<Begin Segment 11>

HM: Okay, now. I don't know... what do I feel about the memorial? I feel that it is necessary. Because there are still people out here, out in the United States of America, who are citizens or who have become naturalized citizens or who were born into citizenship, that still think that some people are better than the others, or some people should not have the same rights. And I was working this puzzle and I came across this saying that, "It is easy to take liberty for granted when you have never had it taken away from you." And this was by Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney? Dick Cheney. I thought, this is so true. Although I had a really, really good life in the camps, and no telling what would have happened had I been out, our liberty was taken away from us. And the liberty of my parents and my siblings and my friends, aunts and uncles, all these people who were citizens of the United States, their liberty was taken away. And the reason? Just because they had Japanese blood coursing around in their body. They had, they had no trials. They had nothing. The government just picked them up, took them out of their homes without any promise to a future, and stuck them in a concentration camp. This is what I think is so important about this memorial. Lots of good things came out of this. But it was not the government's, it was not the government's place to say, "Okay, we're going to do this to you." A lot of the good things is because the people who were in this situation took it upon themselves, or took advantage of certain circumstances, to better themselves. Who knows, if I was not, and our family was not put into the concentration camp, maybe I never would have gone to college -- I was the first person in our family to do so -- and become a teacher. Maybe I would still be in the fields, scratching out a living. I can't tell, but that was not the government's place to decide that. Maybe I would have become a teacher anyway. So I think this is why it's important for people to hear the stories of these different families, to find out what can I do as an American? Am I to let something like this happen to another group of people? Is it right for the government to do this? We have a constitution. Should we make exceptions to it for just certain people? That's why I think this is so important. Is to let... we as Americans... be aware that liberty can be taken away from you. You have to be vigilant so that you can take steps to speak out and not let it happen. That's what I think, but I don't know. I just...

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2007 Densho. All Rights Reserved.