MUST THE CHINESE GO!
: * º
*
+
*
EXAMINATION OF TH. CHINESE, 4.
. ...--~~~~. **
.* , "sº
.
#
*.
*
&
sº
#"
:
4.
... r.s ºr
•.
T
:
º
à
;
MRS. S. L. BA 1 YWIN.
#
§
:
º:
:-
•
*-
º
3:
º
3.
FIGHTEEN Y"F.A1*S A MISSIONARY IN CW N A.
º
2
:
**
- k
+ ... ºf , " ..”
i º' - .." -

* *.isar.
uniº'orºup
Sº ºrtfºliºs J
§
Vtº
*T Sºrº
5 * *** ****
º
W
- º
*A* º -
- * * * *
• *.

[ \%&
C 5
p WP,
MUST THE CHINESE GO!
AN
EXAMINATION OF THE CHINESE QUESTION.
BY
MRS. S. L. BALDWIN,
EIGHTEEN YEARS A MISSIONARY IN CHINA.
THIRD EDITION.
NEW YORK
ISSUED FROM THE PRESS OF H. B. ELKINS,
Nos. 13 AND 15 VANDEwATER STREET,
1890.
AGAIN, with increasing humiliation for the necessity, I
re-issue this pamphlet, with added pages of disgraceful his-
tory made by our National Government since the first issue
in 1881. I feel that it is criminal for Christian people to re-
main silent, while oppression and bitter wrong stalk forth
from our Congressional Halls. We are told that $500,000
have been subscribed, and as much more will be added if
necessary, to circulate anti-Chinese literature, and aſſect
political action. I appeal to Christian men—voters—
whether it is not time for the American Christian sentiment
of this country to have some weight with the Government in
Washington. Is it safe for us personally, as Christians, or
as a Christian Government—safe for our own interests for
time and eternity—to go farther in heaping insult after in-
sult upon a friendly nation that has never wronged us, and
thus make possible and safe, oppression, robbery and murder
here, and imperil every interest of every Christian Church
in the great Empire of China It behooves us to stop and
think, and to remember that the men to whom the voters of
this land hand over our government, and the enactment of
law, are the representatives of said voters and doing their
work. In the two previous issues of this pamphlet I have,
at personal sacrifice, met the expense myself. Unable to dr
it at this time, the Chinese Sunday Schools, with their
teachers and friends, have kindly contributed the amount
for the present issue. I herewith desire to acknowledge,
with thanks, this generous help, and to express my earnest
hope and prayer that this effort may contribute not only
toward creating an effective sentiment against further
wickedly discriminating laws, but also toward forcing the
repeal of every such law against the Chinese, and helping
to place them as they should be, on just the same footing in
this country as all other foreigners—just as fully protected
in their “right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
ESTHER E. BALDWIN.
1918 PACIFIC STREET, RROOK LYN,
April 22, r390.
PREFAGE TO THE SECOND EDITION
A PORTION of this pamphlet was published, and quite
widely circulated, at the time when the first anti-Chinese
law was pending in Congress. Although a Republican Con-
gress, Republicans and Democrats, with a few noble excep-
tions, united in the insult to a friendly but weaker nation,
and, in defiance of the whole spirit of our Constitution and
loyalty to God, passed the iniquitous law.
In view of the late terrible massacre of Chinese, in the
West, and the repeated requests for copies of this pamphlet,
I feel that I must again take the field for the people that I
love, for justice, yea, for common humanity.
May the righteous Judge, who knows how utterly sick my
soul is of the awful brutalities perpetrated in this Chris-
tian (?) land against an inoffensive, industrious, sober people,
inspire my thought and guide my hand to show the hideous-
ness of such crimes, and their sure penalty May what I
write not only free me as a Christian from the responsibility
and penalty of silence before wrong, but also move some
stronger, more eloquent voice to cry for justice and right-
eousness in the land
To those who desire to inform themselves further on the
Chinese question, I commend Rev. Dr. Gibson’s reliable
book, “The Chinese in America” (publishers, Cranston &
Stowe, Cincinnati, O.), and Hon. George F. Seward’s very
excellent, just and exhaustive work, “Chinese Immigration
in its Social and Economical Aspects” (publishers, Charles
Scribner's Sons, New York City).
Mr. Seward was our Consul-General at Shanghai, and
afterward our Minister to Peking, for several years. His
personal knowledge and experience in China, his ability and
fair-minded consideration of a subject of which he is so
capable of judging, make his book entirely reliable and very
valuable. # 2, 4 & rºº
**
**
}.
*** - †:
C} . . . $4.3 h. ESTHER E. BALDWIN.
: A
**...*
85 LEXINGTON STREET, EAST BOSTON, MASS.,
Jan. 9, 1886.
MUST THE CHINESE GO 2
“The people of the land have used oppression, and exercised robbery,
and have vexed the poor and needy; yea, they have oppressed the
stranger wrongfully.”—EzEK. xxii. 29.
“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to
you, do ye even so to them.”—MATT. vii. 12.
“What you do not like when done to yourself, do not do to others.”
—Cox FUCIUS’ Doctrine of the Mean (chap. xiii).
THE spectacle now presented by the Government of this
country, in its attitude toward the Chinese, even leaving
Chaistianity entirely out of the question, ought to bring the
blush of shame to the face of every honorable, fair-minded
man. Seeking, even insisting upon, a treaty of amity and
trade with a weaker people, pledging its national honor for
the protection of any of that people who come to us, and
yet, knowingly and willfully, allowing for years the most
constant, systematic persecution of the Chinese in our land,
in defiance of treaty, law, and justice; and finally, at the
bidding of the lowest, wickedest, most brutal, of our popula-
tion,--‘‘the balance of power,”—enacting laws that delib-
erately insult this very nation with which we have such
treaty, violate the whole spirit of our Constitution, dishonor
God, and make possible such crimes as the Wyoming mas-
SQ.CI’{*.
I believe before God that the anti-Chinese laws, and those
who enacted them, are largely responsible for these massacres
and other outrages that have made so black a page in our
national history the last few years. These laws were a con-
cession to that element in this land which is the most to be
feared, and should be the most carefully watched and firmly
resisted. Every concession made to it only strengthens and
6 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
makes said element more domineering and dangerous to the
natives of this land. -
An Irish washer-woman, who had manifested much indig-
nation that I had presumed to bring home with me a Chi-
nese servant, said, “We have a right here, they haven’t.”
Two months later, an Irish gentleman (?), who showed the
same spirit toward our faithful, polite, Christian servant,
used the following expressive language: “We have a right
here that those who are here by the mere accident of birth
have not.” American-born citizens, how do you like such
doctrine 2
Now, let us consider the charges against the Chinese
people that are said to justify the anti-Chinese laws. Here
I may as well say that I am prepared to prove the state-
ments I make.
First, “ They come here as sort of slaves.” This is
wholly untrue. They come here as voluntarily as do the
immigrants from across the Atlantic. A needy family has
heard of “King Sang’” (“the Golden Hill”), as they call
California; and all the family unite in saving their meagre
earnings to send one of their number to this far-famed
“Golden Hill,” with the hope that he will return able to
make life more comfortable for them all.
Some of them came here by invitation to build our rail-
road, which has opened up the great West, and enriched
multitudes of men. Others came by like invitation to work
in and redeem untillable lands in the West, making millions
of acres productive, thus enriching the country.
They did their work faithfully to the end, and have left
that much at least of permanent benefit to us. But, asks
one, “Are they not in a sense owned, and bound to obey,
the six Chinese companies?” Not at all. These companies
are simply benevolent and protective Societies, such as are
common in China, and much to be commended. The Ningpo
men in Foochow, for business purposes, form a Ningpo
guild; and the Canton men in Shanghai form a Canton
guild. There are “six companies” to represent the six
districts or counties of the Canton Province, from which
come nearly all of the Chinese in the United States. The
object of these guilds. is to help each other in a friendly
way, to relieve any member of the guild in need, to care for
them if sick, etc. They all agree to certain rules by which
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 ;
they shall be governed; but the whole thing is entirely
voluntary. Any one is at liberty to enter and to withdraw.
They are in no sense secret societies or immigration bureaus.
Such guilds existed in China long before we were a nation,
and are by no means peculiar to the Chinese in the United
States.
Second, “ They are of the lowest classes.” They are of
eacactly the same class as the immigrant from other lands.
The needy poor, with few exceptions, must ever be the im-
migrant class. Those who come to us across the Pacific are
largely from the respectable farming-class, who fall into
laundry-work, shoe-making, etc., because these branches of
industry are chiefly open to them. Not one in a hundred of
these workers were laundrymen in their own country, but
crowded out of every other industry, the large majority took
patiently what was left, and they are abused and threatened
for even doing that, by such as the so-called “American
Laundrymen’s Association.” A fine Christian Chinese
gentleman, educated in Mr. Moody’s school at Northfield,
and a rare Bible scholar, as well as a capable business man,
said to a friend of mine in Springfield, Mass. : “Is there
nothing they will let me do in this country but wash
clothes?” If they desired real estate to farm, I think they
would ſind no little difficulty in purchasing. I have no fear
of the Chinese immigrants suffering in comparison with those
who come across the Atlantic. It is not the Chinaman who
is too lazy to work, and goes to the almshouse or jail. It is
not he who reels through our streets, defies our sabbath
laws, deluges our country with beer, and opposes all work
for temperance and the salvation of our sons from the liquor
curse. It is not the man from across the Pacific who com-
mits the fearful crimes we read of in our daily papers, and
who is longing to put his hand to our political wheel and
rule the United States.
Two intelligent, wealthy business-men of the State of New
York, the one a Republican, the other a Democrat, talking
with me on the Chinese question, asked, “Why do you not
send us decent immigrants *. In reply, I put the following
questions, and received in substance the same replies from
both gentlemen :
“Did you ever see a drunken Chinaman P’’ —“No.” —
“JDid you ever see a noisy, boisterous one on the streets?” —
8 MUST THE CHINESE GO 2
“No.”—“Did you ever see one disturbing others, or loung-
ing at saloons, or gossiping 2'' — “Never.” – “Did you ever
see one on the street who did not seem to have some object
in view, and to be going right toward it. 2” – “I must con-
fess I never have.” – “Has a Chinese tramp ever come to
your door?”—“Never.” — “Do you hear of them commit-
ting murder, burglaries, or other crimes against our laws?”
“No.” — Will you be so kind as to inform me of any other
immigrant class in regard to which you can reply in the
negative as above, and also what you regard as a ‘decent
immigrant ’”
Both gentlemen honestly and frankly admitted that this
was an entirely new view of the question. Both stated that
they had formed their opinions from “newspaper state-
ments;” and yet these same intelligent men read their
newspapers with brain alert on every other subject than
this, on which they were ready to accept the most libellous
statements against a friendly nation, whose representatives
were, by their own personal observation, the most inoffen-
sive, law-abiding people of our land. But how fearful is the
responsibility of our press, which, so far from being, as it
should be, the educator and conservator of the morals of the
people, a mighty lever to lift them up to the nobility of true
patriotism, is to-day, in a large degree, only the tool of evil
men, stooping to pander to political prejudice and party in-
trigue, sacrificing right, justice, and even humanity for
votes' -
Third, “They will bring leprosy.” Then what are our
health officers at San Francisco and on the Pacific mail steam-
ers doing? What our Consul at Hong Kong 2 What that
important “Commission of Immigration ‘’ appointed in 1872
by the California Legislature, and empowered to examine
every one that lands, morally and physically 2 Dr. Stout, of
the California State Board of Health, in reply to the ques-
tion whether the Chinese were introducing leprosy, said :
“I think that this hue and cry is simply a farce. It has
come from Europe if it has come at all, and that very
rarely.” I declare that this charge is absurd. Lepers are
not numerous in China, and are as a rule Separated in their
own villages, and are far more anxious to go out of life than
out of their own country. There are no more healthy im-
migrants than the Chinese. Invalid Chinese have no desire
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 9
to leave their native land. Chinese immigrants sail from
a British port, Hong Kong, where it is the duty of the
American Consul and English authorities to see that they
come voluntarily ; and I take it there is no partiality shown
by our authorities to the Pacific Mail Steamship Company
over the Atlantic steamship companies, in allowing them to
receive immigrants without a clean bill of health. The most
decent, neat, healthy, and orderly immigrants I have ever
seen and travelled with were the Chinese crossing the Pacific.
The twelve hundred Irish that boarded our steamer at
Queenstown were in great contrast to these in many respects.
Two were ill when taken aboard, and both died at sea with-
in a few days. Nine hundred immigrants was the legal
capacity of the steamer; yet she took in twelve hundred, and
left six hundred more wailing on the shore because they
could not come to “blissed free Ameriky.”
“Fourth, “ China is so crowded that there is great
danger of her pouring out her millions and flooding our
land.”
Fifth, “ They do not come to stay, but just to make
what they can in a short time, and go back home and take
their earnings.”
I place the fifth beside the fourth, before replying to the
latter, just to show how lovely and consistent they look to-
gether. If the fourth is dangerous, surely the fifth should
encourage our terror-stricken souls at such an irruption.
And yet the same man will plead both these arguments, in
almost the same breath, against the Chinese.
But let us consider number four: “The Chinese will
come in such numbers as to flood our land.”
In twenty-five years a hundred and fifty thousand Chinese
have come to this country; that is to say, with all the pres-
sure of their poverty, and all the promise this land has held
out to them of successful industry, together with the facili-
ties provided for a speedy and cheap transit hither, in a
quarter of a century, fewer have come here from China.
than in a few months of the last year alone from Europe.
What curious inequality of mind leads us to fear the flood-
ing by the few, while we open wide the gates to the many ?
Again, the Chinese here are almost to a man from the Can-
ton Province ; it is a local immigration. The whole nature
and education of the Chinese are against removing from one
1() MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
place to another, even in their own country. Only the
greatest pressure of circumstances can induce them to leave
their native place. Generation after generation of the same
family have lived in the same locality. The home of their
fathers, the graves of their ancestors, filial piety, every
thing that a Chinaman holds dear, gathers around, and
binds him to, his native place. It is said that there are
only a hundred surnames in all China. The very word for
people is pak sang, “the hundred surnames.” A large
village often has but two surnames, such as Ting and Tang.
To these two families the village belongs, and has belonged
for ages; and all their interests are centred there. The
sacredness of family ties is nowhere more carefully taught
than in China. A cousin of the second degree is called
brother, and all family ties imply duties which can not be
shirked. The Chinaman, from his earliest days, is taught
that his highest duty is to his parents; and upon the con-
dition of obeying, serving, and supporting them in this life,
and making sacrifices to their spirits after death, depends
his prosperity here and his eternal welfare. This universally
recognized duty must ever be a great obstacle to emigra-
tion, and the sure pledge of their return to their native land.
We may call all this foolish; but I honor the Chinaman for
his obedience to his convictions of right, and think many a
Christian might learn a much-needed lesson from his zeal.
As to the charge that a Chinaman forfeits his citizenship if
he is absent from his country beyond a certain time, I an-
swer, that is all nonsense. There is no such law and no such
penalty.
And now for charge fifth : “ They do not come to stay,
but to make all they can in a short time, and then return
home and take all their earnings with them.”
Intelligent men who know too much to fear a Chinese
flood, and who are too just to countenance their persecu-
tion, still quote this argument. Let us look at it. Of course
it neutralizes and renders harmless No. 4 at once. It is true
they do not come to stay ; and I can’t help saying, What a
pity some others do not follow their example ! Did they do
so, I would not have heard this apology from an intelligent
man for the corruption of our political parties: “You must
remember,” said he, “all we have to contend with, that
foreigners control our politics.” The problem of a success-
MUST THE CHINESE GO 2 11
ful republican government, with universal suffrage, has not
yet been worked out.
However, there is nothing in our Constitution or laws
which defines the length of time any one must promise to
stay in this land to secure him the right of entrance. But
this objection becomes the veriest mockery, when we re-
member the welcome we give these strangers, and how comm-
fortable we make them while here. The mud thrown by
Christian boys (of course they are not heathen) upon the
snowy clothes ready to iron after the weary washing by the
Chinese laundry-man, the broken windows, the stones, the
grossest abuse by people and press, the palpable falsehoods
against the Chinese published by many of the most respect-
able papers, all these do not strike one as the wisest argu-
ments a Christian people can use to induce the Chinese to
stay. But if this is an argument against the Chinaman,
what about the American in China P. He goes there for the
express purpose of making all the money he can, whether it
be from tea, silk, or opium ; to spend as little as possible
in China, importing his stores and clothing from London,
New York, or San Francisco, -and only buying perishable
meats, vegetables, and fruit in China; and bringing home
with him all his earnings (ten dollars to every one the China-
man takes out of our country), and I regret to say not al-
ways leaving a blessing or an improved people behind him.
