to me that, unaware of the holiday, she had tried unsuccessfully to reach several offices in Providence by telephone from New York on the second Monday in August. Thinking there might be trouble with the telephone lines, she contacted the local Providence operator and was told that this is the day people in Rhode Island “celebrate beating the Japs.” Such incidents could explain in part why one Japanese resident of Rhode Island told The Providence Journal in 1989 that, while she had not personally been confronted, for years she stayed home on Victory Day. “It really felt awkward just to step out of the house. It was almost painful.”[8]

Changing the Name: Support, Opposition, and Ambivalence

1. Economics

An early proposal to abolish the holiday came from the local Chamber of Commerce, which was concerned about the loss of production and sales on what is a regular business day in all other states. This move was vigorously opposed by representatives of labor unions. The Chamber of Commerce later suggested that the name of the holiday be changed because its current designation was discouraging Japanese investment in the state. After one Japanese diplomat initially agreed that the holiday’s name made Japanese uncomfortable and hindered business in Rhode Island with Japan, the Japanese Consulate in Boston has subsequently avoided public comment on the issue. Nevertheless, as noted above, a number of Japanese companies have recently located factories and offices in Rhode Island, including Snow and Stars, a manufacturer and marketer of jewelry, and Toray Plastics, a large producer of packaging products. Since arriving in the state, both firms have increased their local operations, and Toray announced a major expansion in Rhode Island this year, which will create jobs and generate income for the state’s struggling economy. The news of the company’s decision to expand in Rhode Island, rather than to locate facilities they had been considering in another state, was greeted with jubilation by local residents and the State Department of Economic Development. However, addressing the economic incentive for changing the name of Victory Day, some opponents have argued that this would represent a knuckling under to Japanese money. On a radio phone-in talk show, for example, one opponent recently accused a supporter of being “paid off” by Japanese interests.

2. History versus Revisionism

One of the strongest objections among members of veterans organizations to changing the name of Victory Day is that this would result in people forgetting the sacrifices of U.S. Veterans in World War II. Some in these groups even advocate changing the name back to “Victory over Japan Day.” Otherwise, they say, the aggression and atrocities committed during the war by Japanese Imperial forces will also be forgotten. Other opponents to changing the name share this concern. Several callers to the above-mentioned talk show told of relatives and friends who had been held in Japanese prisoner-of-war camps, and one woman described a relative’s suffering during the Bataan Death March in 1942. A Dutch physician, now a resident of Rhode Island, wrote in a letter to The Providence Journal in 1988 that his family and thousands of other Dutch people, including children, had been held “in deplorable conditions” for years in “a Japanese concentration camp” where his father died and his own health deteriorated from tropical diseases and malnutrition until he weighed only 70 pounds.

The ending of the war represented a new beginning for my family, but the emotional pain still lingers on. We never hated the Japanese people, only their leaders’ policies of military expansionism. I never celebrate the destruction of Nagasaki and Hiroshima on Victory Day. I do not celebrate the death and suffering of the victims of the atomic bomb, and I hope that nuclear bombs never have to be used again.

But I do not feel that I have to apologize to the Japanese people for cherishing life. I am thankful to live in this great nation, and I thank the young men and women who fought for us. I pray with, and for, the parents who lost their sons and daughters in battle so we could live. I thank the state of Rhode Island for Victory Day, but if it is abolished, the first week in August will always be a memory, and a period of renewed hope for me.[9]

Besides concern about fading memories, veterans and others who oppose redesignating the holiday say that this would give aid and comfort to right-wing elements in Japan seeking to rewrite or cover up the history of World War II, dismissing such atrocities as the Nanking Massacre as the exaggerated creations of Chinese propaganda. These opponents of a name change also point to statements by a Japanese government official asserting that Japan’s occupation had benefited Korea, and to attempts by Japan’s Ministry of Education to revise textbooks in a way that would downplay Japanese aggression in China and Korea.[10]

On the other side of the debate, some local supporters of the change, while acknowledging wartime atrocities and a tragically misguided government policy, have objected to portrayals of Japanese exclusively as perpetrators of the war, which seem to ignore its many Japanese victims. Residents of Rhode Island from Japan who testified at the hearing on the Kushner bill recounted their own experiences of loved ones lost in the fighting and homes destroyed in Allied air raids; and an American representative of an anti-nuclear group testified that the holiday’s “militaristic” designation was an insult to victims of the atomic bombings. This sentiment was shared by a contributor to the “Letters” column of The Providence Journal, who wrote in 1991 that “I was outraged by [the recent] letter ‘In Defense of V-J Day’ (8/6). Yes, it was a great victory and I am glad the war was ended. But why should we celebrate the deaths of innocent Japanese? Yes, many American men and women died. But thousands of Japanese men, women and children were killed.”[11] She might have added that many historians now consider the nuclear attacks to have been unnecessary for ending the war, and regard them as the worst of many atrocities committed by Allied forces during the conflict.[12]

