Download Chinese Exclusion Act Background Information

Chinese Exclusion Act Background Information
The Chinese Exclusion Act was approved on May 6, 1882. It was the first significant law restricting immigration into the
United States.
In the spring of 1882, the Chinese Exclusion Act was passed by Congress and signed by President Chester A. Arthur. This
act provided an absolute 10-year moratorium on Chinese labor immigration. For the first time, Federal law proscribed
entry of an ethnic working group on the premise that it endangered the good order of certain localities.
The Chinese Exclusion Act required the few non-laborers who sought entry to obtain certification from the Chinese
government that they were qualified to immigrate. But this group found it increasingly difficult to prove that they were
not laborers because the 1882 act defined excludables as “skilled and unskilled laborers and Chinese employed in
mining.” Thus very few Chinese could enter the country under the 1882 law.
The 1882 exclusion act also placed new requirements on Chinese who had already entered the country. If they left the
United States, they had to obtain certifications to re-enter. Congress, moreover, refused State and Federal courts the
right to grant citizenship to Chinese resident aliens, although these courts could still deport them.
When the exclusion act expired in 1892, Congress extended it for 10 years in the form of the Geary Act. This extension,
made permanent in 1902, added restrictions by requiring each Chinese resident to register and obtain a certificate of
residence. Without a certificate, she or he faced deportation.
The Geary Act regulated Chinese immigration until the 1920s. With increased postwar immigration, Congress adopted
new means for regulation: quotas and requirements pertaining to national origin. By this time, anti-Chinese agitation
had quieted. In 1943 Congress repealed all the exclusion acts, leaving a yearly limit of 105 Chinese and gave foreign-born
Chinese the right to seek naturalization. The so-called national origin system, with various modifications, lasted until
Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1965. Effective July 1, 1968, a limit of 170,000 immigrants from outside the
Western Hemisphere could enter the United States, with a maximum of 20,000 from any one country. Skill and the need
for political asylum determined admission. The Immigration Act of 1990 provided the most comprehensive change in
legal immigration since 1965. The act established a “flexible” worldwide cap on family-based, employment-based, and
diversity immigrant visas. The act further provides that visas for any single foreign state in these categories may not
exceed 7 percent of the total available.
Names _____________________________________________________________________________ AP Global Studies
Discussion Questions – Look over the documents in this packet to discuss the following questions with a small group of
classmates. Write all of your names at the top and note which student was the recorder for the group’s answers.
1. What restrictions were placed on Chinese immigration in the Chinese Exclusion Acts of 1880 and 1882?
2. How did the American public react to the Chinese Exclusion Acts?
3. In the political cartoon, who are the green? What does this tell you about discrimination and immigration in the
United States in the 19th century?
4. Why would the United States issue a formal apology 130 years after the Chinese Exclusion Acts? Was this a genuine
gesture?
Treaty Regulating Immigration from China
November 17, 1880
(Malloy, ed. Treaties, Conventions, etc. Vol. I, p. 237 ff.)
. . . Whereas the Government of the United States, because of the constantly increasing immigration of Chinese
laborers to the territory of the United States, and the embarrassments consequent upon such immigration, now desires
to negotiate a modification of the existing Treaties which shall not be in direct contravention of their spirit: . . .
ART. I. Whenever in the opinion of the Government 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 endanger the good
order of the said country or of any locality within the territory thereof, the Government of China agrees that the
Government of the United States may regulate, limit, or suspend such coming or residence, buy may not absolutely
prohibit it. The limitation or suspension shall be reasonable and shall apply only to Chinese who may go to the United
States as laborers, other classes not being included in the limitations. Legislation taken in regard to Chinese laborers will
be of such a character only as is necessary to enforce the regulation, limitation or suspension of immigration, and
immigrants shall not be subject to personal maltreatment or abuse.
ART. II. 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 nation.
ART. III. If Chinese laborers, or Chinese of any other class, now either permanently or temporarily residing in the
territory of the United States, meet with ill treatment at the hands of any other persons, the Government of the United
States will exert all its power to devise measures for their protection and to secure to them the same rights, privileges,
immunities and exemptions as may be enjoyed by the citizens or subjects of the most favored nation, and to which they
are entitled by treaty . . .
Chinese Exclusion Act
May 6, 1882
(U. S. Statutes at Large, Vol. XXII, p. 58 ff.)
An act to execute certain treaty stipulations relating to Chinese.