But the contributions of the Chinese to our wealth as a na-
tion, during all these years of their persecution, grow in value
as we look into them. When we wanted to unite the halves
of our great continent by rail, in order to develop our re-
Sources, the authorities by their own testimony, tried first to
do it through the immigrant from across the Atlantic. The
sworn testimony of these authorities before a Congressional
Committee was that said effort was a failure. If the hour -
for the men to begin work was 8 A. M., they were just
as likely to come at 9 o'clock. Whiskey drinking, fighting,
with other evils, and poor irregular work prevailed, and
finally in self-defense they sent for Chinese to do the work.
They came, and by testimony, not too gladly given, did the
work faithfully and well, giving entire satisfaction in conduct
as well as work. They did like service in other parts of the
Pacific coast. They also went cheerfully into thousands of
acres of overflowed lands, where no other immigrant would
12 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
go because of the exposure, and redeemed those lands for
the use and residence of those, who now turn to kick their
benefactors out of the country ! These lands that previously
did not return one penny to the State or any human being,
now produce from 50 to 90 bushels of wheat to the acre.
The Surveyor-General of California declared, that in the two
items alone of railroads and redeemed lands, the Chinese
had enriched California by over $280,000,000. It has been
estimated that of $15,000,000 made by the Chinese annually
in this country $13,000,000 are actually expended here, leav-
ing only $2,000,000 to send home, which is probably con-
siderably more than they do send. But the Chinese are not
the only people who send money out of the country. Before
me is a newspaper paragraph, headed “Remembering their
Friends in the Old Country.” I quote it, “The Irish girls in
this country are continually sending financial aid to the
relatives and friends whom they left behind them, and at
this season of the year, the sums sent across the ocean by
the domestics in this city (Boston), are in the aggregate
very large. According to one Boston banker, these remit-
tances this fall have been in excess of any previous year.
During the past four weeks, he alone has made out for ser-
vant girls, drafts or bills of exchange amounting to $70,-
000.” Chinese send a few hundreds to parent, wife and
child, and the newspaper heading reads “They send all their
money out of the country.” I myself heard J. Boyle
O’Reilly, editor of the Boston Pilot, a leading Catholic pa-
per, and of course an undisputed authority—declare, in a
lecture on the wrongs of Ireland, that “the Irish question
is not only an Irish question, but an American eco-
nomic question,” for, said he, “the Irish send out of this
country every year to Ireland $70,000,000 !!” The Hon.
Geo. F. Seward, our former Consul-General and Minister to
China, in his valuable book on “Chinese Immigration ”
(which I commend to all), shows from official statistics, that
the Chinese in taxes and in work give to California in a
single year the amazing sum of $14,000,000, and this does
mot include their large contributions in railroads and re-
deemed lands. At the very time when the Knights (?) of
Labor rose in Seattle, Washington Territory, to drive out
the Chinese by mob violence, these Chinese were paying far"
more taxes than all the “ Knights” together, and the city
MUST THE CHINESE Go ? 13
government was then owing the Chinese merchants $30,000
which it had borrowed from them. O, shame ! shame ! on
such injustice. A few Americans put American steamers
on the Yang-tse River, enriched themselves, and ruined
thousands of Chinese families, who, with their ancestors, had
had the junk-trade of that river for generations; yet these
men, suffering under a real wrong, resorted not to an anti-
American law, neither to robbery or murder.
Siacth, “They pay no taates.”
This charge is either made through ignorance inexcusable,
because the truth is readily to be attained, or through willful
falsehood. Several years ago (1876), “the eleven thousand
Chinese in San Francisco paid nine thousand dollars in taxes
on real estate and personal property; and this in spite of the
invidious legislation against them, and the great diſficulty
of their securing real estate. Every Chinaman paid his two
dollars poll-tax,−many of them two and three times the
same year,” being helpless in the hands of swindlers. “This
added ten thousand dollars, making nineteen thousand dol-
lars. To this add twenty-five thousand dollars for licenses,
and we have the neat sum of forty-four thousand dollars
annual revenue to the city of San Francisco alone.” Besides
this, the Chinese of that city alone paid the same year inter-
nal revenue license five thousand dollars, and stamp tax on
cigars made during the year to the enormous sum of three
hundred and sixty thousand dollars, or over a thousand dol-
lars each working-day. The grand total of public revenue
from the Chinese of San Francisco alone, during 1876, reached
the magnificent sum of four hundred and nine thousand dol-
lars. A part of this money was paid for the public-school
fund, but no schools were provided for the Chinese. These
ſigures do not include the tax of five dollars (for a time it
was fifty dollars) collected from every Chinaman landing in
this country, and from no other immigrant : nor hundreds
of thousands of dollars collected under the provisions of the
Foreign Miners’ Tax Law, four dollars a month for every
miner, which tax was seldom collected of any others than
the Chinese, the law being specially for their benefit. Col-
lector Austin himself informed my friend Dr. Gibson, from
whose reliable and able book I collect these statistics, that
“there is less difficulty in collecting taxes from the Chinese
than from any other class of inhabitants, and less delin-
14 MUST THE CHINESE Go ?
quencies among them.” “But this matter of revenue mul-
tiplies, as we look at it.” The imposts or duties on rice
alone brought by the China trade, and mostly consumed by
Chinese, amount to over one million dollars gold coin an-
nually ; duty on oil and opium, two hundred and seventy
thousand dollars more ; and the duties on other imports
swell the figures to over two million dollars customs collected
annually in the port of San Francisco on the trade from
China, and mostly from Chinamen. Add all this revenue
together, and we have the not insignificant sum of two mil-
lion, four hundred and nine thousand dollars, including taxes,
licenses, and customs. The Chinese also patronized the in-
surance companies of that city to the amount of over fifty
thousand dollars annually. “Moreover, many of them wear
garments made of our cloth, wear our boots and hats, are fond
of our watches and sewing-machines. They ride in our cars
and steamers. They eat our fish, beef, and potatoes, and in
some parts do much to exhaust the pork market. In this
last item alone, they have paid to producers on the Pacific
coast over a half million of dollars annually.” Finally, as
the same author has said so truly, “These croakers about
the Chinese sending all their money home ought to know
that the fortunes amassed by American merchants in China,
and brought to this country, amount every year in the ag-
gregate to five times more than all these Chinamen can
send to China as the fruits of their daily toil.’’
Seventh, “They do not bring their wives here.”
A Chinaman when asked why he didn’t bring wife and
children here, replied : “It is as much as I can do to keep
my own head on my shoulders here; what could I do with
wife and children also to protect P” American merchants,
naval officers, sea captains and others, go to China and fre-
quently leave their families in this country, but not for any
such reason as the above, as they would be perfectly safe
in China. I and mine were for nearly twenty years.
The customs of most eastern nations Seclude women. In
China there is more than this custom to keep the wife at
home. According to the education of the Chinese, it is the
highest duty of the wife to be the keeper at home, and es-
pecially to serve the parents of her husband in his absence,
and to attend to the affairs of the family, which she often
does with great skill. It would indeed be an unfilial son who
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 I ,
left his parents without the care of his wife. This may strike
the American (in whom filial piety is a virtue fast fading
out) as most foolish; but then it is certainly no crime, and
no reasonable cause for excluding the Chinese from the
United States. This may tend to immorality, but not
to the extent practiced by not a few early residents of Cali-
fornia, who had families in both the East and West. In the
Chinaman’s case, the first wife is the chief always. This
can not be said of American polygamists. I regret to say
that such an argument carried out would speedily terminate
the residence of many an American and European in China.
It would be as well not to press this argument in the face of
Mormonism, and the well-known lives of various people not
a thousand miles from anybody. But that this charge may
also cease, let me say that the laws dictated by the hood-
lum forbid any bringing of Chinese wife or child here. I
append my official proof, and could duplicate it over and
over again. *
In the spring of 1887, I received the following statement
from a friend in New Haven : “There is a Chinese in this
city who has been in our Sunday School about four years.
He is very studious, amiable, obliging and faithful. He has
made friends not only with the people of the church to which
his school belongs, but also with other families of culture,
refinement and wealth, and this because of his excellent
qualities of mind and heart. Last August he went to China,
and he now desires to return here and bring his wife and
little son six years old. He appeals to his teachers and
friends here to help him to prove his good character, and
assist him in securing the admission of his family to this
country. Can you tell us the means to be employed to bring
this man’s wife to America P” This appeal was sent to me
as “the Champion of the Chinese.” I read it with inex-
pressible shame, knowing that any American might go to
China, with his family without let or hindrance. I wrote at
once in reply that they should assume, what was the fact—
and I was supported in my position by able authority—that
the Restriction Act did not include, by letter or spirit, the
exclusion of wife or child of any man lawfully here under
the treaty. But as I knew that the officers in San Fran-
cisco would make trouble in the case, I advised a petition to
Secretary Manning of the Treasury, requesting the issuing
16 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
of the needful papers, for this wife and son to be admitted
without objection. This petition was sanctioned and signed
by many of the most prominent professors, ministers and
teachers of New Haven. I append only a few of the many
well-known names: ex-Pres. Porter, of Yale ; William M.
Barlow, Prof., of Yale; Levi Jois, M.D.; Francis Bacon,
M.D.; James K. Thatcher, Prof. Med. Dep’t, Yale; J. H.
Cannolt, Prof., Yale ; Rev. Newman Smythe, Pastor First
Cong. Church; M. C. White, M.D., Prof., Yale. I now
give for the benefit of all fair-minded people, and especially
for voters, a true copy of the reply received very promptly :
“TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY,
“WASHINGTON, D. C., March 1, 1887.
“MOSES C. WHITE, M. D., AND OTHERS, NEw HAVEN,
CONN. :
“ Gentlemen—The department is in receipt, by reference
from Hon. O. H. Platt, of your communication of the 1st
ultimo, requesting that instructions be issued to the Col-
lector of Customs at San Francisco, to permit the wife and
little son of Mr. Ip-ki-tsak, a Chinese laborer residing at
New Haven, to enter the United States. In reply, you are
informed that, inasmuch as it appears from your statement
that Mrs. Ip-ki-tsak was not in the United States prior to
the expiration of ninety days after the passage of the
Chinese Restriction Act of May 6, 1882, and in view of the
existing decisions of the department, and the U. S. Circuit
Court of California, to the effect that the wife of a Chinese
laborer is a person whose original entry into this country is
prohibited by said act, the department has no power under
the law to grant your request. Respectfully yours,
“C. S. FAIRCHILD,
“Acting Secretary.”
In consequence of this wresting of both the spirit and let-
ter of the law, whether by decisions of the Treasury De-
partment or United States Courts, Mr. Ip-ki-tsak was com-
pelled to return here without his family. On the steamer in
which he returned came four prostitute Chinese women,
who were promptly landed, no court or department decision
proving the least obstacle ! A few weeks later the follow-
ing telegram from San Francisco appeared in our papers:
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 1;
“SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 2.
“The Chinese steamer this week brought over forty-four
women, all but four of whom were without the necessary
papers. By the usual habeas corpus routine these women
will doubtless be landed.”
As I am accustomed to verify statements before giving
them to the public, I immediately returned the telegram to
a friend in San Francisco, who is in a position to know the
truth, and requested him to write me whether the statement
was correct. I quote from his reply: “Your letter to hand.
It is a perfectly correct statement which you have sent, with
this addition, that they were all prostitutes. Cargoes of
such women are landed here with or without certificates,
while wives of respectable Chinese like Woo-kim Yin, the
Methodist merchant here, can not land. The custom officers
do good work, but the courts throw open the gates. It is
maddening to think of the writ of habeas corpus, that sacred
birth-right of Anglo-Saxons, and the safe-guard of our lib-
erties, being turned into a slave-chain to drag these women
down to hell. There could not be landed a single one but
for the aid of American lawyers and American courts.
There are decent and moral Chinese in San Francisco, whom
we call heathem, who cry shame on us for practices which
are not so much as thought of in their country.”
The writer of the above has lived a number of years in
China, as well as in San Francisco, and lºnows whereof he
speaks. I ask in all fairness, in view of the above facts, if
anything more ought to be said against the Chinese for not
bringing their families here. Our graceful attitude is that
of silence and humiliation.
Eighth, “They are opium smokers, and are teaching
Americans its use.” Americans are by no means depend-
ent upon foreign teachers for such instruction. But in view
of the great European and American firms in China, which
for years have dealt out opium to the Chinese by the whole-
sale, the less we say on this subject the better. This point
pressed would prove fatal to many an American and
European in China, would indeed prove almost a “restric-
tion act.” How did opium go into China. ? The Chinese
Government had national prohibition of opium, save only
for medical purposes, and punished with the utmost severity
any of its people who violated this law. One hundred years
18 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
ago no such vice existed in China. About that time the
Portuguese, seeing an opportunity to gratify their greed,
commenced to smuggle opium into China. The great East
India Company, then in control of India, at once proceeded
to profit by the example of the unprincipled Portuguese, and
also took up the smuggling of opium, only on a far more ex-
tended scale; and this in spite of the protests of the Chinese
Government. When refused entrance to the port of Canton,
they established heavily armed receiving ships at the island
of Lin Tin, at the mouth of the Canton River—and from
there ran boats, also armed, and loaded with the contra-
band opium, into Canton under cover of night. This was
done for sixty years. Finally the Chinese Government
sent Commissioner Lin from Peking to Canton with full
authority to arrest and punish offenders, and to seize
and destroy the opium. He did his work nobly and well,
shut up the American and English merchants in their fac-
tories, seized $2,500,000 worth of opium, dug pits in the
earth, put the opium in them, filled them with water, and
floated said drug out to sea. What was the result P Did
Christian England applaud P Did the United States cry
well done? Nay, verily? England promptly sent her ships
of war, with soldiers, cannon and swords, and deliberately
went to war with China, and, because might was stronger
than right, conquered, and compelled China to pay $21,-
000,000–$12,000,000 for the war, $3,000,000 to English
merchants for property which they professed had been
injured, and $6,000,000 for the $2,500,000 worth of opium de-
stroyed; and in addition forced the cession to England
of her beautiful Island of Hong Kong, and also com-
pelled the opening of the five Treaty Ports to trade. That
I may not be charged with misstating facts as to the occa-
sion of this war, I quote Mr. Gladstone’s words uttered in
Parliament. He declared: “A war more unjust in its
origin, a war more calculated to cover this country with
permanent disgrace, I do not know, and have not read of.”
Again, in the same speech, he said : “They gave you notice
to abandon your contraband trade; when they found that you
would not, they had a right to drive you from their coasts,
on account of your obstinacy in persisting in this infamous
and atrocious traffic.” Whom did Mr. Gladstone address
in these severe words? The English Government, for that
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 19
Government had not only defended the East India Company
in its violations of the Chinese laws, but had actually taken
the whole traffic out of the hands of that company, and
for years itself engaged in this illicit traffic. After the
war it tried, through its Commissioner, to induce that grand
old Emperor, Tau Kwang, to legalize the traffic in opium.
That so-called Christian Commissioner exhausted every
argument, finally urging that by a “high license ’’ a large
revenue might be secured to the Chinese Treasury. But the
grand old man stoutly resisted. Would that his final reply
might reach the ears and hearts of at least all Christian
voters in this land : “I will never reap a revenue from
the weakness and misery of my people.” English soldiers
behind English guns forced this hero to pay $21,000,000, and
to cede a part of his vast Empire to a robber government.
But neither guns nor might could conquer that invincible
spirit, and so that cowardly government proceeded to violate
law and bring opium into China without permission, until
another war was the consequence, and this time the young
Emperor who had succeeded Tau Kwang was unable to
resist great England’s might, and was compelled to sign the
document legalizing the ruin of millions of souls. As he did
so, the tears rolled down his cheeks as he exclaimed : “I do
this, I know, for the ruin of my people, but can not help
myself.” And from that day to this England has forced
this infamous traffic upon China, as her own minister
declared, “against the conscience of the whole people.”
Our Own American merchants’ hands are black with the
traffic, as are those of almost every other foreign merchant
in China. These merchants are not in a few small “opium
joints,” such as are made so much of here by the anti-
Chinese element, but in great wholesale establishments,
dealing it out for the ruin of the people by the chest.
Christian (2) merchants from all the chief Christian nations
of the earth have been and are in this traffic : the English
Government forcing the Indian farmers to plant the poppy
on the fair plains of India, and selling the opium to mer-
chants to poison China. Understand, my dear reader, this
opium business is an English Government monopoly. The
merchants buy it from the Government.
