As U.S. and Allied forces closed in on victory in the Pacific, restrictions on Japanese Americans were lifted. On December 17, 1944, Major General Henry C. Pratt, acting commander of the Western Defense Command (General DeWitt had been dismissed in late 1943), issued Public Proclamation Number Twenty-one, which restored the rights of evacuees to return to their former homes. The next day, internment was officially brought to an end when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Mitsuye Endo, an internee who in 1942 filed a writ of habeas corpus, compelling the government to either release her or provide just cause as to why she should be interned. In ruling in favor of Endo, the Court stated that the government could not detain loyal citizens without just cause. Since no evidence of disloyalty had been presented against Japanese Americans, they were free to go.

Though the West Coast was...