Nisei Progressives and Beyond

Abstract

That bitterly cold and emotional pilgrimage in 1969 led Sue Kunitomi Embrey into a 35-year endeavor to raise awareness of the enduring consequences of Executive Order 9066. This campaign, culminating in the designation of Manzanar as a National Historic Site in 1992, had a long prelude in progressive politics for Sue. Sue’s first experience with national politics was in 1947, when she joined a group supporting the third-party presidential candidacy of Henry Wallace, vice president during President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s third term of office. Sue explained her attraction to liberal politics. “I had felt helpless in camp. I realized if you don’t have people representing what you believe in, then you have no power.”¹ She also remembered how much she had appreciated working in an integrated racial environment in the Newberry Library in Chicago. When she returned to Los Angeles, she sought organizations that worked for racial integration and found Nisei for Wallace.