This cursed traffic has indeed wrought ruin enough to jus-
tify the rallying cry of a mob when, years ago, driving for-
20 MIUST THE CHINESE GO 2
eigners out of their city, they cried after them : “You
killed our Emperor, you burned our summer palace, you are
poisoning our people, you are devils l’” Some of us who
know the truth, and the bitter, bitter wrong, cry out :
“How long, O Lord, how long P” We grow impatient for
the Divine arm of retribution to be stretched out in redress
of the oppressed. If a little of this opium filters through
into the United States and a great deal of it into England,
let us make no word of complaint, for the few Chinese in the
traffic here are only following afar off, and in a very small
way, the distinguished example of renowned American and
Tºnglish merchants. I close my answer to the opium charge
with a financial and moral question so simple that the
primary school child can understand it. China’s opium bill
for her 400,000,000 of people is about $75,000,000. The
United States’ liquor bill for its 60,000,000 of people is
$900,000,000. Which is the larger ? which is the worst 2
Shall we point our finger at the “mote” in our brother's
eye, driven there by the weight of a Christian nation, while
we deliberately choose, vote to have, a “beam ” in our own
eye *
Ninth, “ They endanger our morals, especially by their
evil women.”
If the Great Judge of all the earth, sitting on his throne
of justice and righteousness, ever laughs in derision at
wrong, methinks he does when the anti-Chinese party, with
all their record, dare to talk of injury to their morals.
I fell in with one of their most lusty champions on a train.
He declared himself to be an inſidel, his wife the same ; be-
lieved in lynch-law, especially for the Chinese, his only
charge against them being that they find work in this land ;
told, with fiendish delight, of his share in “cleaning out one
of their camps.” Said he, “Do you know that man Gib-
son P’’ (the late Rev. Dr. Gibson, the heroic superintendent
of Methodist mission-work among the Chinese on the Pacific
coast). I replied, “Yes; he is a dear personal friend of
ours, who worked nobly in our mission for ten years,”—
“Ah, we hate him " We’d like to have his heart.” Such
were the brutal words of this man, outwardly a gentleman,
but betrayed, under the intense excitement of his hatred of
the Chinese, to reveal the foul, murderous nature within.
And yet he could talk of morals. Does it not become a bur-
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 21
lesque when such men fear for morality ? I could but think
that if the respectable gentleman I have met, who have
sympathy with this anti-Chinese element, could have seen
and heard this “shining light,” they would have been
heartily sick of such association.
And will the Californians use this plea for protection to
their morals 2
The horrors that I heard, and facts that polluted the air,
in San Francisco and smaller towns, come up to me so
vividly, that I am amazed that people living in so frail a
“glass house ’’ dare to throw a stone like this at the more
respectable house of the Chinese. There are many good
people in California, and I honor them for their struggle
against wrong. But, alas ! the reputation of San Francisco
and other places is badly tattered. I shall never forget the
shock I experienced, when, just after our arrival in San
Francisco from China, we were on our way to church one
Sunday morning, and a man went shouting through the
street, “Sweet oranges, fresh peas for sale !” and our Chi-
nese servant quietly remarked, “Teacheress, it is just about
the same here as in China, isn’t it P” I then awakened to
the realization of the fact that I was in a Christian city
where the Sabbath was not regarded. But to return to the
Chinese women. So far as I have seen, they are at least de-
cently clothed, which is more than I can say of the white
creatures of the same class I saw in San Francisco. There
is also this difference. The latter have chosen their life of
sin in the full blaze of the saving Christian light of this
land; while the Chinese woman in San Francisco has prob-
ably had no choice in her life, and certainly no light from
Christianity. She is, in a large majority of cases, more
sinned against than sinning. *
But let the pleader of this last refuge of lies tread care-
fully here, and note the following:—
“In 1872 the Legislature of California passed a law creat-
ing a commissioner of immigration, with power to examine
immigrants, and to forbid the landing of those whom he
should find to be criminals, or lewd persons, or afflicted with
contagious diseases. Under the provisions of that Act, the
commissioner forbade the landing of twenty-five Chinese
women from the steamer ‘Japan,’ which arrived in August,
1873. The women-dealers, by the help of lawyers of a cer-
~
22 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
tain class, obtained a writ of habeas corpus, and brought
the women on shore before Judge Morrison of the Fourth
District Court. The judge sustained the commissioner, and
remanded the women back to the steamship company to be
returned to China.
“Immediately after Judge Morrison’s decision was pro-
nounced, Messrs. Edgerton & Quint obtained a writ of
habeas corpus from Chief Justice Wallace of the Supreme
Court, upon the allegation that the women were illegally de-
tained by the captain of the “Japan.’ The writ was execu-
ted, and the women escorted back to the county jail.”
The Supreme Court of the State of California sustained
the ruling of Judge Morrison, and the women were a second
time remanded back to the steamer. But the women-dealers
and their unprincipled lawyers then applied to the United
States District Court, procured a third writ habeas corpus,
and the case was tried before that tribunal, which reversed
the decision of Judge Morrison and the Supreme Court of
California, pronounced the law under which the commis-
sioner had acted unconstitutional, and ordered the women to
be allowed their freedom. Respectable Chinese merchants
in San Francisco stood ready to pay the passage of such
women right back to China. The Chinese Government it-
self (without doubt) would quickly respond to any action on
the part of our Government for excluding Chinese vice;
though it might in fairness insist upon a speedy clearing of
its own ports of like women, gamblers, and drunkards, not
Chinese. We have been forced to endure the company of
such white women (Americans) on our way to China, and
have felt that the less we said about our national morality,
the better. Any and all evils found to-day in Chinatown,
San Francisco, are simply a shame to the authorities of that
city, and entirely under their control. There are no people
more amenable to law than the Chinese.
But, alas ! it is by no means a secret that the very officers,
who, in San Francisco, by solemn oath are bound to do their
utmost to stop crime, wink at it for the sake of the bribes
with which their hands are black. Evil men come from
China as from other countries; but the bad Chinaman can
be sent back, or controlled more easily than others. Chi-
nese gambling-dens and brothels can be utterly rooted out
of Chinatown whenever the high-minded officers of that
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 23
city can consent to forego the bribes they now receive.
When they have attained to so high a state of grace as this,
and Chinatown is cleaned up, I would humbly suggest that,
if they put on their glasses and look around, they may find
a few other like dens not imported from China; and similar
places may be found in Philadelphia, New York, Brooklyn,
and the model city of Boston itself, to say nothing of the
moral (?) cities of Chicago and Cincinnati. “Consistency,
thou art a jewel !”
In the mean while, let the American people meditate upon
the answer of the president of one of the “Six Chinese Com-
panies,” in San Francisco, to Mayor Bryant, in reply to his
condemnation of Chinese prostitution. “Yes, yes, Chinese
prostitution is bad. What do you think of German, French,
Spanish, and American prostitution ? Do you think them
good?” This astute heathen wondered at the Christian (save
the mark () silence and forebearance toward the many, and
the loud horror-stricken hoot at the few. Very stupid and
heathenish the question, no doubt ; but then we can’t make
a law to prevent the Chinese from thinking, questioning,
and drawing conclusions. But what of the morality of many
of the American merchants, naval officers and captains and
others in China, and I might add in India, Japan, and all
other places to which our commerce goes P Would that, in
justice to imperiled human souls, I might maintain my
usual silence here ! But I dare not. The enemy is mighty
—we are a weak folk—and I must, as before God, meet
every charge, and prove at least that we should not demand
more of these Eastern people, who never heard of the
decalogue, than we do of those born and bred under its
commands. How are our college-bred, Christian-born men
living in the East P Alas ! that I must say it of the
majority of them, in such a way as would bring grief and
shame to every Christian parent, wife and child at home.
Glad am I to say that there are noble exceptions, but the
rule remains. God forgive them for so shaming us before
the heathen, and for putting by far the greatest obstacle
in the way of our missionary work that we ever meet.
Imagine the chagrin and humiliation of my husband, with
other missionaries, when, as was so customary, in preaching
to an audience of natives, after telling them of the great
one God, His work in creation, the fall of man and our hope
24 MUST THE CHINESE GO 2
in Christ, he proceeds to expound man’s duty toward that
creator, as given in the first table of the law, the brotherhood
of man, and man’s duty to his brother as taught in the sec-
ond table, a keen, courteous man in his audience, rises
and in most respectful word and manner asks, “Teacher,
may I say a word P” The “Teacher ‘’ can only assent, for
there the pew may reply to the pulpit. The “heathen ‘’
proceeds to say: “Teacher, what you have said is good.
The native people believe that all men are brothers—and
that we should be kind and just to all. You need not have
crossed thousands of miles of Ocean and left your honorable
country and venerable parents to come to tell us this, for our
teacher Confucius told us this hundreds of years ago. We
believe it ; but, to give me to see, your people don’t believe
these doctrines which you teach. You say, ‘ICeep sacred the
worship (Sabbath) day.” We know nothing of this worship
day—but if it is important, why don’t your own people keep it?
Don’t you know that your merchants are loading their ships
with tea to-day as on any other day ? You say that the com-
mand of your great teacher not to kill, means also not to in-
jure any one. Who brought the opium here * Who forced
it upon our Government and people 2 Who are selling it to
our poor people to-day in this place 2 Isn’t it your Jesus
doctrine people * You say that another of your Teacher’s
commands is to be pure in life. Surely, teacher, you know
how your men are living here, just across the river in your
foreign settlement Are they clean P” Alas! alas ! that
this is no fancy sketch, but a true description of what has
occurred. To my most bitter knowledge the great and all
important fact that there is one true God and Saviour Jesus
Christ was often rendered ineffectual, by the ever present,
evil example of those who were justly supposed to be His
followers; for as it is customary here to term all those
Eastern people heathen—so do they suppose us all to be
Christian. “First, cast out the beam out of thine own eye;
and then shalt, thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of
thy brother’s eye.”
Tenth, “The Chinese cheapen labor, and throw others
out of employ.” The cry not so many years ago in Califor-
nia was against the exorbitant prices demanded for labor.
A few had command of the labor market, making many
lucrative industries impossible by their high demands. To-
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 25
day it is against the cheap labor of the Chinese, but this
argument is reserved for strangers who are ignorant of
Western prices.
There is absolutely no such thing as cheap labor on the
Pacific Coast. An untrained Chinaman commands from
three to five dollars a week, and board, in kitchen employ;
Chinese cooks, from twenty to forty dollars à month, and
board. Is this cheap labor? A gentleman from the Pacific
Coast, whom I met in Rome, made to me, as one of his
charges against the Chinese, this one of “cheap labor,” but
quickly yielded the point when he found that T was posted
on prices in California. The Chimaman takes the place of
mo ome who will do the work as well as he , but when un-
faithfulness, dishonesty, and utter disregard of the employ-
er’s interests are superseded by faithfulness, honesty, and a
recognition of duty to give a fair return in work for wages
received, who will complain of such a change 2
Eleventh, “ The Chimamam wears a cue, retains his
own style of dress, and eats rats and puppies.”
There is so much bigotry and ignorance in these com-
plaints, that they are almost unworthy of notice; yet, as
they are really given as grounds of complaint, I notice them.
The “Father of his Country” wore a cue. Many of our
young ladies to-day do the same. The Chinaman’s cue is a
badge of his loyalty to his Government, and as such he has
no right to dispense with it; neither is it any of our business
how he dresses his hair. He has likewise the same natural
right to retain his own dress: the foreigners in China do the
same. I and mine arrayed ourselves, and dressed our hair,
in China after our own style; and no Chinaman was dis-
courteous or impertiment enough to find fault with us.
The rat and dog eating charge is simply disgraceful, and
those who make it only illuminate their ignorance before
the public. In nearly twenty years’ residence in China, and
visiting different parts of the country, I never saw or heard
of such a thing but once, when a poor low-class man was
charged with partaking of dog-meat; and it excited as much
indignation among his associates as it would have done here.
I have heard that in exceptional poverty-stricken cases, such
food has been taken, and that it is sold in Some restaurants
at Canton; but to state, as some of our school-books do,
that the Chinese eat rats and dogs, and enforce the libel by
26 Aſ UST THE CHINESE GO 2
that ancient and disgraceful picture of a Chinaman with a
bamboo across his shoulder, with dogs at one end, and rats
at the other, thereby conveying the impression that such
is the general diet of the Chinese, is to slander the people
of China. It would be just as true for a Chinaman to visit
the United States and England, and go home and state to
his people that Americans eat frogs, and Englishmen horse-
meat. I, for one, protest against any such public-school
teaching to my children.
Twelfth, “They look so impassive, keep themselves to
themselves as though they had mo hearts.”
Well, it is amazing that they don’t run into our arms
We could aim our stones more surely then, and the mud
would spatter more generally “Love your enemies,”
“pray for them who curse you,” are Christian teachings,
that, alas! the “heathen Chinec ’’ has never learned. He
has learned the lesson mot to strike back well in this land.
The Chinaman’s idea of courtesy will forever prevent his
pressing his company upon us as “a stranger guest’’ among
us; but there are many in this land who can testify to his
quick and grateful response to the slightest kindness. Their
gratitude to, and appreciation of, their Sunday-school teach-
ers in Boston, New York, Brooklyn, and every other place
where they have such attention, is constantly shown in the
most practical, beautiful, and generous manner. Grand,
true, Christian workers will testify to the truth of this asser-
tion. In this connection I desire to quote the telling words
of a lady resident in Connecticut, who speaks out my senti-
ments:
“It is seventeen years to-day since my brother, a young
man of rare promise, laid down his life on a Southern battle-
field in defence of human rights; and his blood cries out
against those who are trying to make us believe that God
and our fathers meant only black and white men when they
declared the nations of one blood. Ten years ago we received
into our household two Chinese lads, twelve years of age,
who came from the middle, or merchant, class, and were
members of the Chinese Educational Mission recently re-
called. These boys, taken from heathen surroundings, were
not only as intelligent, courteous, and refined as any youths
in this Christian land, but they were exceptionally noble and
high-minded. During all these years they have grown into
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 27
the heart of our family life, tender of our sick and aged,
sorrowing with us over our dead, until they have become
our own kindred; and the hopes and ambitions buried in
our brother’s grave blossom anew, as they live over his
experiences in their college career. You can understand,
then, how our hearts grow hot with indignation as we hear
men, who are not worthy to stand in their presence, speak
of our beloved brethren as belonging to an essentially and
irreclaimably inferior race. Like the Jews of old, who de-
spised the Gentiles, these noble senators will, some of them,
See the despised Chinaman sitting with Abraham and Isaac,
and themselves, the children of the kingdom, cast out.”
Thirteenth, “The Chinese will not become citizens.”
When living in another city of this country, after I had
written a series of articles, taking up in detail this whole
Chinese question, in a prominent daily paper of that city,
and had frequently spoken in public upon the same subject,
I learned that such work on my part was exceedingly ob-
noxious to various labor unions, to the “ Knights of Labor.”
among the rest. Vile, abusive and libelous letters were sent
me, and all of them save two, which professed to be from
women, were anonymous, as were the most of the attacks
in the labor union papers. I could not help feeling, that if
the Christian people and ministers, some with “D.D.” at-
tachments, who have taken their stand in support and de-
fense of this wicked anti-Chinese work, could have seen these
letters, they would be ashamed of such company. Finally
the Chairman of an Executive Committee of the “ Knights
of Labor ’’ of that city came and had an interview with me.
He told me that they had discussed my work for the Chinese
for several hours in their union. I asked him for his charges
against the Chinese. He gave them, and I answered them
one by one, he declared, to his entire satisfaction. Finally,
he said : “I am glad to have had this talk with you, I shall
never think, as I did, of you and your work; but there is still
one more charge, and it is the chief with us laboring men,
which you can not answer:—They will not become citizens !”
I replied, “Would you put out a man's eyes, and then abuse
him for not seeing 2" He asked, “What do you mean 2’’
“I mean that we have a national law that the Chinese shall
never become citizens?” He sprang to his feet in great ex-
citement, and insisted that there was mo such raw, could not
28 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
be, adding “Why that is our chief charge against them l’’
I as ſirmly and emphatically assured him that there existed
at that moment said law, and also assured him that I was
well aware that probably eight out of ten voters did not
know it—our Government doing an immense amount of
dirty work, that the people did not and could not know, of
slipping bills through under cover of disguised titles and at
the bidding of hoodlums and Jesuits. “Do you mean to say
that you have seen this law in black and white?” he asked.
