<Begin Segment 12>

FA: Tell me, Frank, about the bulletins. You had Fair Play Committee Bulletin No. 1.

FE: Yes.

FA: Tell me about that.

FE: The Fair Play Committee issued three bulletins during that period. They probably issued few more but the only ones that I've had in hand, that was kept, was the three bulletins. The first one was informational and told our stand, our theme of the Fair Play Committee. And the second bulletin was a question and answers as regarding the Fair Play Committee, and the third bulletin was the one in which we took the stand, a definite stand on the draft issue. Which was not only informational but now we came to the point where we said that we'll refuse to go to the draft or to the induction when we are called in order to contest the issue. And the reason for that was because we felt that the draft as applied to camp was, as I said before, illegal, immoral, unjust, unfair and against all concept of civilized use of it.

[Interruption]

FC: I think in one of the bulletins, it was clearly stated that Fair Play Committee's intent was to create test cases. And in the third bulletin, the second bulletin, you may have to go to court.

FE: Right, uh-huh.

FC: Now that seemed to say that you wanted to create test cases.

FE: Right.

FA: With the third bulletin, was it really, was it very clear in your mind what you were proposing to create, a test case?

FE: Yes, the third bulletin we came out and very clearly set forth our views and what we were going to do. We said that, as I said before, refuse to, hereby refuse to go to the draft in order to contest the issue.

FC: That's the one line, that's the one line that pissed the FBI off.

FE: That's the one line that got us indicted.

FC: Who wrote that line?

FE: I think I was guilty of that. 'Cause we had a very serious discussion in the steering committee before we printed that, and there was two or three that didn't want to go as strong. They said this might get us in trouble. And I remember arguing that if we don't take a definite stand, it's not going to do any good. We've been information long enough and as the Fair Play Committee we should take a stand on this. In fact, my brother told me that one of the fellows, Min Tamesa, told my brother that if I had talked to this other fellow -- should I mention his name? Paul Nakadate like I did, he would either have swung at me or run away. I was pretty adamant at that meeting and said that we had to take a stand. And that was finally passed and we did go that route. Which landed us in prison, but at least we felt that we took the right track. And we put this in resolution form to the mass meeting at our next meeting and proposed it to the members and see if they would pass a resolution and it was unanimous. 'Cause as I said, one or two opposition that these were former ROTC members, but rest of them were unanimously accepting the resolution that they will resist the draft. But when their, most of them, when their actual notices did come, they were more afraid of going to jail, so they obeyed the, their physical orders.

FA: What was the immediate reaction in camp outside of that, after the meeting that the resolution was passed? What was the immediate reaction in the general camp?

FE: Well, as I said before, the camp's a huge place. Like, it's like a small city so we really didn't see any immediate reaction from the people. I think the reaction was mostly from those people at the meeting, and which was very positive.

FC: How did the camp newspaper respond?

FE: The Heart Mountain Sentinel really crucified us after that. They likened us to a second Pearl Harbor etcetera, and called us dimwitted and stupid and idiots and that we were, we should be put in, put in prison for sedition. They really raked us over the coals. And in one of the editorials, Nobu Kawai wrote a very, very stinging editorial about, on the Fair Play Committee, so I wrote a very long letter rebutting him which had, came out in two editions of the Sentinel instead of one. They couldn't put it all in one. And rebutted him on that which was also all in the FBI files.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 1998, 2005 Frank Abe and Densho. All Rights Reserved.