Following Dr. Mazukazu “Jack” Fujimoto’s testimony, commissioners pressed him and others on issues of education and economic loss. Their questions reflected concern over how incarceration disrupted the futures of Japanese American youth and farm families.

• Education Interrupted: Asked whether Japanese American youth were denied the right to attend college before the war, and how the camps shaped their opportunities afterward. Commissioners wanted to know if dispersal across the country created more or fewer chances for higher education.

• Financial Barriers: Raised the question of how families, stripped of resources after release, could possibly afford college. Commissioners highlighted testimony that the lack of savings or property after camp closed doors for many.

• Farm Losses: Noted that many testifiers came from farm families and asked whether the Farm Security Administration provided any assistance in selling equipment or property.

• Follow-Up Request: Invited Dr. Fujimoto to submit a memorandum expanding on an idea he had mentioned in his statement, showing their interest in carrying his proposal further into the record.

Bill Izumi Nakagawa, an architect from Washington, testified before the Commission about his family’s forced removal, their losses, and his own journey from the assembly centers to the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. His words drew from diary entries kept at the time, offering a vivid picture of daily life under incarceration.

• Life Before the War: Lived with his family on a 25-acre truck farm in Bingen, Washington, across the Columbia River from Hood River, Oregon. Owned farming equipment, vehicles, and boats, all sold off at a fraction of their value under evacuation orders.

• Cultural Fear: His mother burned her beloved Japanese records, fearing they might cause trouble. Their spring cabbage crop, nearly ready for harvest, was left to rot in the fields.

• Evacuation at 19: On his birthday in May 1942, he and 600 others boarded trains from Hood River to Pinedale Assembly Center in California. He described the exhaustion of the train ride and first impressions of camp life in diary entries.

• Work and Wages: Began working at Pinedale, enduring 110-degree heat for $4.99 a half month. He saved his first paycheck as evidence of their meager pay. Later transferred to Tule Lake, then Jerome in Arkansas.

• Camp Conditions: Food was monotonous — “lamb stew, lamb stew, and lamb stew.” Despite hardships, he witnessed meetings where young men volunteered for the U.S. Army, defying block managers who questioned their loyalty.

• Military Service: Passed his physical in Chicago but was restricted to the infantry due to discrimination. Joined the 442nd Regimental Combat Team; his brother Kiyoshi served in Military Intelligence.

• After the War: Returned with no farm to go back to, settling in Kingsburg, California. His mother passed away young at 57, which he attributed to the strain of repeated uprooting.

• On Injustice: Declared three main wrongs — the evacuation of U.S. citizens, the reclassification of draft status from 1-A to “enemy alien,” and the denial of his right to choose his military branch.

• Redress Demands: Urged resettlement of unpaid claims from 1948, fair monetary compensation including for time lost in camp, and inclusion of incarceration in U.S. history textbooks so future generations would learn from the injustice.

Dr. Yoshiko “Fred” Fujikawa, a physician born in San Francisco in 1910, testified before the Commission about the forced removal from Terminal Island and his work as a doctor inside the camps. His story highlights both the chaos of evacuation and the crushing conditions of providing medical care for thousands of Japanese Americans.

• Life on Terminal Island: Practiced medicine from 1936 until February 1942. The community of 3,000 Japanese Americans, mostly fishermen and cannery workers, lived surrounded by shipyards, Navy installations, and military facilities.

• Pearl Harbor & Crackdown: After December 7, soldiers blocked off access, jeeps patrolled with machine guns, and the FBI rounded up hundreds of men. He lost hospital privileges by mid-December, leaving him unable to fully care for patients.

• 48-Hour Evacuation: On February 25, 1942, residents were ordered off the island. With his family, he worked around the clock dismantling X-ray machines and packing medical equipment while neighbors were preyed upon by opportunists offering pennies for cars and furniture. His mother, in grief, burned family heirlooms and handmade furniture rather than see them stolen.

• Emergency Medical Work: Recruited by the U.S. Public Health Service, Fujikawa set up the makeshift “hospital” in the horse stalls at Santa Anita, caring for 18,000 people with only six doctors. He described severe vaccine reactions, fainting, and diarrheal illness in long lines. Paid just $16 a month.

