<Begin Segment 20>

BF: How did the recommendations... how did that process work -- the recommendations following the report?

WM: Well, I think you've heard Angus Macbeth describe it, maybe he didn't. I think he described it... were you at the general session? Where Angus --

BF: Yeah...

WM: -- Macbeth spoke? Well, the redress part was cut apart from what had happened. First a determination was made of what had happened, and was this right or wrong, was it a violation. And the answer to that was a unanimous yes, including Dan Lungren. Then the second part was issued six months later as to what the remedy should be. The remedy of $20,000 per person, and an apology. And this was deliberately done that way so that the two would not get confused. If we had issued the report that this was wrong, and in addition to that included $20,000 payment which would result in 120,000 people at $2.4 billion, the focus would be upon the money. Everybody would, "Holy smokes, these guys are getting 2.4 billion dollars? They're recommending that?" And nobody'd pay attention to what happened, that this was wrong. So there was a severance there. A decision was made as to whether it was right or wrong, and then Congressman Dan Lungren went along -- it was unanimous. It was only six months later when we got to the amount that he broke ranks, and he did not want to pay the money.

<End Segment 20> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.