To complicate matters, one Japanese woman, a long-time Rhode Island resident, privately opposed changing the name of Victory Day to “Remembrance Day,” preferring “World Peace Day,” because she was concerned about what it was that people were supposed to remember. Her husband said he believed the theory that President Roosevelt had prior knowledge of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Such statements suggest that one difficulty for some Japanese with the name “Victory Day” is that it represents defeat for Japan. The official Japanese name for this holiday, observed on August 15, is Day Commemorating the End of the War (Shūsen Kinenbi). On the use of the word “victory,” some opponents of a name-change have expressed the opinion that, having ultimately failed to expand by military conquest, Japan is controlled now by government and business leaders who are seeking world domination by economic means. According to this view, changing the name of Victory Day would cause people to forget that powerful forces in Japan still harbor hegemonic designs.

3. Discrimination

Supporters of a change in the name of Victory Day have long maintained that the holiday’s designation, in combination with the date of its observance in mid-August, makes Japan its obvious target and encourages harassment of Japanese, and, because of their racial affinity, of other Asians and Asian-Americans as well. Many of these supporters have openly deplored Japan’s wartime aggression and criticized current Japanese trade policies, but assert that the effect of the name Victory Day has been to stigmatize all Asians and Americans of Asian descent in Rhode Island. They point out that no similar observance accompanies “V-E Day” in May, commemorating the Allied victory over Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. And one wonders how long a holiday popularly called “Victory over Italy Day” would survive in a state with a large Italian-American population.[13] Officials of veterans organizations publicly deny that the holiday’s designation is intended to single out Japan, insisting, as noted above, that it is meant only to commemorate the end of World War II. But supporters of a name change then ask why these same officials oppose any change in the name, even to something like “World War II Veterans Day.”

The issue of discrimination raises the possibility of an alliance between Japanese residents of Rhode Island and other minorities, especially African-Americans[14] who have asserted that the inclusion of a design from the confederate flag as one section of the state flags in Georgia and Alabama constitutes discrimination, even though no racial or ethnic group is specifically named. Former Rhode Island State Representative George S. Lima, an African-American and World War II veteran, has strongly supported legislation to change the name of Victory Day. Since his retirement from the House of Representatives, Mr. Lima has remained a leading political activist, and continues to press vigorously for redesignation. Through his good offices, members of the Rhode Island Japan Society have met regularly with members of the State Legislature’s Black Caucus, of which he was a founder. Most legislators in the Caucus have supported bills for redesignation despite their anger over recent aspersions against American blacks by Japanese politicians,[15] and the belief that labor policies pursued by Japanese corporations in the United States have the effect of excluding minorities from employment in these firms.

4. The Danger of Exacerbating Tensions

Finally, a number of Japanese nationals and Japanese-Americans in Rhode Island have opposed litigation to require a name change out of concern that tensions, already exacerbated considerably by trade friction, could escalate dangerously in the heat of a lawsuit. Most of these individuals continue to favor change by legislative means, but some Japanese nationals, including executives of Japanese companies in Rhode Island, have declined to participate in the effort to get a bill passed. Nevertheless, a much larger number of Japanese nationals, Asian-Americans, and others have volunteered to sign petitions and to advocate publicly for redesignation. Students at local universities, including many who have no national or ethnic Asian connections, have been particularly active and outspoken on the issue. Though I am unaware of any students who have met with harassment for their views, obscene and threatening letters were sent anonymously to me and to another individual who has publicly supported changing the name of the holiday.

An Alternative Approach

With various options still under consideration and the controversy continuing, it would seem inappropriate at this point to formulate a conclusion in a study of this issue. It seems likely that any legislation that proposes to change the name of Victory Day will encounter the vigorous opposition of veterans organizations which are well-funded, highly organized, and, as noted above, wield considerable influence in Rhode Island state government. Still, in this veteran’s opinion, these groups do not represent the views of a majority of Rhode Island veterans, most of whom, if fully informed of the holiday’s impact, would support a redesignation that commemorates their service, but does not unfairly stigmatize Japanese today and create an atmosphere for hostility and violence against Asians and Asian-Americans.