“I have that law in the house now, and will send you a copy
of it to-morrow morning,” I replied. He answered, “I have
not a word more to say; I go to throw a bomb into our
union l’’ Men, like this man, go on making this charge
against the Chinese ; and the hoodlums and that secret
power, that plans this work and so much else of evil in this
land—gloats over the ignorance of the native voter. I here-
with quote from the Constitution of the State of California,
adopted March 3d, 1879, and submitted to a vote of the peo-
ple May 7th, 1879. I can not resist the inclination first to
quote from Article I., Section 1, the following :
“All men are by nature free and independent, and have
certain inalienable rights, among which are those of enjoy-
ing and defending life and liberty; acquiring, possessing,
and protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining safety
and happiness.” In the very next Article we have the fol-
lowing burlesque upon the above :
“ARTICLE II. Right of Suffrage. Section 1. Every native
male citizen of the United States, every male person who
shall have acuuired the rights of citizenship under or by
virtue of the treaty of Queretaro, and every male natural-
ized citizen thereof, who shall have become such ninety days
prior to any clection, of the age of twenty-one years, who shall
have been a resident of the State one year next preceding
the election, and of the county in which he claims his vote
ninety days, and in the election precinct thirty days, shall
be entitled to vote at all elections, which are now or may here-
after be authorized by law ; provided, no native of China,
no idiot, insane person, or person convicted of any infamous
crime, and no person hereafter convicted of the embezzle-
ment or misappropriation of public money, shall ever exer-
cise the privilege of an elector in this State.” This villainy
was perpetrated in 1879. Not content with thus honoring
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 29
her own State, California, through her rulers, demanded
such a law for all the States; and in 1882 their demand was
granted, in another discriminating Act against the Chinese,
entitled “To execute certain Treaty stipulations relating
to the Chinese,” passed by the Senate, March 9, 1882.
Section 16 reads as follows: “That hereafter no State
Court or Court of the United States shall admit Chinese to
citizenship ; and all laws in conflict with this Act are hereby
repealed.” Surely this charge may well vanish with the
troop that have gone before | But suppose there was no such
law, and still the Chinese were so irresponsive to the won-
derful liberty and gracious, kindly treatment they receive
at our hands, that they did not all hasten to become citizens
and vote “early and often,” and, like some other foreign
guests in this land, only bide their time to seize the whole
machinery of our Government; suppose they are so utterly
stupid, what right have we to complain P My husband did not
go to China to repudiate his loyalty to his own Government
and become a subject of the Chinese Emperor; no more do
any of our merchants; and we women not being citizens of
any country, save only from the dim reflected citizenship of
our husbands—if we are so fortunate as to have any, we
of course never dreamed of being Chinese citizens; and up
to date there has never been a Chinese idiotic enough to
suggest such an impertinence to the American in China.
Consistency, thou art indeed a jewel as rare as beautiful!
And now I have conscientiously and fairly I think,+
warmly, with a righteous indignation, I admit, answered
the popular charges against the Chinese. Some one is ready
to ask, “If all you have said is true, what is the source of
this anti-Chinese howl?” Your question is easily answered.
The Chinese laborers belong to none of the labor unions of
this land; worse still, they are the exceptional class that does
not patronize the rum-shops. Think of the host of enemies
they at once array against them in this last respect, and of
the mighty money power in the hands of these foes. Again,
they have no vote, and so are worse than worthless to the
average politician. Lastly, and fatally for the native
American, the immigrant from across the Atlantic desires
and intends to command the labor market here; not only
to rule in our homes, but in every other department of in-
dustry into which he enters; to fix prices of labor, to strike
30 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
for more, to do or not to do, without fear of Competition.
An efficient competitor is his only obstacle ; and that he has
in the patient, faithful, sober, Chinaman. This Atlantic im-
migrant now holds the balance of power at the polls, and
Says to the politician, “My competitor who stands in the
Way of my inalienable right to rule must go;” and down
goes the politician on his knees before the balance of power.
There are a few noble exceptions of statesmen Who do not
bite the dust in this manner. Such are Senators Hoar,
Dawes, Hawley, Platt, and Wilson, who have stood nobly
for ancient principles and the right; and such too are
there on the Pacific coast, grand men and women Who have
held on to justice and right amid an Overwhelming and de-
moralizing public opinion.
In speaking of the immigrants from across the Atlantic, I
except the good men and women who are honest, industri-
ous, and sober, and who are in consequence a Strength to
Our Country. I want further to say that there are good men
in the East who really believe the miserable lies COncocted
in the West against the Chinese; but I can not regard even
Such as excusable. Certainly in these days of intelligence
and facilities for obtaining information, some near approach
to truth could be reached, and should be, before men vote
to exclude a race from the rights granted freely to others.
But, unfortunately, I find that men who read newspaper
statements on other subjects with CYCS Open and brains alert
just swallow without questioning any thing and everything
said against the Chinese; vide the popular newspaper para-
graph that the Chinese Government had beheaded a Chinese
student in Hong Kong for falling in love with an American
girl! If the reader and editor did not know that the Chi-
nese Government does not punish its subjects for being
Smitten with the charms of the foreign fair one, they at
least ought to have known that Hong Kong is an English
Colony, and that the Chinese Government does not behead
its love-stricken subjects under the shadow of the British flag'
And yet this paragraph has been quoted to me against the
Chinese by men of great intelligence. If the Chinese people
are what the American fancy paints them, then the conun-
drum remains how a beneficent Creator could permit one-
third of humanity to be of this “vile race.” But knowing
them as I do, not from newspaper items and the hatred of
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 31
the “balance of power,” but from a personal knowledge of
all classes of the people in their own country; knowing them
to be industrious beyond any other people, patient under
trial, cheerful under burdens, fond of learning to such an
extent that they have a literary instead of a moneyed aris-
tocracy, showing a respect to age almost unknown in this
land, filial piety the central virtue around which all others
cluster, and upon which their present and eternal welfare
hangs, the virtue which ever takes them back to their native
land and the graves of their fathers, knowing all these to
be the marked characteristics of the great Chinese people, I
no longer wonder that the Creator has made one-third of
the human race after the Chinese pattern, and less than
Seventy million Americans. Nor do I wonder that he has
given to them a country greater in extent than our own,
and as rich in minerals, soil, and scenery. I only wonder
that he has given to us (who in more respects than one are
not the equals of the Chinese) the crowning blessing of hu-
manity,+a, knowledge of Christ,-instead of giving it to the
greater people. Let us see to it that in our treatment of
that people we offend not the King of kings. He may bear
long, but in the end we shall certainly reap what we sow,
as a nation as well as individuals.
Passing from China to India, on our way we stopped at
Singapore and Penang, and were assured there that the men
of business integrity, wealth, and good character were the
Chinese ; and in Calcutta, we received no contrary testi-
mony. Time and time again our own American merchants
in China have assured me that their Chinese customers
were just as reliable as European or American. Our own
real-estate agents, customs officials, and tax collectors ac-
knowledge that none in the land are more prompt in the
payment of their dues, or more quiet, orderly tenants.
The Mayor of New Orleans lately averred in public that
“No more industrious, honest, and law-abiding people help
to make up the mixed population of New Orleans, than the
Chinese.”
I here assert, fearless of any counter statement capable of
proof, that the Chinese to-day are the most industrious,
quiet, honest, sober, patient, and forbearing (oh, how for-
bearing !) in migrants in this land. And how have they
been treated 2 If they go into the streets, they are insulted;
32 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
if they stay at home, they are not exempt. Newspapers
vie with each other in libelling them; even Christian men,
through party rule, unite with hoodlums in the cry “Away
with them l’” They have been compelled to pay their taxes
over and over again ; are taxed for our schools, and not
allowed to attend them. They have been beaten and killed,
and no one has redressed their wrongs; nay, more, officers
whose business it was to protect have stood by and said,
“It is only a Chinaman l’’
I must say, with shame and confusion of face, that the
heathen Government of China has kept its treaty in our
protection in China, and redressed any wrongs we had ;
while the Christian Government of this land has not even
tried to keep its most solemn treaty obligations with China.
Chinese have been taxed when entering the country, and
when leaving it ; invidious taxation in many ways has been
put upon them, and laws enacted especially to oppress them;
and our Government has interfered in no way for their pro-
tection. To show that I make no exaggerated charges, I
will give quotations from Western papers, showing how
long, and to what an outrageous extent, the crimes against
the Chinese have gone. They are mainly from the Rev. Dr.
Gibson’s valuable book, “The Chinese in America,” which
I earnestly recommend to those who desire to know the un-
adulterated truth on this subject. Dr. Gibson was a mem-
ber of our (Methodist) mission at Foo Chow, China, for ten
years. On his return to this land, our missionary board
availed itself of his ability and experience by appointing him
superintendent of our Chinese mission-work on the Pacific
Coast; and bravely for twenty years did he stand in defence
of the persecuted Chinese on that coast, often, too, at the
peril of his life, even at the cost of the most villainous libels
of the anti-Chinese party.
At one of the anti-Chinese meetings, Dr. Gibson was
burnt in effigy in the presence of Mayor Bryant, without re-
buke; as one paper says, “the mayor looking Smiling on 1’’
At one time for weeks, when he left the house, his wife was
in anxiety for his life; he received letters threatening his
life; and at another time the Mission House had to be pro-
tected by police. Again, When on one occasion, he, a free
American citizen, was in the California hall of legislation,
a member of that honorable (?) body sprang up, and ad-
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 33
dressing the speaker, shouted, “I move you, sir, that Otis
Gibson, the most offensive man to our party on this coast,
be expelled the house !” And they actually dared to take a
a vote on such a proposition, and failed to put him out by
only nine votes. He had risen to leave, but sat down to see the
result. A few days later, when he was again present, the
same outrage was committed. His sole offence in all these
years was his Christian work and brave stand in the defence
of the Chinese. Dr. Gibson was a hero of the noblest,
purest type. His record is made on high, and so is that of
his foes and those of the oppressed stranger. Glad am Ithat
there is a righteous Judge, who will with unwavering jus-
tice mete out to each according to his deeds.
California has been the breeding-place for anti-Chinese
agents. Not content with brutalizing its own people, and
disgracing itself, and the rest of our country, before the
heathen as well as civilized world, it has sent out its agents
along the coast to havk its lies, and incite to murder and
robbery, until “Kearneyites” and “sand-lots” at once sug-
gest their native locality. The Chinese at first were not
only welcomed, but invited, to California. The European
immigrant demanded four and five dollars a day for work,
and every one was helpless before him; but when the China-
man came, by invitation, he was willing to work for two
and three dollars a day. This was his sin at first, and per-
secution at once commenced; and when prices, by a fair
Competition, levelled to a somewhat reasonable rate, but by
no means to “cheap labor” (for still wages were high com-
pared with those in the East), so that industries formerly
impossible could be carried on, enriching the State, this
hatred of the Chinese only increased. They had dared to
compete, and successfully, with the European laborer, and
So were never forgiven. The politician, wanting the votes
of those ruling laborers, joined in the cry; and soon official
silence, or sanction, made all manner of wrong possible.
The newspaper quotations I now give will fairly hint the
State of affairs, but it would take volumes to record the hide-
ous wrongs perpetrated against these helpless strangers in
Our land. The “Annals of San Francisco,” written in 1854,
Says, “In short, there is a strong feeling—prejudice, it may
be-existing in California against all Chinamen, and they
are nicknamed, cuffed about, and treated very unceremoni-
34 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
ously by every other class; yet they are generally quiet
and industrious members of Society, charitable among
themselves, not given to intemperance and the rude vices
which drink induces.”
On this subject “The Nevada Journal” said, “There is
a species of semi-legalized robbery perpetrated upon the
Chinese. Many of the collectors are gentlemen in every
sense of the word, but there are others who take advantage
of their position to extort the last dollar from the poverty-
stricken Chinese. They date licenses back, exact pay in
some instances for extra trouble in hunting up the terrified
Chinamen, and by various devices fatten themselves upon
the spoils thus obtained. The complaints of the injured and
oppressed find no open ear; for is it not declared by the
Supreme Court, the hignest tribunal of the land, that their
oaths are not to be regarded ? Under this state of things,
the life of a Chinaman in California is one of hardship and
oppression.” This is from the eactreme West, please note.
“The North Californian,” published in Oroville, delivered
the following : —
“As we have once said, so do we now repeat, that we are
ready to sanction any honorable measure to prevent our
country being overrun with hordes of Asiatics; but we pro-
test against the application of the rack and thumb-screw to
the poor, unassuming Mongolians now among us. John
Chinaman always has a little money, because he must and
will work, whether he earns much or little. He must have
cash, or starve, for he can’t get trusted for his food ; and
so he comes down with the dust. In this way, and by
means of the oppressive taa, which he pays for the privi-
lege of laboring, he contributes more to sustain trade, and
support a government which refuses him the least protec-
tion, than many worse specimens of humanity of a more
favored race, who affect to Sneer at lim as being no better
than a brute. Let justice be done, though the heavens fall,
and let it be done to John Chinaman.”
Such statements from the scene of crime are refreshing
and emphasizing. Under this system of official and general
oppression, of course morals did not improve, and crimes
multiplied against the Chinese, until in October, 1876, a con-
gressional joint commission of investigation on the subjéct
of Chinese immigration, was held in San Francisco. Sen-
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 35
ators Morton of Indiana, Sargent of California, Cooper of
Tennessee, with Representatives Meade of New York, Piper
of California, and Wilson of Iowa, composed the commis-
Sion.
“It was arranged to have the investigation proceed some-
what after the form of a court-trial; the anti-Chinese party
being the prosecutors, and the Chinese the defendants.
State Senator M’Coppin, Frank M. Pixley, and a certain
Cameron H. King were recognized as the lawyers for the
prosecution. Col. F. A. Bee and B. S. Brooks were attor-
neys for the defence.” The following will show Mr. Pixley’s
character: “Mr. Pixley made an hour and a half state-
ment of charges against the Chinese, such as, they live
cheaply, are industrious, are not subject to be drafted as
jurymen, do not attend our schools, take no interest in Our
politics, etc. He neglected to state that the Chinaman is not
juryman or soldier because we do not allow him to be a citi-
Zen, also that he does not attend our schools because the
school boards refuse him admission. He did state, how-
ever, that one of the principal dangers to our white labor-
Žng population is because the Chinaman labor so well, are
anarious to learn trades, and are quick to acquire knowl-
edge / On the religious question, Mr. Pixley boldly stated
the view maintained by the prosecution generally, when he
said that he could not speak of the matter of Christianizing
the Chinaman with the gravity which the circumstances
demanded. For his part he did not believe that Chinamen
had souls, or, if any, none worth saving /?”
“Anti-Chinese clubs were organized throughout San
Francisco. The frantic cry was raised, ‘ Organize, organ-
ize 3’ Politicians organized ; loafers, tramps, and bummers
organized. Hoodlum boys of ten and fifteen were encouraged
to join some of these organizations, and have been found
very useful in teaching the Chinese that they are not wanted
in this country.”
Excitement finally ran so high, and indignities against
the Chinese so multiplied under the encouragement of oſſi-
cials, that the helpless Chinese were driven to make appeals
for relief. I append one of these, and insist that it is a credit
to the heads and hearts of those persecuted strangers who
prepared it, and that it should bring the utmost shame
and humiliation, not only to every Californian, but as well to
36 MUST THE CHINESE GO #
every American voter who has not thrown his influence, as
far as he has any, against the cowardly assaults upon a
helpless people.
A MEMORIAL FROM REPRESENTATIVE CHINA-
MEN IN AMERICA.
To HIs ExCELLENCY U. S. GRANT,
President of the United States of America.
Sir, In the absence of any consular representative, we
the undersigned, in the name and in behalf of the Chinese
people now in America, would most respectfully present for
your consideration the following statements regarding the
subject of Chinese immigration to this country:—
First, We understand that it has always been the settled
policy of your honorable Government to welcome immigra-
tion to your shores, from all the countries, without let or
hinderance. The Chinese are not the only people who have
crossed the ocean to seek a residence in this land.
Second, The treaty of amity and peace between the
United States and China, makes special mention of the rights
and privileges of Americans in China, and also of the rights
and privileges of Chinese in America.
Third, American steamers, subsidized by your honorable
Government, have visited the ports of China, and invited
our people to come to this country to find employment, and
improve their condition. *
Fourth, Our people in this country, for the most part,
have been peaceable, law-abiding, and industrious. They
performed the largest part of the unskilled labor in the con-
struction of the Central Pacific Railroad, and also of other
railroads on this coast. They have found useful employ-
ment in all the manufacturing establishments of this coast,
in agricultural pursuits, and in family service. While bene-
fiting themselves with the honest reward of their daily toil,
they have given satisfaction to their employers, and have
left all the results of their industry to enrich the State.
