Our Fathers Were Interned Under the Alien Enemies Act. This Law Should Be Repealed, Not Revived

Max Ebel fled his home in Nazi Germany after he was assaulted for refusing to join the Hitler Youth. Susumu Shimizu, a Japanese immigrant in Peru, helped run a successful family business in Lima. Neither Max nor Susumu had broken any law or posed a threat to the United States. Yet the U.S. government imprisoned these men for years in World War II internment camps.

Their internment was declared permissible under the Alien Enemies Act, a law that allowed...