Question

What did Roosevelt's Executive Order 9066 do

Answer 1

Roosevelt's Executive Order 9066 effectively established the internment camps, to which thousands of Japanese Americans were sent. It has since been viewed as a grave mistake. 

Answer 2

In February, 1942, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, which allowed the Secretary of War to designate certain areas as military zones.  FDR's executive order set the stage for the relocation of Japanese-ancestry persons to internment camps.  By June of 1942, over 100,000 Japanese Americans were sent to such internment camps.

Follow-up:

In February, 1976, President Gerald Ford issued a proclamation that rescinded the old Executive Order 9066, which was still on the books.  In his proclamation, President Ford said:

February 19th is the anniversary of a sad day in American history. It was on that date in 1942, in the midst of the response to the hostilities that began on December 7, 1941, that Executive Order 9066 was issued, subsequently enforced by the criminal penalties of a statute enacted March 21, 1942, resulting in the uprooting of loyal Americans. Over one hundred thousand persons of Japanese ancestry were removed from their homes, detained in special camps, and eventually relocated.  ...

We now know what we should have known then--not only was that evacuation wrong, but Japanese-Americans were and are loyal Americans.  ... The Executive order that was issued on February 19, 1942, was for the sole purpose of prosecuting the war with the Axis Powers, and ceased to be effective with the end of those hostilities. Because there was no formal statement of its termination, however, there is concern among many Japanese-Americans that there may yet be some life in that obsolete document. I think it appropriate, in this our Bicentennial Year, to remove all doubts on that matter, and to make clear our commitment in the future.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GERALD R. FORD, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim that all authority conferred by Executive Order 9066 terminated upon the issuance of Proclamation 2714, which formally proclaimed the cessation of hostilities of World War II on December 31, 1946.

I call upon the American people to affirm with me this American Promise -- that we have learned from the tragedy of that long-ago experience forever to treasure liberty and justice for each individual American, and resolve that this kind of action shall never again be repeated.