They have not displaced white laborers from these positions,
but have simply multiplied industries. *
Fifth, The Chinese have neither attempted nor desired
to interfere with the established order of things in this coun-
try, either of politics or religion. They have opened no
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 37
whiskey-saloons for the purpose of dealing out poison, and
degrading their fellow-men. They have promptly paid their
duties, their taxes, their rents, and their debts.
Siarth, It has often occurred, about the time of the State
and general elections, that political agitators have stirred
up the mind of the people in hostility to the Chinese; but
formerly the hostility has subsided after the elections were
OVCI".
Seventh, At the present time an intense excitement and
bitter hostility against the Chinese in this land, and against
further Chinese immigration, has been created in the minds
of the people, led on by his Honor the Mayor of San Fran-
cisco and his associates in office, and approved by his Ex-
cellency the Governor of the State and other great men of
the State. These great men gathered some twenty thou-
Sand of people of this city together on the evening of April 5,
and adopted an address and resolutions against Chinese im-
migration. They have since appointed three men (one of
whom we understand to be the author of the address and
resolutions) to carry that address and those resolutions to
your Excellency, and to present further objections, if possi-
ble, against the immigration of the Chinese to this country.
Eighth, In this address, numerous charges are made
against our people, some of which are highly colored and
Sensational, and others, having no foundation in fact, are
only calculated to mislead honest minds, and create an un-
just prejudice against us. We wish most respectfully to call
your attention, and through you the attention of Congress,
to some of the statements of that remarkable paper, and ask
a careful comparison of the statements there made with the
facts in the case.
(a) It is charged against us, that not one virtuous China-
woman has been brought to this country, and that here we
have no wives and children.
The fact is, that already a few hundred Chinese families
have been brought here. These are all chaste, pure, keep-
ers at home, not known on the public street. There are also
among us a few hundred, perhaps a thousand, Chinese chil-
dren born in America. The reason why so few of our
families are brought to this country is because it is contrary
to the custom and against the inclination of virtuous Chinese
Women to go so far from home, and because the frequent
38 MUST THE CHINESE GO #
outbursts of popular indignation against our people have
not encouraged us to bring our families with us against
their will.
Quite a number of Chinese prostitutes have been brought
to this country by unprincipled men, but these at first were
brought from China at the instigation and for the gratifica-
tion of white men. And even at the present time it is com-
monly reported that a part of the proceeds of this villainous
traffic goes to enrich a certain class of men belonging to this
honorable nation, a class, too, who are under solemn obliga-
tion to suppress the whole vile business, and who certainly
have it in their power to suppress it if they so desired. A
few years ago, our Chinese merchants tried to send these
prostitutes back to China, and succeeded in getting a large
number on board the steamer; but a certain lawyer of your
honorable nation (said to be the author and bearer of these
resolutions against our people), in the employ of unprin-
cipled Chinamen, procured a writ of habeas corpus, and
brought all these women on shore again, and the courts de-
cided that they had a right to stay in the country if they so
desired. These women are still here; and the only remedy
for this evil, and also for the evil of gambling, so far as we
can see, liesin an honest and impartial administration of muni-
cipal government in all its details, even including the police
department. If officers would refuse bribes, these unprin-
cipled men could no longer purchase immunity from the
punishment of their crimes.
(b) It is charged against us, that we have purchased no
real estate. The general tone of public sentiment has not
been such as to encourage us to invest in real estate, and yet
our people have purchased and now own over eight hundred
thousand dollars’ worth of real estate in San Francisco
alone.
(c) It is charged against us, that we eat rice, fish and
vegetables. It is true that our diet is slightly different from
the people of this honorable country; our tastes in these mat-
ters are not exactly alike, and can not be forced. But is
that a sin on our part of sufficient gravity to be brought
before the President and Congress of the United States ?
(d) It is charged, that the Chinese are no benefit to this
country. Are the railroads built by Chinese labor no bene.
ſit to this country P Do not the results of the daily toil of
MUST THE CHINESE G O P 39
one hundred thousand men increase the riches of this country?
Are the manufacturing establishments largely worked by
Chinese labor no benefit to this country Is it no benefit to
this country, that the Chinese annually pay over two million
dollars duties at the custom-house of San Francisco 2 Is not
the two hundred thousand dollars annual poll-tax paid by
the Chinese any benefit P And are not the hundreds of
thousands of dollars taxes on personal property and the for-
eign miners’ tax, annually paid to the revenues of this coun-
try, any benefit 2
(e) It is charged against us, that the Six Companies have
Secretly established judicial tribunals, jails, and prisons, and
secretly exercise judicial authority over our people. This
charge has no foundation in fact. These Six Companies were
organized for the purpose of mutual protection and care of
our people coming to and going from this country. The Six
Companies do not claim nor do they exercise any judicial
authority whatever, but are the same as any tradesmen’s
or protective and benevolent societies. Neither do these
companies import either men or women into this country.
(f) It is charged, that all Chinese laboring-men are slaves.
This is not true in a single instance. Chinamen labor for
food. They pursue all kinds of industries for a livelihood.
Is it so, then, that every man laboring for his livelihood is a
slave? If these men are slaves, then all men laboring for
wages are slaves. -
(g) It is charged, that the Chinese commerce brings no
benefit to American bankers and importers. But the fact,
is, that an immense trade is carried on between China and
the United States by American merchants, and all the car-
rying business of both countries, whether by steamer or
sailing vessels, or by railroad, is done by Americans. No
China ships are engaged in the carrying traffic between the
two countries. Is it a sin to be charged against us, that the
Chinese merchants are able to conduct their mercantile
business on their own capital? And is not the exchange of
millions of dollars annually by the Chinese of this city any
benefit to the banks P
(h) We respectfully ask a careful consideration of all the
foregoing statements.
The Chinese are not the only people, nor do they bring
the only evils, that now afflict this country. And since the
40 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
Chinese people are now here under the most solemn treaty
rights, we hope to be protected according to the terms of
this treaty. But if the Chinese are considered detrimental
to the best interests of this country, and if our presence here
is offensive to the American people, let there be a modifica-
tion of existing treaty relations between China and the
United States, either prohibiting or limiting further Chinese
immigration, and, if desirable, requiring also the gradual
retirement of the Chinese people now here, from this country.
Such an arrangement, though not without embarrassments
to both parties, we believe would not be altogether unac-
ceptable to the Chinese Government, and doubtless it would
be very acceptable to a certain class of people in this hon-
orable country.
With sentiments of profound respect,
LEE MING HOW,
President Sam Yup Company.
LEE CHEE KWAN,
President Yung Wo Company.
LAW YEE CHUNG,
President Kong Chow Company.
CHAN LEUNG KOK,
President Wing Lung Company.
LEE CHEONG CHIP,
President Hop Wo Company.
CHANG KONG CHEW,
President Yan Wo Company.
LEE TONG HAY,
President Chinese Y. M. C. A.
But alas ! these pitiful appeals to the American public
and its President, by these “strangers within our gates,”
were all in vain. Yielding to the demands of this same
“balance of power,” our Government has grown steadily
weaker before it, until now it commands and is obeyed. By
its order the most wickedly discriminating laws against the
most peaceable, law-abiding immigrants in our country have
been passed. I append, in brief, statements of the same.
At the demand of this power on the Pacific coast our Gov-
ernment determined in 1880 to send a special embassy to
Peking, to secure a modification of the first treaty that ex-
isted between the two nations, which secured equal rights
for the citizens of either country, in order to enable the
United States to abrogate those rights so far as the Chinese
were concerned, but holding on to every right of the Amer-
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 41
ican in China. Who were the Commissioners sent? John
F. Swift, of California, a representative of the element de-
manding said modifications; William Henry Trescott, a
trained diplomatist, who well knew the force of treaty stipu-
lations and the binding obligations of the representations
through which they were obtained, and James B. Angell,
an accomplished student of public law and a worthy repre-
sentative of the best element in American politics and soci-
ety. What did these three distinguished men accomplish P
They secured the following. I quote Articles I. and II. of the
treaty. “Article I. Whenever in the opinion of the Gov-
ernment of the United States the coming of Chinese laborers
to the United States, or their residence therein, affects or
threatens to affect the interests of that country, or to en-
danger the good order of such country, or of any locality
within the territory thereof, the Government of China.
agrees that the Government of the United States may regu-
late, limit or suspend such coming or residence, but may
not absolutely prohibit it.” Article II. stipulates: “Chinese
subjects, whether proceeding to the United States as teachers,
students, merchants, or from curiosity, together with their
body and household servants, and Chinese laborers who are
now in the United States, shall be allowed to go and come of
their own free will and accord, and shall be accorded all the
rights, privileges, immunities and exemptions which are
accorded to the citizens and subjects of the most favored
nations.” The American Commissioners rejoiced over their
work, and in reporting it to the Government closed their
despatch with the following reference to the action of the
Imperial Commissioners: “After a free and able exposition
of their views, we are satisfied that in yielding to the request
of the United States, they have been actuated by a sincere
friendship and an honorable confidence that the large powers
recognized by them as belonging to the United States and
bearing directly upon the interests of their own people, will
be eacercised by our Government with a wise discretion,
£n a spirit of reciprocal and sincere friendship, and with
entire justice.”
These Commissioners, when arraying these one-sided con-
ditions, assured the Chinese Government that “so far as
those (Chinese) are concerned who, under treaty guaranty,
have come to the United States, the Government recognizes
42 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
but one duty, and that is to maintain them in the exercise
of their treaty privileges against any opposition, whether
it takes the shape of popular violence or legislative enact-
ment.” How well this confidence in the most sacredly
pledged word and assurances of this Government was
realized, let the series of legislative acts against this people,
and most brutal mob violence, wholly unpunished, testify. In
pursuance of these modifications, made under the most
solemn pledge of the United States Government that there
should be no oppressive legislation against the Chinese, in
1882, May 6, Congress passed an act entitled : “An Act, to
execute certain treaty stipulations relating to Chinese.” The
first section of that act was as follows: “That from and after
the expiration of ninety days after the passage of this act,
the coming of Chinese laborers to the United States, be, and
the same is hereby suspended, for ten years; and during
such suspension it shall not be lawful for any Chinese la-
borers to come, or having so come after the expiration of
ninety days, to remain within the United States.” So that
this very first act was not to “limit ’’ or “regulate,” but to
suspend, and this included ‘’ skilled ” as well as “unskilled
laborers.” The Chinese who were in the country at the
time this act was passed were excepted from its conditions,
and were assured liberty to go from and return to the
|United States. Still not content with this oppressive acu,
the enemies of the Chinese in 1884 demanded that certifi-
cates should be issued to the Chinese in the country under
most solemn treaty conditions, and that these certificates
should be the sole evidence of their right to be in the coun-
try. Again Congress obeyed the demand of these unprin-
cipled rulers, though in direct violation of our honor, Was
the hoodlum power content then 2 Nay! A presidential
campaign was ahead, and again they saw their opportunity
to still further oppress the Chinese. Sö' the “balance of
power” planted itself between the two great political par-
ties, and demanded the most abject and disgraceful act of
legislation this Government has ever been guilty of, and be
it said to the everlasting shame of both parties that they
vied with each other in hastening to obey. In September,
1888, an act was passed by Congress, with a view of exe-
cuting certain stipulations of a treaty still more unjust
against the Chinese, which treaty was signed March, 1888, but
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 43
afterwards was so offensively amended by our Senate that
the Chinese Government did not agree to it. While this
treaty was pending between the two Governments, with
amendments presented by the Chinese Government not even
considered by our Government, the infamous, treaty-violat-
ing “Scott Exclusion Act ’’ was passed by Congress in Oc-
tober, 1888. This act provided that no Chinese laborer in
this country at the date of its passage, October, 1888, or
who at any time prior to that date, had ever been in this
country, or who should leave the United States, or had left
and not returned, should have the right to return, and more-
over it cancelled all the outstanding return certificates
which had under previous legislation been issued, entitling
those to return who had been here and who had gone away,
declaring all such to be “void.” A total abrogation and
falsification of every sacred pledge this United States Gov-
ernment had given to the Chinese Government of security
to and protection of the rights of the Chinese in this coun-
try. I here quote again this pledge from “ Foreign Rela-
tions of the United States,” 1881, page 173: “So far as
those (Chinese) are concerned who under treaty guaranty
have come to the United States, the Government recognizes
but one duty, and that is to maintain them in the exercise of
their treaty privileges, against any opposition, whether it
takes the shape of popular violence or of legislative enact-
ment.” Was there any cause on the part of the great
Chinese Government for such action ? Had it been unrea-
sonable P Had it resented and retaliated because of the in-
sults heaped upon it by our so-called Christian Government *
Let Mr. Evarts answer. In reference to this very act he
said: “There has not been an approach that this Govern-
ment has made to China in our domestic interests, in the
questions of our polity, the questions of our naturalization,
and the questions of immigration, that the great nation
confronting us has not met us in the most conciliatory and
yielding attitude.”
Mr. Sherman said, “the Chinese Government might at
once, with great propriety and according to the system of
civilized nations, upon our refusing to observe existing treat-
les, declare that all the treaties are null and void ; there is
no question about that.” Cong. Rec., Vol. 19, p. 8451.
The same gentleman said at the same time in his speech in
44 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
the Senate, “I submit as a national honor whether it be right
or proper for us to seek to nullify a treaty that is now being
considered by a friendly nation. * * * I frankly say
that if our position was reversed, and Great Britain was thus
to act toward Americans, I would, without hesitation, vote
for a declaration of non-intercourse or war !” Was this
“Scott Exclusion Act ’’ legal? I here give my readers the
decision of the Supreme Court of the United States concern-
ing it : “The act of 1888, is in contravention of the ex-
press stipulations of the treaty of 1868 and of the supple-
mental treaty of 1880, but as it is in the exercise of a sover-
eign power vested in Congress, it must be respected and
obeyed as the supreme law of the land l’’
Mr. Chang Yen-Hoon, the Chinese Minister at Washing-
ton, thus most astutely and justly comments on this de-
cision—in an official letter to Mr. Blaine, July 8, 1889. He
says “it, the Supreme Court, says that it can not inquire
whether the reasons for this action are good or bad, because
that court can not be a censor of the morals of other depart-
ments of the government, and that the will of Congress
must be obeyed, though it is in plain violation of treaties.”
This able man goes on to say, I should think to the infinite
shame of Mr. Blaine, who has sustained all this evil legis-
lation—“you will pardon me, Mr. Secretary, if I express
my amazement that such a doctrine should be published to
the world by the august tribunal for whose members, by
personal acquaintance, I entertain such profound respect.
It forces upon me the conviction, that in the three years I
have resided in this country, I have not been able fully and
correctly to comprehend the principles and systems of your
great Government. In my country we have acted upon the
conviction that where two nations deliberately and solemnly
entered upon treaty stipulations they thereby formed a
sacred compact from which they could not be honorably
discharged except through friendly negotiations and a new
agreement. I was, therefore, not prepared to learn, through
the medium of that great tribunal, that there was a way rec-
ognized in the law and practice of this country, whereby
your Government could release itself from treaty obligations
without consultation with, or the consent of, the other party,
to what we had been accustomed to regard as a sacred in-
strument.” He then goes on to remind Mr. Blaine that the
MUST THE CHINESE Go ? 45
United States itself had sought treaty relations with China,
and that the Government of the latter had protected and
maintained the rights of Americans in China, most sacredly
keeping every item of the treaty. The whole correspond-
ence between the Chinese minister and at first Mr. Bayard
and later Mr. Blaine, is such as ought to crimson the cheek
of every loyal American who has the slightest regard for the
honor of his country. Both Mr. Chang Yen-Hoon, and his
successor the present minister Mr. Tsui Kwo-Yin, are ex-
ceedingly able men. In reading their part of the correspond-
ence, one might well Suppose that able, Christian statesmen
were trying to induce a dishonorable heathen government to
observe the commonest national courtesies—to say nothing of
fulfilling its sacred pledges. But all in vain were these expost-
ulations by the representatives of a bitterly outraged people.
Later and very recently, our present Secretary of the
Treasury surpasses his predecessor in an oppressive regula-
tion—and that, too, we must suppose from what will appear
hereafter—without the knowledge of Mr. Blaine, the Secre-
tary of State, and without notifying the Chinese minister or
the Government. I append the correspondence relating to
this oppressive order.
Mr. Tsui Kwo-Yin to Mr. Blaime :
“CHINESE LEGATION,
“WASHINGTON, 16th October, 1889.