• At Jerome Camp: Later transferred to Arkansas, where seven doctors cared for 10,000 people. Facilities were slightly better, but the scale of need remained overwhelming.

• Life After Camp: Left in 1943 to work at a TB sanatorium in Missouri, eventually returning to Long Beach in 1949.

• On Redress: Closed by saying many of those who most needed monetary support had already passed away, underscoring the urgency of reparations.

Mazukazu “Jack” Fujimoto, later the first Japanese American college president in the United States, testified before the Commission about his childhood experiences at Poston and the lifelong lessons he carried into his career in education. He reflected on the humiliation of FBI raids, the disruption of school, his mother’s illness in camp, and the quiet strength his family drew on to survive.

• FBI Raids: At 13 years old, forced to interpret for his parents as agents accused the family of signaling enemy boats. Traumatic questions from federal authorities left lasting impressions.

• Education Interrupted: Lost his leading role in a high school play after Executive Order 9066, part of the social isolation that came with being Japanese American.

• Economic Loss: His family’s bumper crop of cucumbers and berries was taken by their caretaker after removal, leaving them with nothing.

• Mother’s Illness: Arrived at Poston in unfinished barracks, where his mother nearly died from fever while caring for five children. Denied ice for relief, the family endured without proper medical care.

• Child’s Perspective: Wrote a class essay comparing himself to a chicken in a cage — “I was a chicken, incarcerated in a hot, dusty hellhole.”

• Discrimination Outside Camp: Paid $8 a month for ice-hauling work, and when trying to buy a soda in Parker, Arizona, was denied service because of his race.

• Postwar Struggles: After release, worked long hours sharecropping on present-day La Costa farmland while resuming school and sports. Teachers helped him make up lost credits through independent study.

• Later Life & Service: Became a U.S. Army counterintelligence officer, then pursued higher education, eventually breaking barriers as the first Japanese American college president.

• Call for Action: Recommended the Commission establish a national trust fund — not just reparations for Japanese Americans, but a permanent program to educate Americans against prejudice so “no other group would have to be incarcerated without due process of law.”

Commissioner Arthur Goldberg, former Supreme Court Justice and U.S. Secretary of Labor, addressed the Commission as he prepared to leave the hearings due to illness. Speaking personally, not officially for the panel, Goldberg reflected on the purpose of the hearings, the dangers of division, and the meaning of constitutional justice.

• Personal Note: Thanked the Commission and the public, explaining his early departure for health reasons.

• On the Commission’s Task: Reminded listeners that Congress created the Commission with bipartisan support, and its duty was to listen before making recommendations on redress.

• Civility & Democracy: Urged restraint and respect after disruptions in the hearing room, insisting disagreement must be expressed civilly, not physically.

• On Incarceration: Called the evacuation of Japanese Americans “an unconscionable evil act” by the government. Dismissed debates over terminology — “relocation center” or “concentration camp” — as semantic. What mattered was that people were unjustly confined behind barbed wire.

• Constitutional Principles: Emphasized that both citizens and resident aliens were denied due process and equal protection. Criticized the Supreme Court’s wartime rulings in Korematsu and Hirabayashi, comparing them to Dred Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson as historic failures.

• Redress & Apology: Declared that an official apology should come from both Congress and the President. Financial compensation was necessary, though the exact form and amount must be shaped by testimony and debate.

• Root Causes: Stressed that mass incarceration happened only because Japanese Americans “looked different.” Germans and Italians were not targeted en masse — the injustice was racial.

• Final Appeal: Quoted scripture: “Justice, justice shall thou pursue.” Urged the Commission and the nation to give justice to Japanese Americans and to eliminate prejudice from future government action.

Reverend Bunyu Fujimura, a Buddhist priest who served 22 years in Salinas and later in West Los Angeles, devoted more than four decades to ministry before retiring in the 1970s. His long service in the Buddhist Churches of America was interrupted by war, prejudice, and years of forced removal.

• Early Life & Ministry: Came to the U.S. in 1935, leading the Salinas Buddhist Temple for over two decades before transferring to West Los Angeles. Widely respected in the Japanese American community.

• Arrest After Pearl Harbor: On December 9, 1941, local police forced him to take down the church bell, claiming it could signal the Japanese Navy. Soon after, he and two other priests were arrested by the FBI and paraded in the press as suspected saboteurs.

