<Begin Segment 5>

FC: What attracted you, young lawyer, to join the ACLU? Why not big money, private practice?

FO: Well, I'll tell you. It's a kind of a long, interesting story. I went to undergraduate school at UCLA, and I was on the freshman tennis team. One Saturday morning we had a meet out at UCLA. I lived in Boyle Heights on the east side of town, it was a long trip, didn't have a car, was taking the bus out. And on the seat next to me, I mean, there just happened to be a pamphlet about the ACLU. And I read it, and I was very much interested, and I thought, "Gee whiz." I wasn't quite sure I was going be a lawyer at that time, I didn't know what I was going to do, I was just a freshman. But I said, "That's something that I'd like to think about," and over the years I remembered that. And I went to law school, and as I went to law school, I took constitutional law, and I said, "That's the kind of work I'd like to do. It's just something that I'd like to do." And when I got out, I didn't have any connections at all, I was envious of other guys in my class, they had people they could go to and everything. And I didn't have, I didn't have any money to start my own office. One of my classmates happened to know Al, in a limited sort of way and I talked to him, and he said, "Well, why don't you go up and see if you can get a job in that firm? They had a firm, a small law firm called Gallagher and Wirin. And I went to see... well, the first guy I interviewed with was Gallagher, then I met Wirin. They did have an opening, and I went on at twenty-five dollars a week as a lawyer. And because Al was so involved with the ACLU, and he asked me to be sort of an assistant for him, so I, as much as I could, I did ACLU work and neglected the money part of it. But... and that's all, and I've been, as I say, I was, all my professional life I was with the ACLU, first as a volunteer and then as the director, I was emeritus. But that's, it was just... what attracted me? I don't know what inside attracted me, but that's what I wanted to do. [Laughs]

FC: Has it been worth it?

FO: Absolutely, no question about it. I think that there's no organization that I can think of more worthy of support than the ACLU. And as I mentioned earlier, sooner or later two things happen about, happen about the ACLU: sooner or later they make an enemy of everybody, and sooner or later everybody needs the ACLU. So I think it's a great organization.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 1995, 2005 Frank Abe and Densho. All Rights Reserved.