Chinese Immigration and Labor in the 19th century America

Takaki Chapter 3Forced to become “strangers” by economic interests and white society

Professor Estella Habal

Chinese Immigration and Labor in the 19th century

Pull - Demands of capitalists for a colonized labor forcePush – English imperialismWhite worker - economic competition resulting in ethnic antagonismRacial ideology of America - homogenous white society Pattern of discriminatory treatment set as racialized group, unassimilability, “aliens ineligible for citizenship”

Chinese Labor in Gold

First major wave Asians to come to America, 1849

Called themselves “Gam Saan Haak” travelers to Gold Mountain

Independent gold prospectors, placer mining, low tech

20,026 in 1852

2/3 Chinese in California mines

Chinese Labor in Gold

Chinese Labor in railroads

1865 Central Pacific Railroad, 1869 completed employed

15,000 Chinese; 90% of entire workforce

Cheaper labor than white workers

Hard labor, clear trees, handle explosives for boring tunnels, lay track

Struck for higher wages, e.g. 8hr/day

Lost strike; Starved into submission

Chinese Labor in railroads

Chinese Labor in cities

1860s-1870s moved to cities like San Francisco, refuge, segregation46% in S.F. labor force Chinese worked in manufacturing, boots and shoes, cigars and garment, wool mills during civil warEthnic enclaves (served in own communities): retail (food), service and vice (laundries, gambling and prostitution)By 1900, 45% of all Chinese lived in S.F. Bay Area

Chinese Labor in agriculture

Settled in rural areas

Cultivated, planting, harvesting in vineyards, orchards, fruits and vegetables

Substitute for freed slaves

Chinese fought backClaims of civil rights

Chan Yong (1855 SF federal district court), applied for citizenship on basis of his whiteness in appearance. (1790 Naturalization law restricted to “whites.”) Denied based on classification Mongoloid.

Ling Sing v. Washburn (1862) ruled that Chinese could not be taxed as special subjects – violated US Constitution

1885: Tape v. Hurley, school discrimination, but results in separate schools for Asians

1886: Yick Wo v. Hopkins, San Francisco laundry-licensing board engaged in discrimination

Chinese fought backClaims of civil rights

1868 Burlingame Treaty, Chinese Six Companies “free migration and emigration” of the Chinese as visitors, traders, and rights of Chinese to “enjoy same privileges…in respect to travel or residence..”1870 Civil rights acts extended to Chinese “all persons“ same right to enforce, make contracts, sue, be parties, give evidence and to the full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for security of person and property as is enjoyed by white citizens.

Chinese community organizations (forms of agency)

Chinatowns “ethnic enclaves” cities SF and rural towns of Sacramento, StocktonSecret societies – TongsDistrict Associations based on regions helped migrants, housing, employmentChinese Six companies (6) settled differences, dealt with white world, gave health and education servicesChinese stores catered to community. Post office, foods, books, herb, etc.

Gender and Chinese women

Chinese men trapped in womanless world. Anti-miscegenation laws.

Few Chinese families, fishing industry in Monterey

1870 census, 61% of 3,536 women listed as prostitutes, debt peonage, 1880-24% Page Act of 1875.

1882 Chinese Exclusion Act