Interviews

1. Loyalty questionnaire

2. Fair Play Committee

3. Speaking out in camp

4. Wanting to take a stand

5. Ostracized by the camp newspapers

6. On trial for draft evasion

7. Draft resisters sent to jail

8. Fair Play Committee charged with conspiracy

9. Prison

10. Meeting other Americans in jail

11. Would do the same again

12. Arrested in camp for trying to leave

13. Becoming involved with the NCRR and redress

14. Apologies from the JACL

15. Different feelings from veterans about the draft resisters

16. “No more shikataganai”

Emi,Frank

(1916-2010) draft resister, helped form the Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee

Ostracized by the camp newspapers

The camp newspaper The Sentinel, they were really bashing us. They were calling us stupid, idiots, uh crazy, you know mad and everything. Because the uh, uh associate editor who was doing writing was a past president of the JACL in Pasadena, Nobu Kawai. And uh, (clears throat) and yeah it was about three four issues there that they were really uhh, calling us all kinds of names. As did the citi- Pacific Citizen, JACL paper. In fact the JACL paper uh, Sabruo Kito I guess was the fellow writing editorials he even went further than uh the government says uh we should be charged with sedition. Which was a more serious charge than draft evasion. That’s why I say the JACL really went out of their way to ostracize us.

civil rights draft resisters imprisonment incarceration resistance resisters World War II

Date: May 9, 2006

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Lisa Itagaki

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

Interviewee Bio

Frank Emi was born on September 23, 1916 in Los Angeles, CA. He ran the family produce business until life was interrupted by war. Emi was sent to Heart Mountain, Wyoming with his young wife and two kids.

Emi, along with many others, openly questioned the constitutionality of the incarceration of Japanese Americans. He helped form the Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee and protested against the government’s actions by organizing a draft resistance. Emi was not even eligible for the draft because he was a father.

The Fair Play Committee argued that they were willing to serve in the military, but not until their rights as U.S. citizens were restored and their families released from the camps. The government convicted Emi and six others leaders of conspiracy to evade the draft. He served 18 months in jail. 86 others from Heart Mountain were put on trial and imprisoned for resisting the draft.

Following the war, Emi and other draft resisters were ostracized by Japanese American leaders and veterans. It was not until the fight for Redress, some forty years later that the Fair Play Committee was vindicated for taking a principled stand against injustice.

He passed away on December 2010 at age 94. (December 2010)