Japanese Pride, American Prejudice : Modifying the Exclusion Clause of the 1924 Immigration Act

Adding a dimension to the history of U.S.-Japan relations, this book reveals that an unofficial movement to promote good feeling between the United States and Japan in the 1920s and 1930s only narrowly failed to achieve its goal: to modify the so-called anti-Japanese exclusion clause of the 1924 U.S. immigration law. It is well known that this clause caused great indignation among the Japanese, and scholars have long regarded it as a major contributing factor in the final collapse of U.S.-Japan relations in 1941.

Not generally known, however, is that beginning immediately after the enactment of the law, private individuals sought to modify the exclusion clause in an effort to stabilize relations between the two countries.

The issue was considered by American and Japanese delegates at almost all subsequent U.S.-Japan diplomatic negotiations, including the 1930 London naval talks and the last-minute attempts to prevent war in 1941.