A few months ago hundreds of people, young and old, from all economic levels and representing a cultural rainbow, gathered in the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium.
They had come to say their last goodbye to a man they admired, a man who had served them for 26 years in Congress, a quiet leader whose voice was always heard when it truly mattered.
They had come to pay their respects to U.S. Rep. Robert Matsui who died at the age of 63 of complications from a rare disease.
And how strange it was as we sat in that beautifully restored hall to think back to a time a little more than 62 years before that moment, to a time when America was at war, as it is now.
That was the first time that Bob Matsui, then six months old, had been in this same Memorial Auditorium. Bob’s mother and father were visited at their home and given 72 hours to pack up, abandon their business and show up at the auditorium, with their son, so they could be hauled in trains to the internment camp at Tule Lake. And they remained there for three and a half years, American citizens who happened to be of Japanese ancestry, treated as war criminals.
It would have been so easy for most of us to emerge from that experience filled with anger and bitterness. But Bob Matsui didn’t. He took another path that led him to serve his city, his region and his country. And to make sure that people would never forget what this country did to loyal citizens, creating a truly ugly blot on our history.
Bob was one of the leaders in the fight to pass a law apologizing to and giving compensation to the 60,000 Japanese Americans who were interned and still living in the 1980s. President Ronald Reagan signed the legislation Aug. 10, 1988.
In one of his speeches on the House floor, Bob talked about his father and how he couldn’t speak about the internment for 40 years.
“It was very interesting,” Bob said then, “because when he finally was able to articulate, he said, ‘You know what the problem is, why I can’t discuss this issue, is because I was in one of those internment camps, a prisoner of war camp, and if I talk about it the first thing I have to say is, look I wasn’t guilty, I was loyal to my country,’ because the specter of disloyalty attaches to anybody who was in those camps.”
“And that stigma exists today,” Bob continued, “on every one of those 60,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry who happened to have lived in one of those camps. They were in that camp for three and a half years and, yes, they have gotten out and they have made great Americans of themselves, and I think if my mother were alive today she would be very proud of what the U.S. Congress is hopefully about to do. Because the decision we make today is not a decision to give $20,000 to the 60,000 surviving Americans, the decision today is to uphold that beautiful, wonderful document, the Constitution of the United States.”
Then he posed a simple question: How could he, as a six-month-old child born in this country, be declared an enemy alien to this country?
That same child grew to be a leader in the country that had interned him, assuming some of the highest positions in the Democratic wing of Congress. Before his death, Bob was the party’s leading spokesperson in the fight over Social Security. He was a high-ranking member of the powerful Ways and Means Committee. He chaired the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
But he never forgot his home. For example, he was able to bridge enormous philosophical differences with Republican colleagues in order to bring quality flood control to the Sacramento area. And one of those Republican leaders, Rep. John Doolittle, spoke at his service, praising him for his ability to put aside differences to reach decisions that were best for the community at large. And how they shared friendship that went beyond their disagreements, something that so many of us are unable to do.
Ever since I first met Bob shortly after I became executive editor of the Sacramento Bee 20 years ago, I always thought of him as a reluctant politician. He was shy, and glad-handing didn’t come easy to him. But no opponent could come close in election after election.
People trusted him. They believed he would fight their battles. That he wouldn’t forget his roots, and he never did.
Speaker after speaker inside Memorial Auditorium talked of him in terms reserved for those we care deeply about. They talked about a quiet leader who didn’t have to raise his voice to win a point; a leader who always remembered those who chose him to represent them; a leader who could forgive the sins of the past and look to the future and who represented the best in politics; a leader who defended his ideas and his ideals with deep passion.
Sixty-two years later, that six-month-old Japanese American child who became a revered Member of Congress, returned to Memorial Auditorium. His flag-draped coffin carried by members of the United States military.
Goodbye, Bob. Thanks for the wonderful lessons you taught all of us who knew you, especially about forgiveness.