• False Accusations: Newspapers and LIFE magazine falsely linked him to espionage and the Black Dragon Society. Even normal church items like bells, PA systems, and flags for children’s classes were twisted as “evidence” of sabotage.

• Interrogation & Internment: Taken to San Francisco, interrogated without food, and later transferred through Fort Lincoln, Camp McCoy, and Camp Livingston. Singled out for the hardest labor, including ditch-digging and hauling lumber in the Louisiana heat, despite being a priest unaccustomed to such work.

• Family Separation: Eventually moved to Santa Fe and then reunited with his wife at Poston concentration camp.

• Postwar Exclusion: After the war, unlike most internees, he was barred from returning to the West Coast. Sent to Chicago, he was forced to report weekly to a church guarantor and monthly to federal agents until restrictions eased.

• Return to Salinas: Upon his eventual return, discovered only 26 Japanese families remained — down from 300 — due to an organized Anti-Japanese Committee of growers and bankers determined to keep them out.

• Legacy: His testimony captured both the personal humiliation of false charges and the systemic efforts to erase Japanese Americans from places like Salinas, even after the war had ended.

Tsuye Nozawa, a 64-year-old housewife from Gardena, testified before the Commission about the devastating loss of her first child at Manzanar and the lasting health and financial struggles that followed. Her story captured the intimate toll of incarceration on mothers, families, and future generations.

• Family & Business: She and her husband borrowed money in 1940 to open a cleaning shop in Los Angeles. They lived in the back of the store, but were forced to abandon it and all their possessions when sent to camp.

• Life at Manzanar: Shared a single small room partitioned by sheets; slept on mattresses stuffed with straw sacks; endured dust storms and poor food. She was pregnant during this time and often ill.

• Medical Neglect: In January 1943, while in labor, she was denied care from Japanese American doctors by camp authorities. A young, inexperienced doctor administered gas inappropriately, leading to days of agony.

• Loss of Her Baby: After three days of suffering and neglect, her baby boy, whom they named Toshio, was stillborn. She described wishing she had died as well. Nurses gave little care; her family begged for a cesarean that was refused.

• Lingering Grief: She and her husband still visit Toshio’s grave at Evergreen Cemetery and include him in their daily prayers. Though later blessed with two children, she endured miscarriages and lifelong health issues.

• Financial Hardship: Her health prevented steady work; repeated hospitalizations left the family financially strained. Her husband, despite being elderly and ill, continued working as a gardener.

• Appeal to the Commission: Declared that “all the money in the world cannot pay for the life of my baby,” but asked the government for $100,000 as a measure of justice.

Robert Hayamizu, executive secretary of the Nisei Veterans Coordinating Council of Southern California, testified before the Commission on behalf of a coalition of Japanese American veterans’ posts and organizations. His statement honored the long but often overlooked history of Japanese American military service and demanded that their loyalty and sacrifices be fully recognized.

• Representing Veterans: Spoke for the 442nd Association, Disabled American Veterans, American Legion Nisei posts, and others. Declared their mission was to tell the story of evacuation and service to the American public.

• Service Across Wars: Highlighted Japanese Americans who fought in the Spanish-American War (nine on the Maine, seven killed), World War I Hawaiian Guard units, and World War II in the 100th Battalion, 442nd RCT, and the Military Intelligence Service.

• Unrecorded Histories: Noted veterans’ contributions erased from textbooks, fueling ignorance and prejudice before WWII.

• Betrayal in Uniform: Recalled veterans being forced into camps, some wearing their American Legion uniforms as silent protest while herded onto buses.

• Military Intelligence Service (MIS): Emphasized 6,000 Nisei who served as interpreters, interrogators, and translators across the Pacific. Told the story of Sergeant Frank Hachiya of Oregon, removed from his town’s honor roll because he was Japanese, later killed while carrying vital maps that saved American lives.

• Women in Service: Remembered Japanese American women who served in the WACs, WAVES, and Nursing Corps.

• Unbroken Loyalty: Despite camps, prejudice, and erasure, Japanese Americans served in every theater of WWII, Korea, and Vietnam.

• Call to the Commission: Stated Japanese Americans were the only group of U.S. citizens forced into concentration camps who then had to prove loyalty through bloodshed in war. Urged the Commission to ensure their story is told and recorded for future generations.