Japanese-American Sam Mihara was only nine years old when the United States government used fear and security to justify his family's imprisonment at the Heart Mountain Internment Camp in northwestern Wyoming for the entirety of World War II.
Since then, Mihara has worked to make sure that history won’t repeat itself. Next week, he’ll be in Laramie for his speaking series “Memories of Imprisonment.” Wyoming Public Radio’s Jordan Uplinger spoke with Mihara.
Editor's note: This transcript has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.
Jordan Uplinger: The Heart Mountain Internment Camp had a census book. And in that book, there was close to 15,000 names of families who had been forcibly relocated from California to, in this instance, the Heart Mountain Internment Camp in Wyoming. Knowing that your family's name is recorded in that book, I want to ask what it's like to know that your name was etched into history against your will?
Sam Mihara: The fact that it took place, the fact that there was a record, is very, very important. It clearly shows the government was responsible for our forced stay at this prison camp. And, by the way, I call it a prison camp because that's what it was. It had barbed wire fences, it had guard towers. It had sentries with 30 caliber rifles with instructions to shoot. There were signs along the perimeter that warned us, 'Do not try to escape, otherwise, sentries have orders to shoot.' I mean, there's no question about it, we were in a prison. And so it was a very, very difficult time in my life. I was nine years old when I was removed from my home in San Francisco and taken to Heart Mountain, and I was there for three years. When I got there, the conditions were awful. I remember the train stopped at a site just outside the camp. And under military guard escort, we were taken to our barracks. When I walked into my barracks for the first time, I saw a room, which was 20 feet by 20 feet square. And the inside walls, there was none. There was no inner drywall, there was no insulation. All you saw was the inside surface of the outside siding. It was like a storage shed. There was no electricity, no water in the room. And so looking at that condition and seeing four military cots in the room, and there's hardly any room for anything else, that was a very depressing scene. And the thought that we will be there for a long time was even more depressing.
JU: We're coming up on 70 years since the very Supreme Court case that allowed for the internment of Japanese-American citizens and that is Korematsu v. United States. In that Supreme Court case, a six to three majority argued that Japanese-American citizens were just a security risk during World War II, even though they had done nothing wrong. Interestingly, in 2018, Korematsu v. United States is referenced again, in a Supreme Court case called Trump v. Hawaii. This was about Trump's self proclaimed Muslim ban. And the argument was that the federal government might once again be unilaterally affecting a group of people who have done nothing wrong under the guise of national security. To add to that, previous candidate Donald Trump in 2015, said 'What I'm doing here is no different from FDR'. When you hear modern leaders quote the people who let you be forcibly relocated into a prison camp, do you fear for the future? Or do you see this as just another bump in the road of America righting the wrongs of the past while ensuring rights for future generations to come?
SM: Well, like I said, the answer is a divided answer. There are many who believe it was a wrong decision. There are some who believe it was a correct decision. There's no question that the Supreme Court, President Ronald Reagan, President George H.W. Bush, President Biden, and other leaders of this country have declared in writing an apology is due to these people who were removed, these American citizens who were removed, from their homes and placed into prisons. And so there's no question, it was unconstitutional. The 14th Amendment clearly states that liberty and equal justice is important and is due to everyone, all American citizens. So from my view, it should have never happened. And hopefully, it'll never happen again, to any other American citizen, because it was clearly a violation of our constitutional rights.
JU: Next week, you'll be giving a talk here in Laramie, about this very topic. And I have to imagine that your relationship to the state of Wyoming is rather complicated. So I want to know, what is it like when you revisit the state? And how has that relationship maybe changed over time?
SM: Well, the initial answer I gave relative to never coming back to Wyoming had to do with the conditions of my experience. When our family suffered so much there - my father going blind and my grandfather dying a horrible death in the camp - my reaction was, I will never come back to Wyoming again. And because it's a reminder of the horrible things that happened. But ever since some time has passed, I realized that I think it's important, based on my talks all over the country. And I've spoken to over 100,000 students and teachers, at many schools, across the country. Most people have never heard about this event that happened. And my purpose is to try to educate as many people as possible whenever people will think about any event in the future that involves a combination of hate, and some hysteria, and worst of all, a few leaders propose that it's okay to incarcerate American citizens because of their background. That is the point that I make, that it should never happen again.