“SIR:—I have received information, not of an official char-
acter, that some new measures of your excellency’s Govern-
ment have been adopted, which it is reported are working
hardship to the subjects of China, who seek to exercise the
privilege guaranteed to them by treaty stipulations of tran-
sit through the territory of the United States.” He then
asks for information on the subject. Mr. Blaine replies,
Oct. 18, 1889, acknowledging the receipt of the above note,
and says, “I have the honor to inform you that no new
legislation has been adopted on that subject.” Mr. Tsui
Kwo-Yin replies Nov. 5, 1889, enclosing to Mr. Blaine a
printed copy of the new regulation. He says, “In reply
to my inquiries, the Imperial Chinese Consul in New York
reports to me that your worthy colleague, the Secretary of
the Treasury, has issued a new regulation, requiring every
Chinese subject, desiring to pass in transit through the
46 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
United States, to cause to be deposited with the Collector
of Customs at place of arrival, a bond of $200, before he
shall be permitted to exercise the privilege guaranteed by
treaty of transit through the United States. * * * I
was much gratified to receive the assurance in your note of
the 18th ultimo, that no legislation had been adopted on the
subject of transit of Chinese subjects through the United
States, and I am at a loss to understand by what authority
the Secretary of the Treasury can adopt a regulation which
has the eſſect to nullify the treaty. If I have been correctly
informed as to your system of Government, an executive
officer can not enact laws, much less nullify a treaty.”
Quoting our own law against us, he then adds: “It will
be seen that your Congress—which I fear has not always
shown a great regard for treaty stipulations—has passed
no laws which in any degree restrict the treaty privilege
of transit. How then can the Secretary of the Treasury
legally do such a thing 2’’ How, indeed 2 Yet Mr. Windom
did that thing. Mr. Windom rose to explain. I quote
from his reply, evidently to an enquiry of Mr. Blaine's : “A
Question having arisen at one of the ports of the United
States, touching the right of Chinese laborers to enter the
United States in transit from one foreign port to another,
was referred by the Collector of that port to this Depart-
ment, which by law, regulation and custom, has a general
supervision of such officers and the subjects committed to
their jurisdiction '' (he might have added to enforce exist-
ing laws but not to enact new ones, “much less to nullify
treaties”). He further says: “Upon consideration of the
question by the Attorney General to whom it was pre-
sented, that oſſicer gave his opinion that the right of such
transit was legal and proper.” So he was estopped from
forbidding their passage over our sacred soil. But he felt
that he could at least distress them and make their legal
transit as difficult as possible, and so pleading the miserable
excuse—which if true should only have brought punish-
ment to our own officials for neglect of duty, he said “the
Department could not, under the guise of providing for the
transit of Chinese laborers across American territory, have
an open door for the admission, at their will, of such of
them as were disposed to establish themselves as additions
to the population.’’
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 47
But it is evident that he did not feel quite easy under the
remonstrances of the able Chinese Minister, for he adds,
“ Under further consideration it is proposed to amend the
third paragraph of the regulations of Sept. 28, 1889, by add-
ing thereto an alternative provision, that common carriers,
engaged in the business of conveying Chinese in transit,
may execute a general bond in lieu of the special bond re-
quired in the care of each transit laborer.” This interesting
information and gracious concession of Mr. Windom was
communicated to the Chinese Minister by Mr. Blaine. I
quote from Mr. Tsui Kwo-Yin's reply to Mr. Blaine: “You
are kind enough to inform me that in consequence of the pro-
hibition of the entrance (immigration) of Chinese laborers
into the United States, it became necessary for the Secretary
of the Treasury to devise measures to prevent the violation
of that prohibition under cover of the privilege of transit.
It would seem to be inferred from this declaration that un-
der cover of transit the laws against immigration were be-
ing violated. My note which occasioned this correspondence
related to the transit between the Eastern ports of the
United States and San Francisco. The records of the Im-
perial-Consulate-General at San Francisco show that no
abuse of the transit privilege has eacisted since the regu-
lation of Jam. 23, 1883, and it is understood that a report
to the same effect was made by the customs officials of
San Francisco to the Treasury Department, before the
adoption of the regulations of Sept. 28 last, that is, that
every Chinese laborer exercising the privilege of transit
has passed through and out of the United States with a
single eacception, and that eacception was occasioned by
death en-route ’’ ſ / / Was it in consequence of the one
poor man dying en-route and so not going out of the coun.
try—that Mr. Windom felt the emergency so great as to
necessitate such an unheard of order? Did not our own
customs officials unite with the Chinese-Consul-General in
assuring the Treasury Department that all of these terrible
people who, in transit, had touched our sacred soil since
1883 had gone out and not added themselves to the popula-
tion of the country P. If Mr. Windom felt that our Repub-
lican Institutions were endangered by the presence of this
“one exception ‘’-the dead man, he might have issued an
order, as legally as his other, to send such terrible excep-
48 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
tion back to China, and appointed Messrs. Morrow and
Mitchell a committee of two to see it done !
The Chinese Minister, strangely enough, did not seem to
appreciate the great modification that Mr. Windom had
made in his oppressive order, for he writes as follows to Mr.
Blaine: “The modification of the third paragraph of the
last named regulations, proposed by the Secretary of the
Treasury, does not in any manner remove the objection pre-
sented in my note of Nov. 5th last. Neither the Chinese
Government nor its representatives have any control or in-
ſluence over the transportation companies in this country,
and it is understood that these companies, centering at the
port of New York (through which the Chinese residents of
Cuba principally pass), are unwilling to give any bond for
this traffic. It thus leaves the individual Chinese subject
under the necessity of giving the bond of $200. As these
subjects are strangers in New York, their only practicable
way of complying with the requirement is to make a deposit
in that city of the sum named, and as the bond is not re-
leased until proof is produced that the subject has actually
departed from the port of San Francisco, it is readily seen
how great is the inconvenience even in case the subject
would be possessed of the ready cash. And in default of
this $200 the regulations amount to an absolute prohibition
and a plain violation of the treaty. I have no disposition to
prolong this discussion by repeating the arguments made in
my note of Nov. 5th last, but I respectfully suggest that
they remain unanswered by your note of the 6th inst.
“The action of the Congress of the United States in the
passage of the Act of Oct. 1, 1888, in the opinion of my Gov-
ernment manifested an open disregard of treaty obligations
on the part of the legislative department of the Govern-
ment of the United States. If anything should occur to
make it appear that a similar spirit influenced the conduct
of any of the Ea:ecutive Departments of that Government,
its effect would create upon my Government, I fear, a most
unfavorable impression. ICnowing the high sense of justice,
which marks your excellency’s conduct, I had hoped, and
still hope, that you might bring about a resolution of this
question in accordance with treaty stipulations.”
We have now arrived in our discriminating legislation to
December, 1889. Was there anything more that the ever alert
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 49
anti-Chinese party could do to distress the Chinese in this
country, as well as in transit * Yes. With a keen eye to their
opportunity, and under the direction of that secret power
as untiring as death, they saw through the coming census
enumeration a chance to drive out, deport or imprison the
Chinese who are in this country, under treaty regulation, that
as yet with utmost effort they have not been able to utterly vio-
late. Under the disguising title, of “An act to amend an act
to provide for taking the eleventh and subsequent censuses,”
the following act was rushed through the House on the 17th
of March last: “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States of America in Congress
assembled, that the 17th Section of an Act entitled ‘to pro-
vide for taking the 11th and subsequent censuses,’ be so
amended as to authorize and require the superintendent of
census to enumerate the Chinese population in such a manner
and with such particulars as to enable him to make a complete
and descriptive list of all Chinese persons of either sex who
may be found in the United States at the time of taking the
census.” The act goes on to order the superintendent of
census to provide for the giving of a certificate to each Chi-
nese, children not excepted—their parents to receive said
certificates, and if mimety days after the first day of June,
1890, any Chinese person be found in the United States
“without such certificates of identification,” he or she
“shall be deemed to be unlawfully in the United States and
may be arrested upon a warrant issued, upon a verified com-
plaint filed by any party on behalf of the United States, by any
justice or judge, or commissioner of any United States Court,
returnable before any justice, judge or commissioner of a
United States Court, or before any United States Court;
and when convicted upon a hearing and found and
adjudged to be one not lawfully entitled to be or remain
in the United States, such person shall be removed from
the United States to the country whence he came, or
be imprisoned in a penitentiary for a term not exceeding
five years.” Will the reader please note that these
Chinese, thus discriminated against in this infamous act,
are in this country by solemn treaty right, and that the
proposed certificate was to be the “sole evidence ’’ of their
right to be here, their treaty rights to the contrary notwith-
standing 2
50 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
This act includes laborers, merchants, travelers, yea,
children. A babe born ninety days after the first of June,
1890, would be liable under this beautiful act to “deporta-
tion or imprisonment for five years ”!!! No one is excepted
either that is in the country now or hereafter may enter—
for we do not take a census every day; I said no one was
excepted—ſ beg Messrs. Mitchell and Morrow’s and their
hoodlum constituency’s pardon—they did most graciously
except the “Chinese Diplomatic and Consular Officers and
their attendants;” these gentlemen “shall be admitted under
special instructions of the Treasury Department.” Mr.
Dawes, in the Senate, ventured to ask Mr. Mitchell “what
would be the use of Diplomatic and Consular Officers ?”—
as by this act all the Chinese here would soon be deported
or in our penitentiaries. Mr. Mitchell shamelessly replied,
‘‘I do not know that there is much use for them even as it
is now !” The House (Republican) exceeded all its prede-
cessors in passing this wicked act. When Mr. Mitchell was
asked by a member whether he was willing for like acts to
be applied to Americans in China, he promptly replied in
effect, “Yes, there are but a few missionaries and merchants
there and they are limited to few places.” All of which
was contrary to the facts. The churches of this country
having large and most important interests in the missiona-
ries, property and many thousands of native Christians in
China—all of whom are endangered by these discriminating
laws. Moreover, our trade with China is only second to
that of Great Britain. But while this act was pending be-
tween the two Houses, the Christian people of the country
rose in might and protested against any more such dis-
graceful legislation, warning their representatives in the
Senate that if they passed this act they would learn that
Christian sentiment could affect elections as well as the
hoodlum sentiment of the Pacific Coast. The Chambers of
Commerce of New York and Boston sent in their earnest
protest against thus endangering our valuable trade with
China, which they declared had already been lessened one-
third by the discriminating acts already enacted. For once
Congress paused in its knee-service to “the balance of
power.” The Senate proceeded to amend said Act. Their
first most destructive amendment was a penalty of $1,000
fine and two years’ imprisonment of any census taker who
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 51
failed to give said required certificate. This was maddening
enough to the ingenious hoodlum representatives, who, no
doubt, had their nice little plan to put in men after their
heart who could easily cheat the poor Chinese of their cer-
tificates, many of whom could not even know of this act;
but when under the pressure of Christian protests, the same
honorable body went on its amending way through this last
most remarkable act, and actually excepted all children
born after the taking of the census, and further, all persons
other than laborers (why, indeed ') who had met the usual
conditions, and finally with one fell swoop of moral victory
even over the “political exigencies' of the Pacific Coast
vote—no President having to be immediately elected—the
honorable Senate actually abolished the “deportation or
imprisonment’’ of men, women, children and babies of ninety
days, tourists, preachers and scholars, Messrs. Morrow and
Mitchell were in despair, they felt that the very bone, mar-
row, muscle and blood had been taken out of their protégé :
in fact, to them what was left was mere putrid matter, and
they hasted to suggest its speedy burial. It was done; but I
warn the friends of decency and humanity, to say nothing of
national honor and Christianity, that we need to be con-
stantly on the alert, for the enemy is not dead with this in-
famous Act.
I shall not have completed the record of our disgrace as
a nation until I record here a recent Act passed by the mu-
nicipal authorities of San Francisco which, through local
wrongs to many, so utterly violates the Treaty between
China and the United States, and withal is so utterly in-
human, that every American should know about it. I quote
again from the speech of the Hon. J. W. Foster before the
Census Committee of the United States Senate the 27th of
last March. He says: “I hold in my hand a copy of an
ordinance of the City of San Francisco, which became a law
on the 14th of the present month and published in the San
Francisco Eacaminer on the 15th, designating a particular
quarter in the suburbs of that city as the only permitted
residence of the Chinese population, and requiring them,
under penalty of imprisonment, within sixty days to re-
move from their present place of residence to the new quar-
ter. Notwithstanding Chinese merchants and other indus-
trious law abiding and peaceable residents have invested
52 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
millions of dollars in real estate and established permanent
business in their present locations, they are to be forcibly,
and by the strong arm of the law, driven from their homes.
The attorney, who acted as the city supervisor’s counsel and
drafted the ordinance, states, that doubtless the aid of the
Federal Court will be involved by the Chinese in defense of
their property and business interests; but he says: “In the
meanwhile there is no reason why the object in view should
not be accomplished if the chief of police and police and state
judges will carry out the law, without stopping to inquire
what the judiciary in Washington may think about it three
or four years from now.” A bill has been prepared and for-
warded to Congress which, if it passes, will settle for all
time the Chinese question. It provides for the modification
of the treaty so as to confer upon State governments the
right to empower municipal authorities to do what the State
constitutions say they can do.” That is to say, Congress
is to be asked to pass a bill to allow California to do what it
pleases with those who are within her borders, under the
most solemnly pledged national protection, and what she
wills to do is finely illustrated in the city ordinance, to force
the Chinese from their hard earned homes.
And now what has been the result of all this wicked work
on the part of our Government * For while we recognize
the power that has demanded it, our Government alone—
whether Democratic or Republican—has been and is respons-
ible for the legislative acts ; and they have led to certain
and unavoidable results. Let the parent of children or a
teacher in a School discriminate unjustly against any child,
and how soon persecution from the others follows! The
Chinese have a proverb–º Commit one sin and a hundred
will follow.” This has been shockingly illustrated in this
legislative wrong to the Chinese. Robbery, arson and mur-
der, with unlimited persecution, followed swiftly in the
train of these legislative acts. The hoodlum felt the support
of executive authority and has worked his wicked will against
a lielpless, inoffensive people. Their helplessness and weak-
mess in our midst ought to have appealed to the commonest
instincts of humanity—but on the contrary, whole volumes
might be written of the most awful brutality, perpetrated
against them, not only on the Pacific Coast, but in almost
every Lastern city. A peaceable, quiet, industrious Chinese,
|TUST THE CHINESE GO 2 53
living in a quiet residence street, near us in Boston, had his
windows broken twenty-two times in eighteen months, and
without redress; and the policeman of the street asserted
that he could do nothing. Three cases of brutality oc-
curred in a single week in the same city. A Chinese was
working one evening in his own hired house, when a man
threw a stone at him and cut his head in the most shocking
manner. He was in the hospital for some time in a most
critical condition. The same night a man's nose was broken
by a cruel blow from an intruder into his house. In the
third case six men went to a laundry where was one small
man. Four went in to do their wicked work, while the other
two remained outside ready to aid, if four cowards were not
able to manage one man. Two held the poor Chinese on
the hot stove, burning his neck most shamefully, while the
other two robbed his drawer of his hard earnings. Police
were called and refused to do anything. The same month
a boy stood at the entrance of a laundry where a Chinese
was quietly ironing. As the man passed by to change his
iron, the boy deliberately aimed a pistol at him, fired, and
just missed him, the bullet entering the counter. It was
taken out and carried to court, and this time the boy—who
had abused and persecuted the Chinese for a long time—was
arrested and compelled to appear in court. The act was
not denied, but the judge decided that the boy was too
Ayoung to either be punished or fined The boy was in his
teens. A month later a mob attacked the bouse of a Chinese
in the same city. He had a wife and a dear little girl of
three years, who often came to visit my little girl near her
age. Lillie was as bright, polite and interesting a child as
could be found anywhere. There was also a baby sister but
a few weeks old in the home. Imagine the terror of the
poor young mother and her babes, helpless in that great
Christian (?) city. Chinese friends tried to protect the
home, and one of them was wounded. When the police
tardily appeared, the only persons they arrested were the
wounded Chinese and one other trying to give aid to his
friends. Not one of the mob was arrested or ever has been.
