U.S. Won't Be Bestial With Jap Americans, Says Ickes

By Associated Press.

SAN FRANCISCO, April 13--Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes said today the War Relocation Authority "will not be stampeded into undemocratic, bestial, inhuman action" in handling Japanese Americans evacuated from the West Coast.

Ickes said he believed the War Relocation Authority program "has, in general, handled with discretion, humanity and wisdom" the problem of caring for the evacuees sent away from West Coast points by Army orders.

In a statement outlining his views, Ickes said the eventual status of the Japanese Americans who have been investigated and proved loyal is to a large extent "a local problem."

"It is a problem for people in California, in Washington and in Oregon," said Ickes.

"I hope that the clamor of those few among you who are screaming that this situation should be resolved on the basis of prejudice and hate will soon be overwhelmed by the stern remonstrances of those among you -- an overwhelming majority -- who believe in fair play and decency, Christianity, in the principles of America, in the Constitution of the United States."

"It is intolerable to think that these people will be excluded from a normal life on this country for long," Ickes said.

After disorders in the relocation center at Tule Lake, Calif., which led to widespread criticism, President Roosevelt some weeks ago transferred the War Relocation Authority to the Department of the Interior.

"The War Relocation Authority was given an unenviable job," Ickes said. "It was no responsible for the evacuation of the Japanese Americans from the West Coast. That was a military decision. The Relocation Authority was given the job of providing for the care and welfare of the people who were uprooted and transferred and of arranging for the restoration to normal life of those among them who were the blameless victims of a wartime program."