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Eric Yamamoto on Japanese-American Internment Camps

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Eric Yamamoto is a University of Hawaii Law School professor, an author, and a scholar. Yamamoto spoke at Facing History and Ourselves' 1997 Human Rights and Justice conference, "Collective Violence and Memory: Judgment, Reconciliation, Education." In this video clip, Yamamoto shares a powerful story about a Japanese-American woman who had been held in an internment camp during WWII.

Transcript: 

"…After one talk, I was met by a woman in the audience…and tears were streaming down her face…she said, ‘When I was interned and imprisoned I knew I didn’t do anything wrong. But the President said imprisonment was right, and the Congress said it was right, and the military said it was right, and then the Supreme Court said it was right, and that caused doubt inside my gut. And for forty years I have not been able to speak to anyone about this…only now, with the story being told, and the legal challenge, and reparations forthcoming, only now am I able to talk about it, and now I’m freed."

Video length: 
01 min 00 sec
Date filmed: 
Apr 10 1997