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GK: When you, one of the things about the civil rights, Civil Liberties Act, is that it stopped any litigation after that. So I was wondering if you thought that the coram nobis cases, which didn't really set a precedent, whether they were stopped, they should have gone on? Or do you think the Civil Liberties Act stopped a process that could have come to some kind of fruition, other than what happened?

WM: Well, the lawsuits, first of all, in my opinion, could not have hurt the redress program in Congress. Could not have hurt, that's a negative compliment. Whether or not it actually helped, which is now a positive, I can't say, I really can't say. But at the very least, it was not a negative. It could only have helped, as a practical matter. As to whether they should or should not have continued, like Bill Hohri, whether... I want to say that I have a great deal of respect for what Bill Hohri did, recognition, whether you happen to agree with him or not, he did it. The coram nobis case... I also... my hat's off to Dale Minami and the lawyers who handled that. And I think it comes with very poor grace for people to be criticizing either one. They were doing what they thought was right, and who's to say they're wrong? Their motivation was correct, proper. And as I said before, it did not hurt the redress drive in Congress.

<End Segment 23> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.