Question

Read the excerpt from Executive Order 9066, which President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. Which two sentences describe the central idea of the passage?
The president allowed the secretary of war to declare military areas wherever required.




The order allowed for the evacuation and internment of only Asian Americans.



The order allowed for the evacuation and relocation of any citizen from military areas.



The attorney general had the highest authority over the designation of military areas.




The military areas could be designated only along the West Coast of the United States

Answer 1

Executive Order 9066 stated that all people (regardless of race, religion, ethnicity, etc.) from all military areas as "deemed necessary or desirable." Using this terminology allowed FDR and the federal government to not only move Japanese-American citizens but also German-American and Italian-American citizens. The reason why these three specific groups were targeted was because they were all part of the Axis Powers. So one of the correct answers would be the one that relates to the fact that all citizens could be moved by this act.

With the original terminology in mind, the military then declared the entire state of California as a war zone, allowing them to target a huge Japanese-American population (roughly 100,000+ people). However, there was no limit as to where the military could declare a war zone. Essentially, wherever the military saw fit, they could declare a war zone in order to move American citizens.