JAP EVACUEES' RETURN AFTER JAN. 1 APPROVED

By Associated Press.

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 18.--Japanese removed from the Pacific Coast early in the war will be permitted to return to their former homes in California, Oregon and Washington after January 1.

Maj. Gen. Henry C. Pratt, chief of the Western Defense Command, announced yesterday that the War Department had decided to revoke its security order, under which the persons of Japanese ancestry were evacuated. The move, General Pratt said, was because of "favorable progress of the war in the Pacific, as well as other developments."

Henceforth, he said, they will be excluded only when the Army considers them, personally, dangerous. All persons not specifically excluded will be permitted to return.

L.A. Mayor Opposed

Reception of the announcement throughout the West was varied. In Los Angeles, outspoken Mayor Fletcher Bowron declared that if the government permits the Japanese to return it should send troops to protect hem.

"If they come back and start moving war workers to get a place to live, I don't know what the result will be," Bowron said, adding that because of inadequate police facilities "we just can't guarantee them protection."

It was uncertain how many evacuees would be affected by the order. More than 115,000 persons of Japanese ancestry were evacuated in the order of March 24, 1942, and it was estimated that there are now approximately 119,000 under jurisdiction of the War Relocation Authority.

Spokesmen for the Western Defense Command said that lifting of the ban will not mean a sudden return of population, adding further strain to war-taxed housing conditions. The Defense Command said it expects the War Relocation Authority to see that the process is gradual, and added that those permitted to return will be carefully investigated.

In Boise, Idaho's Gov. C.A. Bottolfsen voiced hearty accord with the revocation order. Idaho is the site of the Minidoka Relocation Center, which at one time housed 10,000 Japanese Americans.

"Having proved themselves loyal American citizens, these people should be given every opportunity to return to their homes..." Governor Bottolfsen said.

Internees Waited for Today

Yoshita Fujii, chairman of the Minidoka Community Council, said the 7,500 Minidoka internees "have been waiting for this day. We long to return to our homes, our farms, our businesses. We feel that we are good Americans..."

At Salt Lake City, Saburo Kido, president of the Japanese-American Citizens' League and a former San Francisco lawyer, termed the action "a vindication of the loyalty of the Japanese-American population to the United States.

But at Kent, Wash., Benjamin Smith, president of the "Remember Pearl Harbor" League, declared the Japanese still are dangerous to the war effort, and added that his organization has pledged 500 persons not to sell, lease or rent farms, homes or stores to the returning evacuees. He said that "further steps" might be taken.

Orderly Dismissal

An orderly dismissal of the Japanese from the camps was envisioned by War Relocation Authorities. At the Topaz (Ariz.) Center, Director Luther T. Hossman said it would probably be a year before the center is abandoned.

Director Leroy H. Bennett of the Gila River Center at Rivers, Ariz., said the residents won't be returned "immediately," and promised a detailed announcement of procedure would be made later in Washington.

At Washington, D.C., West Coast congressmen were reluctant to comment. Representative Lea, Democrat, California, said he hoped many of the Japanese who left the state would stay away. Congressmen from Oregon and Washington State said there was still considerable feeling against the Japanese in some parts of their districts.

Housing Is Problem

Representative Sheppard, Democrat, California, said he thought the housing situation in many California areas would retard the return of the Japanese.

At Salinas, Calif., which sent many of its youth to Bataan and Corregidor, Chamber of Commerce Secretary Fred A. McCargar said, "Salinas certainly doesn't want any incidents to happen." He envisaged the possibility of an adverse affect on the 3,000 Filipinos in the Salinas Valley, many of whom are now working farms formerly operated by the Japanese.

In Washington, Secretary Ickes said today the Interior Department will expand its relocation program to sent resettled persons of Japanese ancestry back to their West Coast homes.

At the same tme [time], he expressed the belief that a large proportion of the more than 35,000 Japanese-Americans relocated in other parts of the country may choose to remain.

Ickes emphasized that there will be no "hasty mass movement" of evacuees.

18,700 at Tule Lake

The Justice Department is expected to take over and operate the Tule Lake (Calif.) segregation for Japanese nationals and Japanese-Americans who have expressed a desire to return to Japan.

There are approximately 18,700 persons in the Tule Lake area--a barbed-wire enclosed camp. Most of these are Japanese citizens but some are Japanese-Americans who, despite having once become Americans citizens, have decided that their national feeling is with Japan. Of the total, about 5,000 are younger than 18 years of age and have been placed in the Tule Lake area because of the status of their parents or relatives.