And justice for all : an oral history of the Japanese American detention camps /

These 30 oral-history interviews with Japanese Americans interned during WW II are by no means the first presentation of that experience ""in human and personal terms""; but time has perhaps made us all more open, and made Japanese Americans both more secure and more resolute. While many of the interviewees tell familiar stories--the shock of the evacuation order, the loss of possessions and livelihoods, the desolate camps, barracks-living, humiliations and tensions, resettlement to strange locales, menial jobs, educational quests, obstructions and helping hands--there are also a number of personal tales that are moving or striking in themselves. Mary Tsukamoto recalls the mother whose 32-year-old retarded son was taken from her, to an institution, where he died within a month or so. She recalls her grandparents crying--Grandma for her flowers, Grandpa for his vineyard--and her own guilt as a Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) staffer, the messenger of ill tidings. Minoru Yasui was the only Japanese American lawyer in Oregon. His Issei father, a successful agriculturalist and community leader, was confronted with children's schoolwork drawings, from his home, of the Panama Canal: ""I can still so vividly remember the officer asking my father to prove that he didn't intend to blow up the Panama Canal."" Yasui, also an Army reserve officer, deliberately tested the curfew and five-mile restrictions, and served time in prison. There is much reference to questions 27 and 28 of the 1943 ""loyalty""/recruitment questionnaire--""Are you willing to foreswear allegiance to any foreign potentate. . .?"" ""Are you willing to bear arms for the United States?""--which divided the internees, some of whom answered no-no in outrage. The group includes a disabled veteran and a draft-resister. Though many take pride in surmounting their difficulties, the sense of being wronged may be stronger than ever. As massed testimony: extra-potent. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.