<Begin Segment 16>

TI: Well, so this might be a good segue to talk about. Because eventually you got a phone call to consider representing Min in terms of looking at his Supreme Court case. Can you, is this a good time to talk about that?

PN: Yes.

TI: Okay, so let's talk about that.

PN: I think Min was visited by Professor Peter Irons. Peter found some documents in the National Archives and said, "Wow, there's some hot document here. They ought to, the petitioners out to, or Korematsu, Hirabayashi and Yasui ought to think about reopening their cases." He went to visit them, he somehow got in touch with Dale Minami, and I don't quite know how this all worked out. But Dale gave Min my name as one of the only lawyers he knew in Oregon. I know that was one of the connections, and then the other connection was probably with Day of Remembrance where I met Min. And so Min asked me to organize a meeting of Asian lawyers in Portland to talk about the possibility of reopening his case. Which I did do, and I gathered a group of Chinese and... Asian lawyers, Japanese, etcetera. What struck me about that meeting was that those lawyers started talking about his case as though it were an ordinary slip and fall negligence case. They were going over the evidence saying, "Well, I'm not sure it's a very strong case," and I'm thinking, "This is our community's case. This is a case of a lifetime. This is a historical case. Who gives a shit what the -- " excuse me, "Who gives a darn what the evidence is? This is our case." And I was pretty astounded by the conversation. So I said to Min, "I'm in. I don't care who else is in, I will bring your case, I will find other people, but this is a case that I would be privileged to be a part of."

TI: Why do you think those lawyers didn't step up? I mean, do you think it was because it was, they thought it was a minor case, or were there other things going on that prevented them from doing this?

PN: Well, not that I can read minds, but I was on a panel later on with one of those lawyers. Nice guy, well-respected, very good lawyer. And it was a Minority Law Day panel and he was talking about hiring decisions and he said, "I don't really look at the color of people's skin. I really look at their merits." I just had to turn to him and say, "You know, that's bullshit." Because people don't see me as a lawyer like every other lawyer. They see me first as my gender and race, and then they see me as a lawyer. So the fact that we can say that that's what we do is just not true. And so I sort of confronted him on that panel. And two things, one thing that happened before then was that my mentor who was an African American guy said, "Peggy, if you stop being a nice Japanese girl and actually came out with your power, people would remember who you are." And I said, "Okay, I'm gonna do that." And that was at Minority Law Day, and that was that panel. And I said, "Okay, I've got to speak out." And afterwards, Derek Bell, and I don't know if you know who Derek is, but he was the dean at the University of Oregon, he came up to me and said, "Gee, it sounds like you'd like to teach law school. Why don't you send me your resume." And I said, "Hell, no, that was the most archaic educational system I've ever been, it's the last bastion of white male privilege. No." He said, "Send me your resume." And of course I didn't do that, but I did send him a letter saying, "If you're ever in Portland, I'd love to have lunch or dinner with you." And two months later, he sent me a letter saying, "I have an assistant dean position open, I'd like you to apply for it." And it's times like that when I know that it's just my mission to speak out, and that every time I've spoken out, more doors have opened than closed.

And so I guess with Min's case and listening to these other Asian lawyers not want to come forward, wanting to fit in -- and Oregon is a very tough place to be a person of color. Historically it was settled as a white homeland, blacks were prohibited in the territorial charter, there were very few, there are still very few lawyers of color. So it's a tough place to be, and people want to be well-respected in the legal perspective and fit in. I just didn't happen to be that kind of person. But I also that this was the case of my lifetime, so I was going to do whatever it took to do that case.

TI: But you had these two things in front of you. So you had this offer from Derek Bell to be assistant dean at the University of Oregon, and then you had this large case. Was it a either/or? How would you look at that?

PN: Well, that's interesting that you ask that because I said to Derek when he did offer me the job after going through an interviewing process, I said, "I would be happy to take this position, but I have this case, and if I can't bring the case with me, I'm not accepting the position. Because this is the case that I'm going to do." And he, Derek, had worked with Thurgood Marshall at the Ink Fund doing desegregation cases, the first black tenured professor at Harvard Law School. He said, "If my community had wanted me to do that kind of case for African Americans, I would feel the same way. So come down to Oregon, bring your case, it's all great." And to have as your boss this guy who's bigger than life, and the first black dean outside of historically black law schools, to have him as your boss, who said to me, "Asians need to speak out more, go and speak out." And to have Min Yasui as your client, and they at one point met, it was just fabulous. You really can't have a better career than that, and I had just the fortune and the opportunity to be in that position, to be in that place.

TI: Wow, that's a good story.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2009 Densho. All Rights Reserved.