<Begin Segment 7>

LH: So what were some of the important coalitions that you built to support redress on the East Coast? What were some of the other organizations that you wanted to contact and definitely wanted to get their support?

GU: Well, you know, it's very interesting and I'm sure most of the Nikkei people involved with redress agree that initially, besides the Quaker group, who always were very fair-minded people, there was also the Jewish organizations. And the JCRC -- that's the Jewish Community Relations Council -- is in almost every city. And then we have the Anti-defamation League of B'nai B'rith, and those are long established Jewish organizations and because of their experience with the Holocaust, there was no need to take our issue before them. In fact, it was just gathering of the minds, common cause. And then we did get into bringing an understanding of why we call our camp experience a concentration camp experience. We said we understand the Jews went to death camps, and we really should not use that terminology, because we were not in death camps. But I said, "What they suffered was done by a despot and the government was fascist and ours here in the United States has a Constitution as the background of how we are to operate. And so for a nation to set aside its fundamental laws, and lock us up without due process of law, by golly, it is a concentration camp when you see it in the context of a democracy." And so we were very clear about our issue and how we were framing it. Because right from the start I knew I was an American. I knew that because my parents gave me a name for the fact that I was born on the Fourth of July. And sometimes names place a burden on you, just as your sexual identity places some certain responsibility, especially like in the Japanese family. You know, you marry, oh boy, you better produce a son, to carry on the family names. Those are given. So we explained this all to our Jewish friends and they understood. And so since they were long-established and they went through the process, they gave us a lot of help and we went and spoke before them. But that help came through very immediately when I went to Washington. Now, I think before I jump to Washington, I really should discuss how is it that I went to Washington.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.