"A GEM OF A BOOK, FROM ENGAGING ANECDOTE TO PERSONAL NARRATIVE TO SWEEPING HISTORY, AND BEST OF ALL, THE CONNECTIONS BETWEEN YESTERDAY AND TODAY." - John Christgau, author of '"Enemies': World War II Alien Internment"
“HOW COULD WE HAVE LET THIS HAPPEN”? As the government rolled out its domestic
security apparatus after 9/11, I began thinking about historical lessons. I was struck by how much these new security manifestations echoed the
past, specifically World War II.
DO WE PAY TOO MUCH ATTENTION TO HISTORY? Many writers and commentators have stated the
obvious: history repeats itself, or nearly so. But how, specifically? Policymakers, the media, and the public often embrace simplistic or muddled
historical lessons, and each manipulates them to affirm their assumptions.
"Security subsists, too, in fidelity to freedom's first principles." —Justice Anthony Kennedy
Homeland Insecurity is the book I always intended to write. It emphasizes the influence of
historical precedent on domestic security practices, and the contest between security and the Constitution that is the heart of the story. I observe the
impact on detainees and their families of profiling, FBI bungling, military commissions, secret arrests, suspension of due process and habeas
corpus, deportation, extraordinary rendition, and second-class citizenship.
CAN IT HAPPEN AGAIN? The answer to that question may be the ultimate lesson of this tragic
episode.
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"FASCINATING AND CHILLING..." - Oral History Review
Critics praised Stephen Fox's America's Invisible Gulag as "must reading for all concerned about a
repetition and erosion of civil liberties." Now, the award-winning
author presents FEAR ITSELF (2007 ed.), a revised and expanded edition of the original, including new chapters on
the role of German spies at Pearl Harbor and the forced deportation of Germans from Latin America.
Encouraged
by President Franklin Roosevelt, who had warned earlier
against giving in to fear, J. Edgar Hoover's FBI rounded up nearly
11,000 people of German ancestry, including Jewish refugees from
occupied Europe and over 4,000 residents of Latin America.
Weaving together first-person
interviews and government records in this unique study, Fox
relates the inside story of internment and exclusion, and suggests answers to many key questions. Among them: What methods did
the Justice Department and FBI employ? Why were some Germans
nabbed but not others? Why were Jewish refugees and Latin Germans
included? Why did internments continue for four years after
the end of the war?
"Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth—more than ruin—more
even than death. Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and
comfortable habit." —Bertrand Russell
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"BRAVISSIMO!" - Andrew F. Rolle, author of "The Italian Americans: Troubled Roots" and "The Immigrant Upraised"
UNCIVIL LIBERTIES powerfully demonstrates oral history's ability to challenge common
assumptions. While the relocation of Japanese Americans during World
War II has been extensively reported, few are aware that
the federal government also enacted a program that forced thousands of
West Coast Italian and German aliens and their families to leave their
homes and jobs. Other Italians, including American citizens whose loyalty was deemed doubtful, were interned or
excluded without due process.
"I tell you it was a crazy thing. Whoever thought up that law had screws loose
someplace." —Mary Tolomei
In addition to extensive interviews, the book relies on government
documents and newspaper accounts to reveal this little-known
chapter in American history. The painful, long-suppressed
memories elicited in these interviews serve as a reminder of the
fragility of the civil liberties of all people in a time of national
crisis.
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