The two Chinese who were quiet, peaceable men, and mem-
bers of one of our Chinese Sunday Schools, were held for
bail over the Sabbath. My husband was in court when the
case came up, and heard a policeman testify that he found
54 MUST THE CHINESE GO 2
the wounded Chinese on the ground, and a white man on
him ready to kill him. When asked by the lawyer for the
Chinese why he did not arrest the white man, he replied
“I had to arrest the Chinese to save his life l’’ I could
furnish details of outrages against the Chinese in Boston,
New York, Brooklyn, and other places, that would be be-
yond the belief of most people ; and as to San Francisco,
and such places as Tacoma, Denver, Seattle and Rock
Springs, not forgetting San Jose, Sacramento and no end
of places in California, the record of brutality and bitter
wrong in those places is so great, that hardly a lifetime and
many volumes would suffice to tell the tale. The record is
made by the great God himself, and the time is surely com-
ing when that same Mighty God, who fears not the “bal-
ance of power,” has no respect unto the hoodlum's vote,
stoops not to wicked public sentiment as have not a few of
the ministers of God’s holy word ;-I say the time is coming
when the righteous Judge will reckon for all their deeds.
And methinks the time is not far distant when He will reckon
with this Government for its deeds of blood ; for every drop
of blood shed in California, Tacoma, Denver, Rock Springs
and elsewhere can be charged back upon the Government,
which not only has not fulfilled its sacred pledge to protect
these helpless strangers in our midst, nor redress their
wrongs, but has on the contrary, by its legislative acts, en-
couraged and made possible such work. As I recall these
brutalities and the total lack of any protection awarded to
the Chinese by a Christian people, as a people, a contrast
great and humiliating, comes before me.
In 1864, on a night that I shall ever remember for its
weary hours of anxious waiting, a Chinese mob went
through the great city of Foochow, of six hundred thousand
inhabitants. Spurred on by evil stories against us, which
had their source in the immoral lives of foreign traders,
they had determined to make short work of us. They first
went to our newly dedicated church on East Street, and de-
stroyed it. Then they went to the home of the Rev. C. R.
Martin, of our mission, who lived on one of the highest hills
of the city. Next door to his house, with only the wall be-
tween, was a great Tauist temple with its many idols and
priests, poor ignorant heathen who had scarcely heard of
the name of Christ. Mr. Martin had been warned by one
MſTIST THE CHINESE GO 2 55
of our native Christians that the mob was coming to his
house. Without saying anything to his wife to alarm her,
but to be ready for any emergency, early in the evening Mr.
Martin went, and, with the consent of the priests, made an
opening in the wall between his house and the temple, large
enough for them to pass through into the temple. The two
little children slept quietly, all unconscious of danger; and
not until the mob was almost at their gate did Mr. Martin
say, “Now, Mary, we must go.” And as they passed into
the temple, assisted in this hour of their need by the priests
of heathen gods, the mob entered the room we had occupied
the previous night, as we had been spending the Sabbath
with these friends. All during that anxious night, Mr. Mar-
tin, at intervals, as he was able, sent messengers over the
wall to us outside the city, with information as to the riot.
At last, at four o’clock in the morning, there came to us a
scrap of paper torn from an envelope, and on it these words:
“The mob is now in our house destroying every thing; but,
thank God, we are safe in the temple, and the priests are
very kind to us.” The morning came, and help was sent
our friends; and, ere long, the native authorities arrested
offenders. Every cent of loss to natives and foreigners was
paid, and our destroyed church rebuilt. Now for the con-
trast. During the winter of 1881–82, according to the news-
paper statements and telegrams, in the City of Denver (a
Christian city), a mob of evil white men attacked the Chi-
nese of that city. They were as helpless as they had been
inoffensive ; and, ere any protection was given them, the
death-blow had fallen upon one of these strangers in our
land. *.
In September, 1885, a brutal mob ordered the Chinese to
leave Rock Springs, Wyoming Territory, within an hour.
Defenceless, they prepared to obey ; but their tormentors,
not waiting for their own limit of time, “growing impa-
tient,” attacked them, set fire to their houses, and shot
them as they fled,—killing at least fifty, and driving the rest
into the mountains to die of starvation and exposure.
Later, came the Washington Territory outrage. And
now I ask, in the name of the commonest decency and hu-
manity, where were the Christians, the priests of our God,
the temples of Jehovah, in these localities? At this time of
the extreme need of these hunted strangers in Denver, in
56 MUST THE CHINESE GO 2
Rock Springs, in Tacoma, where, oh, where were the Chris-
tian homes? Why were not such homes opened to receive
these fleeing, wounded, dying, innocent people, with this hu-
mane assurance, “You shall be safe as long as we are P’’
Were the decent American people afraid to shelter the
wronged 2 The priests of Tau were not in a city of six hun-
dred thousand people.
When the final shots reached their mark, and those piti-
ful helpless ones fell in the last struggle, at the time of their
extreme need, away from their native land, the parents they
so much venerate, wife and children, as life went out and
the shadows of death settled down upon them, even then did
any door open to them for a last shelter? Were they wel-
comed into any temple of our God P Did any priest of the
blessed Christ draw near to these dying ones, for whom he
gave his life, and tell them of the home beyond, of the
Saviour our only hope 2 The record does not read so. In
Denver, the “dying man was carried to the city jail to
die;” his murderers went to no jail, so far as known. In
Rock Springs and the neighboring mountains, God’s very
own lay dead and dying, in the cold and fire, uncared for.
In Washington Territory, two who died of exposure that
dreadful stormy night, on the prairie, were put upon the
cars with the living. And Chinese fathers and mothers,
wives and children, are liſting their desolate hearts in an
exceeding bitter cry of woe for these loved ones foully mur-
dered in this land; and the great God hears, records, and
bides his time. O God, some of us grow impatient, and long
for the end
The San Francisco “Argonaut. ” sums up the anti-Chinese
movement upon the Pacific Coast in these vigorous words:—
“The refuse and sweepings of Europe, the ignorant,
brutal, idle offscouring of civilization, meet weekly upon the
sand-lots in San Francisco, to determine whether respect-
able, industrious, foreign-born citizens and native-born
Americans shall be permitted to treat Chinese humanely,
and employ them in business vocations, or unite with the
idle and worthless foreign gang in driving them into the
sea.”
Deeds of sin, sooner or later bring governments, as well
as persons, into most difficult places. This principle has
been fully illustrated over and over again by our Govern-
Jſ UST THE CHINESE GO 9 57.
ment in its wicked attitude toward China. During the lat-
ter part of President Cleveland's administration, an honor-
able Chinese merchant who had lived in San Francisco
twenty years, and whose two sons were born there and
therefore were natives of the United States, was taken very
ill in that city, and it was soon evident that he must die.
His wife and sons were at his branch store in Victoria, Brit-
ish Columbia. They were telegraphed to come quickly to
the dying husband and father. They hastened to do so, but
when they arrived at San Francisco were refused permis-
sion to land. The Secretary of the Treasury at Washing-
ton was communicated with, and a Cabinet meeting, I am
told, was actually called, and labored over the solution of
this case for some time. Finally they concluded to call it “a
case of humanity,” and a message was telegraphed to the
customs officials in San Francisco to allow the wife and sons
to land, and under official guard to go to the husband and
father, and remain until his death, when the guard should
see them back to the steamer | | Under the present Admin-
istration and not long since, a steamer on its way from South
America, found some ship-wrecked people, among them one
Chinese, on a raft at sea. The commander took them aboard
and brought them into New York, and all landed promptly
save the Chinese, who was refused permission to do so. But
what could be done with this human being, whose Sole Sin
was that of being born in China 2 There was no ship in
port to take him to China; he could not remain on the ship ;
and the law, as interpreted, would not allow him to land.
Again resort was had to the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr.
Windom, and that gentleman’s resources seemed to fail him
in this puzzling case. But finally, as there was absolutely
no alternative but to allow him to land and remain here
until a ship should arrive that could take him away, or to
kill him, and as our Government was not yet quite ready to
resort to that method of Chinese prohibition—he was allowed,
as another “case of humanity,” to land, and wait for a
ship ! Very recently, within a month, two very honorable
Chinese merchants of Hong Kong, connected with a great
Chinese mercantile house, known in the money centres of
the world before we were a nation, came to San Francisco
to see their customers. As there is no Chinese Consul at
Hong Kong, they could not bring a certificate. They were
58 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
promptly refused permission to land in San Francisco, and
although they offered to put themselves under a $20,000 bond
to leave the country within three or four months, they were
not allowed to stay, and had to return to Hong Kong !!
The poor Chinese on Niagara Bridge, last week, without
food or shelter, refused permission either to return to Canada
or to land in the United States, was a spectacle so inhuman
that it did seem as if no lower depth of degradation could
be left to us, and yet—although these wicked laws are thus
strained even to their utmost to distress, torture and drive
out this poor people—Messrs. Morrow, Mitchell and others
annually appear before Congress to urge other laws still more
wicked, ever repeating the old story that the Chinese
are still coming by thousands, more and more, in spite of
law. The Hon. Mr. Foster gave the statistics of arrivals
and departures in his recent speech before the Senate Census
Committee, showing that from Aug. 2, 1882, when the first
act went into effect, up to Oct. 1, 1888, when the Scott Re-
striction Act was passed, a period of six years, there had
been arrivals 51,261 and 68,974 departures—an excess of de-
partures over arrivals of 17,713. He says: “I have further
an original certificate, signed by the Collector of Customs
at San Francisco, dated the 12th instant (March, 1890),
showing that the number of Chinese laborer certificates,
outstanding on the 1st Oct., 1888, was 20,443. By the terms
of the law passed on that date, these certificates were de-
clared null and void, and the holders thereof were prohibited
from entering the United States. I also have a table giving
a list of all the steamers which arrived and departed from
San Francisco, from and to China, with the dates of arrivals
and departures, and the number of Chinese carried in the
same, from Oct. 1, 1888, when the Scott Exclusion Act was
passed, up to the 14th day of the present month (March,
1890). This table shows that in the year aud a half during
which this last restriction measure has been in force, the
excess of departures at the port over the arrivals, has been
9,195.”
These facts are well known to the advocates of further
legislation, but they also know that the public generally are
not aware of them. When faced with the fact of this de-
crease at the main port of entrance, San Francisco, they
plead that the Chinese are coming in over the Canadian and
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 59
Mexican borders. As there are in all only about five hun-
dred Chinese in Mexico, chiefly merchants, about half of
whom went from the United States, and who merely pass
through the United States, we are not in imminent peril from
them. As to the Canadian border, what between the vigi-
lance of the enemies of the Chinese in the United States and
the Canadian authorities, who are profiting by the wicked
example of our Government, few, indeed, enter that way.
China ceased to make use of her great “Chinese wall” some
time ago—having advanced so far as to open her country to
foreigners without discrimination. I would suggest to
our government, in its strait over the three thousand miles
of boundary that need to be guarded lest any stray Chinese
enter, that a committee be appointed, and again I think
Messrs. Morrow and Mitchell (and Dennis Kearney might
be added) would be suitable representatives on said com-
mittee, to go to China to negotiate for the purchase of said
wall to set up along our boundary for our protection against
this decreasing Chinese flood
A dear friend of ours, a Christian Chinese lady of official
connections, a lady of great refinement, at whose beautiful
English and Chinese house in China. I have seen nearly the
entire foreign missionary, mercantile and official communi-
ties with representatives of our own government entertained
in royal manner, is just now visiting with a mission-
ary friend in Ireland, the home of her people's bitterest
enemies. She desires to return to China next autumn via the
United States, to visit her friends here, and to see the people
who sent her the Gospel of Christ. My husband has found
it necessary to write to Secretary Windom to learn how we
can possibly secure the entrance of this Christian lady into
the country. Is it not time, I ask, for Christian people to
move quickly and unflinchingly for the repeal of all of these
discriminating laws that make such outrages to the Chinese
and humiliation to ourselves possible *
I here quote the words of the Hon. Mr. Foster’s able ar-
gument before the Senate Committee :
“To-day we can trample upon her [China's] treaties with
impunity, and deny her people, within our borders, the rights
conceded to the meanest subjects of the most petty monarchy
of Europe or republic of America without fear of conse-
quences. But, as I have said, China is beginning to feel the
60 MUST THE CHINESE G O 9
effect of intercourse with Christian nations; she is training
her untold millions in warfare and has begun her naval
armament. In 1887, our minister at Peking sent to the
State Department what he deemed was an important docu-
ment, an article written by Marquis Tseng, one of the lead-
ing statesmen of that country, entitled ‘China : the Sleep and
the Awakening,” in which he discussed the relations of China
to the Christian nations, and pointed out the provisions in
the treaties which wounded her susceptibilities, and which
she would ‘surely and leisurely proceed to have modified.
And the marquis concludes his article with this notable sen-
tence : ‘The world is not so near its end, nor the circles of
the sun so nearly done, that she will not have time to play
the rôle assigned her in the work of nations.’”
It is easy to add that there is absolutely no wise political
economy in the anti-Chinese laws. The greatest and most
promising future market for American products is in China.
The trade of that rich country is yet to be developed. Al-
ready American cottons, flour, kerosene - oil, and other
products find an open market there; and the future of that
market, no one can measure.
The Chinese were partial to Americans, because we did
not force the opium curse upon them. We might have had
a large share in the development of their mines, railroads,
etc., which is sure to come. But as we are now doing, we
are not only blocking the way of the missionary in China,
but also manufacturing a sentiment against us. In this too
shall we reap as we have sown.
The Rev. Louis A. Banks in an able article from Seattle,
Washington, hesitated not to declare the truth concerning
the horrible outrages there. Writing as he did, from the
scene of conflict, his words are weighty. I quote from his
article :-
“A few months since, when the news came of the Wyo-
ming massacre of Chinese miners, there had been as yet
scarcely a ruffle on the quiet waters of Puget Sound, con-
cerning the now vexed Chinese question. Almost simulta-
neous with that, perhaps a few days later, there appeared
on the scene an Irish agitator from California, who pro-
ceeded to harangwe the laboring people, and to organize
them into lodges of the ‘Knights of Labor.” It has been
the old story over again, of the man who was given a small
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 61
box in which was confined an evil spirit : in answer to its
pleadings, he partially opened the box, and out of it sprang
a giant which seemed to fill the earth. We had turned
loose on us one wild Irishman, and out of his communistic
heart has sprung a phantom whose shadow has darkened
the whole Northwest coast, and whose tread has made our
young city shake with terror. Ere thirty days passed, four
Chinese laborers had been cowardly murdered in their beds,
and a camp-outfit worth some thousands of dollars burned
at midnight, the inmates being driven half-naked into the
woods. Within ninety days, these so-called Knights arose
en Tmasse at Tacoma, and drove two hundred Chinese resi-
dents from their homes, through the drenching rain, to a
railway-station nine miles distant ; they herded them on the
open prairie, the storm beating all night long on the unpro-
tected crowd, and next morning drove them all into the cars
of an outgoing train, except two poor wretches that had to
be carried, having died from exposure during that awful
night. Seattle only escaped the same or it may be a worse
fate by the coming of the United States troops, who arrived
in the very nick of time.” r
(One can’t help wondering, where were these troops dur-
ing the thirty days and ninety days preceding this monstrous
work?)
“The mayor of Tacoma, who has brought himself into so
notorious disgrace, is a German liquor-dealer, who can only
make the blindest stagger toward speaking the English
language. His family is yet in Germany, and all his money
not spent for beer or anti-Chinese demonstrations goes back
to the Fatherland. In addition to this, it is an interesting
fact, that the seventeen persons, including one woman, in-
dicted at Seattle for conspiracy against the Chinese, are,
without eacception, members of the Liberal League, and en-
thusiastic followers of Ingersoll.
“There are, of course, some exceptions to this rule, some
very sad ones. Notable among these is a Mr. Nixon who was
president of the Young Men's Christian Association of Ta-
coma, and a member of the Presbyterian Church. Mr.
Nixon's sister and brother-in-law have been for many years
missionaries in China, and have just returned to carry on
Chinese mission-work on Puget Sound. Imagine their
chagrin and deep humiliation upon finding their brother, and
62 IHUST THE CHINESE GO 9
Young Men’s Christian Association president, resting under
five well-earned indictments for unlawfully abusing and
driving from their homes the very people to whom they had
come to preach the gospel.
“Now then, let us study a moment the excuses given for
this agitation. . . . We are being overwhelmed by a
great multitude of Chinese laborers, in opposition to and de-
fiance of the restriction law. But the census statistics do not
bear out this statement. There are only thirty-three
more Chimamen to-day, when our population is one hundred
and thirty thousand, than there were five years ago, when
we had only seventy thousand people. If twenty-five white
people were able to get along peaceably and prosperously in
competition with one Chinaman five years ago, there is no
reason to believe forty-five white citizens are in danger of
being overwhelmed by the same Celestial at the present
time. . . . The one great bar to the general advance-
ment and prosperity of the Pacific-coast section is that labor
is so high that it practically prohibits home manufacture.
