Densho Digital Archive - Osamu Mori Interview (denshovh-mosamu-01-0017)

<Begin Segment 17>

RP: This is tape two, three, excuse me, of a continuing interview with Sam Mori. And Sam, we were talking about some of your friends in Tule Lake and where they ended up going. Were you also aware of a law that passed in, I think it was July of 1944, that allowed American citizens to renounce their citizenship, mostly at Tule Lake and were you aware of, some people talk about many Nisei at that time were quote, "coerced" and urged to sign away their citizenship under duress?

OM: I know that such a law was passed, in fact, I think my sister was probably one of the what you term "majority," was one that did renounce. But it didn't apply to a minor, in other words, a minor couldn't renounce anyway so I probably didn't think about it one way or another. I know my sister did and as a result of that she had to stay in camp. I don't know if she had to or what but she, until that was cleared up somehow, she didn't come out of camp until sometime in March '46, you know. But it didn't apply to me so I didn't think too much of it.

RP: Did you... was there a faction, sort of a split between the Kibei and the Nisei in Tule Lake?

OM: I don't think it was a question... you know in Tule Lake, I don't know if it's common knowledge or not, but Tule Lake was made up of, you know, Tule Lake was a camp before it was a segregation camp, a normal camp. And there was a lot of people there that just didn't want to move. They didn't want to go to Arkansas or Amache or whatever. They decided to stay there but because you signed "yes-yes," that doesn't mean you have to go someplace, you just stayed there. So there was a large group of people there, like I was telling you, that the block or ward that we came in was from Delta and from Sacramento area. And those people are "yes-yes" all the way, and they were stayed there, okay. Now you have that group and you have people like us that came in there that signed "no-no" but were on the border or anyway. And there are the other factions, the "yes-yes," I mean "no-no," all the way, right? So the ones that were "yes-yes" and didn't want to move, they were, you know, like my neighbor, he was a young guy, not young but he was probably in his late thirties or forties, you get up in the morning at ten o'clock or whatever and you hear this clarinet going, that's him. All he cares about is playing his clarinet, he don't care about who's winning the war or why this is happening or that happening, all he cares about is playing his clarinet. There's a lot of guys like that, they were just in camp because they had to be, period. Then there was, you know, the other two factions that were there. And I'm not sure that Nisei, Kibei, I'm sure that there was a lot of Kibeis that were, you know, maybe pro-Japanese, more than the Niseis but there was a lot of Kibeis that went MIS, that surprisingly, I'm surprised at the numbers of those guys. But like her cousin, he's a Kibei and yet he was in the service, I'm sure he didn't volunteer but he was in the service and he stayed in the service 'til the war was ended

Off Camera: No, he volunteered.

OM: No, I don't think so. Oh, yeah?

Off Camera: Because he said at the Presidio before the war started, he was --

OM: Yeah, but the draft was going on then too, see? The draft already started but, you know, whether he did or not, he stayed in the service and all that. But there was a lot of people who did volunteer, Kibeis that volunteered so I don't know about... I don't want to label Kibei one way or another. I know there were a lot of pro-Japanese Kibeis and there were a lot of the other kind, you know. So I don't think it's any different than a lot of Niseis. I think among the Nisei it was not pro-Japanese but indifference. You know, it's just like me, I don't volunteer for anything, I was told never volunteer so when I was in the service, I never volunteered. If they wanted to pick me out and do KP duty, that's fine with me, I'll do it but I don't volunteer for anything. So if they draft me, okay, I'm fine, I'll go but if you don't, I won't volunteer.