<Begin Segment 41>

MN: You were involved in a lot of movements, Manzanar, Asian American Studies, Vietnam, LTPRO, redress. Did your street fighting days, did that help you take on these challenges?

JM: Oh, yeah, because during, I remember going to a meeting at East L.A., JACL meeting, we went to speak to that. One of those people, I don't know, he began to whine and moan about white backlash. And it just got to me, and I said, "Look. If you're worried about white backlash, someone's gonna kick your ass. I live at 165... no, 509 Kingsford. Send 'em over there. So I ain't worried about it, and you ought not to worry about it. If it bothers you, I can't help you. There's a lot of us that we're gonna take it all the way. We're gonna do it nonviolently, and we're gonna do it according to the rule of law because that's how the Nisei want it done, and that's how we're gonna do it, but we're not gonna be, we're not gonna be moving off that thing." So if I didn't have that background in me, yeah, I could start treading water, being worried about, "Oh, what's gonna happen to my, my job prospects in the future, and what's gonna happen here?" And, "Am I gonna be ostracized by my community?" I'm like, hell, let it all hang out, and we'll see what's what. You know, we were one of the few groups during December 7th, we used to wear hinomarus on our (clothes) we used to run around... you know what a hinomaru is? The rising sun flag. We used to wear that on December 7th, and we used to run around and see if anyone wanted to take us on. We see other young white kids, we say, "Happy Pearl Harbor Day." [Laughs] Well, anyway...

MN: Well, you know, the early years of the redress movement, though, I mean, it was almost really taking on, it was David and Goliath. What kept you going?

JM: Like I said, I said, "There's nowhere... it's things like that letter that I got from the Justice Department saying I abandoned my father's savings account. I mean, how much... oh, I mean, I was really super offended by something like that. Not only did they commit a crime on me, in a sense, stealing our money, but practically making a mockery of it. And that lady weeping and crying telling us about Pearl Harbor and, you know, what were we supposed to do? Feel good about ourselves? On and on and on and on. Or the people that, when I was walking with my sisters, they would say, "Hey, Tojo, Miss Tojo." And oh, this one here. Remember I showed you a picture of the old Little Tokyo Cafe, I used to go eat there? Well, I'd be sitting there eating, and an old drunken marine would come in there, and he would tell the waitress, "Hey, Mama-san," he'd say, "where's the women around here?" Do you know what I mean? And I'm like... and the guy sitting next to him was a blind man, too, blind Japanese man. And the guy looks around, and the other, his friend tells him, "Shut up." And he says, "I don't give a damn. I can kick everybody's ass in this restaurant." And I'm like... indignity upon indignity at some point. Incidentally, on that one, I got a friend of mine together and we both picked up pieces of lumber and were waiting for the guy. He'd walk by, we were gonna really work him over. I think we had a good chance 'cause he was drunk. But yeah, how much more do you take? And that's why I keep going back to Frank's "dog with a tail tucked under." How often can you run, how often can you tuck your tail back? You kick somebody enough, and they're gonna want to fight back. And so as the years went by again, and people got disheartened, I always would tell them, "There's nowhere I would rather be at this moment in time than at this damn meeting for NCRR, and I'm always gonna be here 'til we win, knowing that we probably may not, but we're gonna fight and fight and fight.

<End Segment 41> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.