The latest bill, submitted in 1992, sought, in a sense, to move beyond the current controversy by responding to the complaint of some veterans of Vietnam and other wars that the term Victory Day limits its commemoration to men and women who served in World War II, the only military conflict to have its own holiday on the calendar. As one marine veteran noted, someone who was killed in Korea or Kuwait is just as dead as someone who died at Anzio or Iwo Jima.[16] The solution proposed in legislation that was supported by Governor Sundlun, himself a World War II combat veteran, would have resolved the “one-war holiday” problem in the same way it was resolved by the federal government after World War II. Veterans of that war led a successful drive to change the name of Armistice Day, which referred specifically to the end of World War I, to Veterans Day, the present designation of this November national holiday. In the same way, it was hoped that the name “Rhode Island Veterans Day” would gain support among veterans, inside and outside organizations, as a holiday that would honor all in Rhode Island who have given military service to the United States. The proposed name did not entirely satisfy advocates of “World Peace Day,” who maintain that Rhode Island already has too many official “militaristic” observances, but they supported it as an acceptable alternative to Victory Day.

Things got off to an inauspicious start on March 4, 1992, when the Senate Committee on Special Legislation, where the bill was first assigned, refused to act, referring it instead to the Joint Senate-House Committee on Veterans Affairs. But on April 7 the bill passed the House Judiciary Committee, generally perceived as liberal in outlook, thus making it eligible for consideration by the full House. The hostile reception the bill received on April 15 in the Committee on Veterans Affairs was predictable. One committee member, in apparent reference to his own service in World War II, told Senator Rhoda E Perry, the bill’s sponsor, not to try passing it “until we’re dead.” An individual attending the hearing, who identified himself as a Vietnam veteran, misguidedly asserted that changing the name to “Rhode Island Veterans Day” would “take away my father’s holiday.” On May 13, after a floor debate, the full House voted overwhelmingly to reassign the bill to committee, effectively killing it for another year. The comments of opponents were quoted in The Providence Journal.

“If our friends in Japan are upset,” [Representative David W.] Dumas [Republican-East Greenwich] said, “all I can say is: ‘Deal with it.’ We won that war.”

Added Lawrence). Fergusen, D[emocrat]-Bristol: “We didn’t start that war.”

The vote to recommit was 82 to 9.[17]

The Journal article did not quote the testimony of representatives who spoke in favor of the bill. Representative Rodney D. Driver, a pastsupporter of redesignation, called it “a good bill.” Representative Linda J. Kushner, sponsor of the 1989 legislation, testified that changing the name to Rhode Island Veterans Day “does not take away from veterans.” And she affirmed that, with the holiday’s present designation, “Americans who are of Japanese descent [are] facing discrimination.... People who are suffering... are people who weren’t even born at [the] time [of World War II].” And Representative Joseph E. Newsome, an African-American and leading member of the Rhode Island Black Caucus, addressed two issues in his statement supporting the bill.

As long as we celebrate and commemorate and honor war, we will condemn ourselves, and more importantly our children, to fight them....I was raised, and many of you I know were raised, with the understanding that if something you do or you say is offensive to your brothers and sisters, then you shouldn’t do or say it. And I think the way we package this holiday is offensive to our Japanese brothers and sisters,... many of who are citizens of this country....The war is over. It’s forty years long over.[18]

Despite such expressions of support, the overwhelming vote against this bill (an even worse defeat than Representative Mornacy’s bill suffered in 1985) has convinced some legislators, who have consistently supported redesignation, that no realistic possibility exists for passage of legislation to change the name of Victory Day for the next five years. On the other hand, Senator Perry and Representative Crowley, sponsors of the 1992 bill, have vowed to resubmit it again next year if, as likely, they are reelected. At that time, they intend to raise the issue of discrimination, which was not discussed in committee hearings this year. They confirmed that their colleagues were under intense pressure in 1992, as in previous years, from veterans organizations, but noted that a number of current legislators will retire from office or lose their seats in the next election, so that the General Assembly will have many new faces in 1993.[19] Thus, there still seems to be at least some hope for a legislative compromise to this continuing conflict of perceptions and agendas. Otherwise, options still remain for filing litigation, if a plaintiff can be found, or for placing a referendum on the ballot in a state-wide election.[20]