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THE UNIVERSITY COURIER.
CONTRIBUTIONS.
CHINESE IMMIGRATION.
The subject of Chinese immigration is a question of great importance to the American people, and like all questions of great importance, has two sides. I believe that at present there is no difference of opinion as to the effect of the wholesale importation of Chinese, upon society. All, I believe, admit, as they are compelled to by stubborn facts, that the Chinese are neither good citizens, nor are liable ever to become such, but, on the contrary, are the most immoral class of people represented in this country. The question, then, has resolved itself into this: "Has the Government the right to prohibit Chinese immigration?" But, before touching upon this phase of the question, we propose to show, upon good authority, that society is injured by having a large number of Chinese in its midst. In the first place, the poor day laborer living in a community flooded with Chinese, is made to feel, most painfully, that the Chinese element contributes to the misery of himself and his family. It is well known that the social habits of the Chinese are such that they can not only live but make money, on wages so meagre that an American laborer receiving the same wages would starve, to say nothing of his family. The result is that the Chinese are willing to work for less wages than the American laborer. Now capitalists are not, as a general thing, philanthropists, hence, regard less of the result, American laborers are discharged by the wholesale, and their places filled with those who can live and grow fat on a few cents worth of rice per day. Now this is not an overdrawn picture. It is an actual fact. In several large manufacturing establishments in Massachusetts, none but Chinese laborers are employed, for the obvious reason that Chinese labor is much cheaper than American labor. In an article which appeared in the New York Tribune several years ago, it was stated that hundreds of American laborers were thrown out of employment and reduced from independent laborers to dependent objects of charity, simply because they were unable to work for the same wages as the Chinese. It is an impossibility for an American and his family to live as cheaply as a "heathen Chinee," and the result is, as the facts testify, that the Chinese element in a community converts good, industrious American citizens into so many paupers. What, then, has a community to show as the result of the introduction of Chinese into their midst? Nothing but paupers, and heathens who can never be converted into good citizens. Thus it is manifest that Chinese immigration is detrimental to the interests of American laborers.
I started out by saying that the Chinese are, as a class, the most immoral people in the country, and am prepared to make good this assertion by testimony taken before a committee of the Senate of the State of California in the summer of 76. A captain of a British vessel, who had been engaged for several years in the Chinese traffic, testified that the standard of morality is so much lower among the Chinese than among the English, that the English government would not permit the Chinese to immigrate to their country, and he hoped never to see such a thing take place; that they measure morals by interest; that it is all nonsense to talk of converting a Chinese, of making a good law-abiding citizen of him; that they will do anything for money—will believe anything you ask, so long as the money lasts, but take away that incentive, and they immediately relapse into their natural state — heathenism and idolatry.
A San Francisco policeman testified that the presence of the Chinese in the State, is demoralizing; that they have a secret tribunal that inflicts the most barbarous cruelties upon those of their number who dare to renounce the Chinese customs; that he never saw a Chinaman whom he would believe under oath. A lawyer of San Francisco testified that they are unreliable witnesses; that they will sometimes swear so as to convict at preliminary examinations, but on trial they turn square around, and swear the other way; that there was no doubt in his mind, that several innocent men, within the brief space of three months, had been sentenced to long terms of imprisonment, through the medium of perjury on the part of the Chinese; that as a class they are naturally vicious, untruthful and dishonest, and that he was fearful of the result of their presence in our country; that while their presence here has no tendency whatever to elevate their own morals, it has a most decided tendency to degrade the morals of the American people.
To the report of the committee referred to, we are indebted for the following additional facts furnished by the most experienced and reliable witnesses.
During their residence in the State of California, the Chinese, amounting to 110,000 in number, have earned $180,000. 000, only a small per cent. of which has been spent in this country. Thus the Chinese have taken out of this country nearly $180,000,000, and what have they left to the country in return for this enormous sum of money? Nothing whatever. I ask, would it not have been infinitely more beneficial to the country if employment had been given to 110,000 Americans and their families, earning and spending from 60 to 70 millions of dollars per annum? One can easily imagine the state of prosperity which would arise from such a change.
Whenever a country contains a class of people who cannot be forced to obey her laws; who, while accumulating large sums of money, do not pay a sufficient amount of tax to defray the expense of imprisoning the criminals among their number; who make the country so much the poorer for their presence, by hoarding up and carrying away to their native country all their earnings; who will not be civilized; who are a class of liars, thieves, perjurers and libertines, ruining thousands of the country's youth, it seems to me that nothing more is necessary to convince any civilized being, not void of