WHEREAS, in the opinion of the Government of the United States the coming of Chinese laborers to this country
endangers the good order of certain localities within the territory thereof: Therefore,
Be it enacted, That from and after the expiration of ninety days next after the passage of this act, and until the
expiration of ten years next after the passage of this act, the coming of Chinese laborers to the United States be, . . .
suspended; and during such suspension it shall not be lawful for any Chinese laborer to come, or, having so come after
the expiration of said ninety days, to remain within the United States.
SEC. 2. That the master of any vessel who shall knowingly bring within the United States on such vessel, and land or
permit to be landed, any Chinese laborer, from any foreign port or place, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and
on conviction thereof shall be punished by a fine of not more than five hundred dollars for each and every such Chinese
laborer so brought, and may be also imprisoned for a term not exceeding one year.
SEC. 3. That the two foregoing sections shall not apply to Chinese laborers who were in the United States on the
seventeenth day of November, eighteen hundred and eighty, or who shall have come into the same before the
expiration of ninety days next after the passage of this act, . . .
SEC. 6. That in order to the faithful execution of articles one and two of the treaty in this act before mentioned, every
Chinese person other than a laborer who may be entitled by said treaty and this act to come within the United States,
and who shall be about to come to the United States, shall be identified as so entitled by the Chinese Government in
each case, such identity to be evidenced by a certificate issued under the authority of said government, which certificate
shall be in the English language or (if not in the English language) accompanied by a translation into English, stating such
right to come, and which certificate shall state the name, title, or official rank, if any, the age, height, and all physical
peculiarities former and present occupation or profession and place of residence in China of the person to whom the
certificate is issued and that such person is entitled conformably to the treaty in this act mentioned to come within the
United States. . . .
SEC. 12. That no Chinese person shall be permitted to enter the United States by land without producing to the proper
office of customs the certificate in this act required of Chinese persons seeking to land from a vessel. Any Chinese
person found unlawfully within the United States shall be caused to be removed therefrom to the country from whence
he came, by direction of the President of the United States, and at the cost of the United States, after being brought
before some justice, judge, or commissioner of a court of the United States and found to be one not lawfully entitled to
be or remain in the United States.
SEC. 13. That this act shall not apply to diplomatic and other officers of the Chinese Government traveling upon the
business of that government, whose credentials shall be taken as equivalent to the certificate in this act mentioned, and
shall exempt them and their body and household servants from the provisions of this act as to other Chinese persons.
SEC. 14. 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.
SEC. 15. That the words "Chinese laborers," whenever used in this act, shall be construed to mean both skilled and
unskilled laborers and Chinese employed in mining.
US officially apologizes for Chinese Exclusion Act
06-19-2012
In a landmark gesture, the US Congress has apologized for a law passed in the 1800s that discriminated against Chinese
immigrants.
The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 made it impossible for any Chinese immigrants to become US citizens for decades. In
Washington reporter Nina Donaghy was following the vote on Capitol Hill.
It's taken a hundred and 30 years - but the us congress has agreed to apologize for the Chinese exclusion act of 1882 the first federal law to restrict the immigration of a specific group - in this case the Chinese - based on nationality.
Despite Chinese immigrants' key role in constructing the modern United States in the 19th century and beyond - taking
part in the great west coast gold rush, helping to build the transcontinental railroad, and becoming one of the largest
immigrant groups in US society.
Many in the US wanted Chinese immigration numbers to be curtailed. European immigration surged - but Chinese
exclusion was extended indefinitely in 1904.
Life was made increasingly difficult for Chinese immigrants - levies were placed on Chinese laundries in California, bans
were placed on inter racial marriages and as late as the 1920s, Chinese had to carry special internal passports.
Until 1943 the Chinese were legally categorized as "aliens ineligible for citizenship. Chinese Americans had exhibited
their resistance to these laws and practices through the American legal system - presenting a series of civil rights cases.
The US senate has already apologized for the exclusion act - and congress has voted to ratify its own apology.
The Chinese American Committee, has lobbied for the apology for years.
President of Chinese American Committee Xue Heipai says, "It is a great day for ...discrimination against Chinese and
Chinese community."
The US congress agreed to acknowledge:
That the framework of previous anti- Chinese legislation is 'incompatible with the founding principles recognized in the
declaration of independence that all persons are created equal'.
That it is 'incompatible with the United States Constitution , and that the house ’deeply regrets passing 6 decades of
legislation directly targeting the Chinese people and the wrongs committed against Chinese and American citizens of
Chinese descent."
Finally the us congress reaffirmed its commitment to preserving the same civil rights and constitutional protections for
people of Chinese or Asian descent in the US accorded to all others regardless of race or ethnicity.