The butter on our table was made in an Iowa creamery.
The lard used to shorten our pie-crust was canned in Chi-
cago. The cheese we eat was pressed in New York. Our
shoes, made from hides which originally grew on Puget
Sound cattle, have twice crossed the continent before they
are ready for our use. The wool sheared from our sheep
this season will be shipped back next year in ready-made
clothing, with two freight rates added. And other things
innumerable might be mentioned. The greatest need we
have is the importation of cheap labor, backed by capital to
sustain manufactories. . . . The Chinaman has one
peculiarity; he lives according to his income. If he makes
but fifty cents a day, he lives on vegetable-soup and boiled
rice, and keeps out of debt, and steers clear of the gout. If
he gets a dollar a day, he has beef, pork, potatoes, fish, and
wheat-bread. And if you raise his wages to a dollar and a
half or two dollars, he will eat more chickens, turkeys,
geese, and fruit, out of his wages, than any other class of
foreigners the writer has yet seen in America.” *.
My own personal experience since I returned to this land
has not been of the most enjoyable, up-lifting kind. The
“spirit moves me '’ to give it to my readers. I have noth-
ing to be thankful for in this experience, save that it is not
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 63
worse, as it surely would have been had I lived on the Pa-
cific Coast. For many years we lived in China. At last
failing health brought me and mine back to this favored
Christian land, the traditional home of the “free and brave.”
We brought with us a Chinese servant. He was a Christian,
gentle, kind, and most courteous to all. On our way home
we travelled through many lands, heathen, papal, and Chris-
tian. This Chinese servant received not an unkind word or
insult in any of those lands. We at last arrived in the
United States. We settled for the winter in the parsonage
of a church in a city proud of its churches and Christian in-
stitutions. Three days after, I sent my Chinaman out with
my little boy in his carriage. In an hour they returned
with such an unsightly, dirty, hooting rabble after them,
that I was shocked, and hastened to bring baby and nurse
in. I then kindly told them that I did not want them to
follow my baby and his nurse in that style, and requested
them to leave.
In return I received only insult and the grossest imperti-
nence. I then told them if it occurred again I would cer-
tainly call the police. That ended their coming to our door,
for they evidently understood that I would do as I said; but
during our stay of some months in that city, I had no com-
fort in taking my nurse or baby down town for any purpose,
and rarely did I do it save from necessity. On one such
occasion I stood in the main street waiting for a car. We
were directly opposite an elegant church, with steeple point-
ing heavenward. The pastor, no doubt, gave his audience
sound doctrine as to the brotherhood of man, Christ's love
and sacrifice for all, and the duty to love our neighbor as
ourselves. Our Chinaman stood admiring the church, now
and then making a remark to me. Just then a man passed
us. He was dirty and ragged, and puffing a filthy pipe. He
evidently had been drinking too much of his native lager or
something stronger. As he passed he gave a look of hatred
at the quiet, clean, gentlemanly Chinaman standing there
holding my baby. The man passed on, crossed the street,
then stopped, reconsidered, turned round, and came back to
where we stood, and deliberately circled us round and round,
with eyes bent full of hate upon the Chinaman, who seemed
utterly unconscious of the evil spirit he excited. Over and
over again our inspector puffed his vile tobacco in my face.
64 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
Of course no police was at hand, and we were only relieved
of his presence by the coming of our car.
The last time we went into the street was no better than the
first. I went to buy shoes for my baby, and had to take Ka
Kü with us. We were again on the main street, and as usual,
had a train of ragamuſlins at our heels. I took refuge as soon
as possible in a large shoe-store, while our escort stationed
themselves at the entrance. The proprietor asked me to al-
low the Chinaman to go into the back part of the store where
he would not be seem, and then advised one of his clerks to
throw water on the rabble at his door. As we emerged
from the store, they were ready to receive us. Sick of such
company, and with a longing for the freedom of China,
where I and mine could go abroad unmolested, quite con-
trary to my intention or wish, I put Ka Kü and baby in a
car and sent them home. Such was my freedom in that
city.
Thence we went to Brooklyn, where we proposed to
stay some months if the lords of the land would permit.
We were in a very respectable, attractive part of the city,
near a beautiful park in which I took delight as just the
place for my children, since we must be in the city for the
summer. What was my experience there? Ditto that in
the previous city, only worse. Day after day the rabble
followed my Chinaman and little boy. I could not tolerate
such associates for them, even if peacefully inclined. But
when they followed with vile language, mud and stones,
filling our and, the neighbors’ steps, hanging on the fence
and refusing to go, the matter became serious. One Sab-
bath, Ka ICú and baby came in with hands filled with stones
which had been thrown at them, any one of which was
large enough to have killed my little boy if it had struck
him. For the first time, our patient Chinaman showed
signs of annoyance, and then more for the sake of his little
charge he so tenderly loved, than for himself; and he asked,
“Teacheress, shall I go after them when they do so?” And
I, with an effort, answered, “No, remember the Christ
doctrine, ‘Love your enemies, bless them that curse you;’”
to which he assented, and again took up his life of forbear-
ance, and during the four years he remained with us, the
patient, loving, Christlike spirit never failed him. My heart
has grown hot with indignation many, many times, as I re-
MUST THE CHINESE GO 9 65
member these wrongs done, and that these are only little
things compared with the crimes in the West.
During the stay of our Chinese servant with us, we were
accustomed to have our family worship in the Chinese lan-
guage every other morning, and Ka Kü took his turn in
praying. Shall I ever forget his humble, wonderful prayers,
his humble confessions of sin, his praise to God for the beau-
ties of his world and the wonders of his grace; touching, be-
seeching prayers for the gift of the knowledge of Christ to
his own people in his native land; and finally and always,
his tender, wise, and fitting prayers for me and mine, for
the little and older children, and for the teacher and teach-
eress? I remember one morning he used this expression,
wholly his own : “Heavenly Father, help us to hide to-day
under thy wings, as the little chickens hide under their
mother’s wing.” And yet the Hon. (?) Frank M. Pixley,
lawyer of the anti-Chinese party and their representative
to Congress against the Chinese, says, “They have no souls,
or none worth saving.” My little boy early learned his part
of the hard lesson taught by wrong, and daily said to his
faithful attendant in Chinese, “Don’t go to the park, don’t
go to the park | They will throw stones at us.” Now, my
Christian friends, and especially my voting readers, what
think you of this experience of mine in this Christian land P
I purposely emphasize the Christian. I have a perfect right
to expect, yea, to demand, at least as much comfort and
safety here as in heathen China and India or papal Europe.
Yea, I have a right to more, just because this is a Christian
land, the land of the “free and brave,” over which the
“star-spangled banner’’ waves; which same banner we
shake vigorously in the faces of any Chinese officials who
fail quickly to redress any wronged American in their coun-
try. “To give me to see '' (as the Chinese say), I was in a
sad plight, compelled by illness to remain in a boarding-
house in a big city during the summer, with an energetic,
ever-active little boy, to whom our narrow quarters were
unendurable for much of the time. All about us were beau-
tiful, shaded streets. Two doors below us was a large, lovely,
shaded park, with its extensive pavilion, and great play-
ground for children. It is the site of a battle that was sup-
posed to help make us a free people; and yet, so free an Amer-
ican was I, that it was only with much anxiety and care that
66 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
I could allow Ka Kü and my little boy to go into those aris-
tocratic streets and shaded park. Is this the freedom and
Christianity for which our forefathers bled ? But, answers
one, “It is only rude foreigners that do these things.” Hold
on, my friend My experience is lengthy, but not ended.
If this statement were true, do we propose to allow foreign-
ers to rule and insult the natives of this or any other coun-
try while under our national protection ? But back of all
these evil deeds is a sentiment that makes these deeds pos-
sible. I have found it with little American girls six years
old, with boys, with intelligent men. One lady told me that
her son, a lad of twelve, was indigmant at us for bringing a
Chinaman here, and could not be reconciled to us. This
child-prejudice bodes no good for them nor us.
Finally, I appeal to the press, the Christian people, the
pulpits of this land,--to the press, Christian and secular,
weekly and daily. What are you doing 2 Where are your
ringing editorials, your fearless denunciations of wrong
and oppression ? O ye mighty engines for good or evil, on
which side do ye stand 2 Few indeed could tell from the
weak, halting, uncertain expressions of many so-called
“best papers;” while many, many, stand openly for con-
tinued wrong, and others keep a salve-lardum silence Oh
for a little moral courage I appeal to the Christian men
of the country, to the Methodists, Presbyterians, Congrega-
tionists, Baptists, and all the other tribes of Israel. I know
that Christianity is not a failure. I draw no conclusions
against Christianity; but I do say, give me an honest
heathenism before a shamming, heartless Christianity.
Christianity is not a failure here; it is not in China. It can
make men true, honorable, morally courageous, and just
and kind to all men. Wherever these fruits are wanting,
it is not the fault of Christianity, but the lack of the
true work. No Christian man has a right to plead igno-
rance, for ignorance that can be enlightened can never ex-
cuse a wrong to our fellow-men. Have you, Christian voter,
informed yourself on the Chinese question, or have you ac-
cepted the dictum of your political party 2 Have you no
responsibility for the hideous wrongs done by men you have
helped put in office? This is “a government for the peo-
ple, of the people, and by the people.” If so, why do not
the Christian men hold the “balance of power” between
MUST THE CHINESE GO / 67
the two great political parties 2 Why, oh, why? save that
Christian men obey party rather than God. Oh, the fearful
responsibility of the Christian voterſ
I appeal to the pulpits. O ye watchmen on the walls, it is
time to cry aloud, and spare not ' This is not the land of
our fathers, in some respects other than progress. I send
my son to this country, and do not see him for six years.
Annually his photograph is sent me, but when I meet him
face to face I would not know him. And yet those who have
been with him these years have hardly noted the changes.
Just so is it with our country. Those living in it, and grow-
ing, and, alas ! changing with it, are not conscious of the
great transformation. But I am away for years. The
newspapers, like the photograph of my boy, from time to
time faintly hint to me of changes; but I come home each
time to find them greater than I could have imagined. Some
of the changes are real advances, genuine progress, bring-
ing added strength to us as a nation ; but, alas ! many are
the reverse. I find that less, far less money is expended by
all the benevolent institutions in the land, than in the rum-
traffic alone. I find streets once quiet and respectable on
Sunday, now the scene of trade and open saloons; and yet
I am assured that this is a violation of our laws. Where
are the officials, then, whose duty it is to enforce said laws,
and where the public sentiment to compel these officials to do
their duty ? Ministers, in Monday meetings, are comparing
-notes as to why the masses do not attend church; when
they have only to look into the empty places in their church
pews, and go into the homes of their parishes, and find
children, whose parents as children were regularly taken to
God’s house, lounging at home, reading doubtful books and
papers all the Sabbath day, a Sunday-school service being
all they are equal to after a week at School. Such a gener-
ation has come upon the scene, and largely makes up the
masses of those who do not attend church.
Numbers are good, and it is said that “figures do not
lie.” If, while our church-records are rolling up figures,
we are losing in morality, in soberness, in keeping the Sab-
bath, in justice and righteousness in our government, in
purity and unselfishness in our churches; if robbery and
murder are abroad in the land unrebuked and unpunished,
if sin has grown defiant, yea, domineering, and proceeds to
68 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
rule:—ye watchmen in the pulpits of this land, is it not
high time to dispense with polished essays: Let Darwin
rest, and even ignore Ingersoll, and call your very own
people back to justice and righteousness all through this
land
When members of our churches talk temperance, and vote
rum ; when they talk justice, and vote oppression ; when
they talk for the enforcement of the law, and silently see
its violation,--it certainly is clearly duty for pastors affec-
tionately but earnestly to find the moral courage to speak
out the truth. Such men declaim against political ser-
mons; but, if the Christian voters of this land recognized
the momentous responsibility of holding the ballot, such
sermons would not be needed. But when principle goes
down before party even in the church, then it surely becomes
duty for the shepherds of the flock to call back the wander-
ing sheep to the fold of safety. Moral courage with the lov-
ing spirit of Christ must win all but the determined sinner.
For our own safety as a nation, we need to be on the alert,
and relax not the strict holding to the principles of justice
and righteousness upon which this nation was founded. As
things are, even a woman meeds only common-sense and
foresight to dread the future. It may seem a thing so small
as to be unworthy the serious consideration of our voters,
that Chinamen are insulted in our streets, the laundrymen’s
windows broken ; Yung Ley Teep, on his way to a mission
Sabbath school, killed on the street in New York City; years
of persecution, oppression, robbery, and murder in Califor-
nia and on the Pacific Coast, and fearful massacres, crime
added to crime, and each growing greater, and adding a
blacker page to our nation’s history. But in the mean
while these are educators downward, and “strikes '' and
“dynamite ” and communism are of near relation to what
we have already had and permitted. The mass of the voters
on the Pacific Coast looked serenely on Kearneyism as long
as only the stranger from China suffered ; but presently it
began to be labor against capital, and this looked wonder-
fully like communism; and then “Committees of Safety ''
felt it necessary to take a stand for capital if not for men.
The same element that persecutes and murders the Chinese
is just the very element to make this nation wail in revolu-
tion and blood. National crime receives national penalty,
MUST THE CHINESE G O P 69
and justly. God waited long for us to right the oppressed
of this land ; but the end of waiting came, and we had our
baptism of blood from north to south, from east to west.
And can it be possible that the very same generation can
forget so soon * The same righteous Judge is on the throne,
and again he will reckon with us. May he who cares for
the four hundred million souls which he made in China, not
deal out to our sixty millions all the judgments we deserve
for failing so terribly in duty, and in recognition of the ex-
ceeding great blessings we have received from his hand, and
our corresponding duty toward others less favored
England has placed an awful obstacle in the way of mis-
sion work in China, in forcing the opium-trade on the Chi-
nese Government, and holding it there to the ruin of millions
in spite of the wail of agony that goes up from almost every
home of that land. France has robbed and wronged China
for her own selfish ends. And now our own United States
takes her stand with these oppressing nations to block our
work for God and humanity in China. We who go to that
land, not for dollars, but for souls, stand amazed and heart-
sick before such obstacles placed in the way of Christianizing
the greatest and in many respects the most promising
heathen nation in the world. Surely the blotting out three-
Quarters of the distance separating China and Japan from
the United States, by the Pacific Mail steamer line, has a
more important significance than simply to expedite the
transit of tea and silks to our country, the filling our mer-
chant’s pockets, and the increase of our national com-
merce. The political economist may see nothing more, but
the Christian economist must see a far more important re-
sult in the placing of the greatest heathen nation of the world
beside the greatest Christian nation. Some of us who have
gone the old, long, weary way of months on the ocean around
the Cape to China, and later over the new way, have appre-
ciated and taken in to some extent the wonderful meaning of
the prophet when he uttered these words under inspiration :
“And I will make all my mountains a way, and my high-
ways shall be exalted. Behold, these shall come from far,
and lo, these from the north, and from the west; and these
from the land of Sinim.” As if he looked down all the ages
into this nineteenth century of light and privileges, and saw
that there would indeed be this great highway between the
70 MUST THE CHINESE GO 9
West and the East, and all nations would traverse it, and
only this one nation be oppressed and down-trodden, and the
God of the oppressed named that mation alone by mame.
Governments at the bidding of selfishness may make their
oppressive and unrighteous laws; but God still reigns, and
his will is sure to be wrought out sooner or later, and his
decisions are final. May he not forsake us, but yet save us
from the ruin into which wrong and injustice would plunge
us! We have mighty evils to face here, and they are grow-
ing. We must conquer them, not by numbers, but by
power. And when the Christian sentiment of the nation
rises in its strength, and says it shall be done, the God of
our fathers will give swift victory.
ESTHER E. BALL)WIN.
1218 PACIFIC STREET, BrookLYN, N. Y.
Tº. *ſ*…*¿¿.*
· * * *ș*
..3 §§§§
±
ſae
✉,
！！！！！！！！


THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
DATE DUE
ºrºtºx ºr "zºº. ." ....: ,--, mes.<------>
*a*a*-a-z-axes...+xº~~~~~~~~
tºwºrary tarºvºsºkº-º-ºrº ºn
MAR 1 0 1966
*>====
tº,
*===___ *
******--
MAR 10 1966
- **--ar.
~ & - C. * : 1343. --
amºº. . . * * * * * * *w-wa-'ºs--"-- *****
AUG 1 9 1983
* *** ***** - --- ~~w rººr” - ºr *-* * ~ * --- --or - …re --- * > *. -------



º
§§
|%
§§
3.