The Chinese Exclusion Act / Report and Resolutions Adopted by the Chamber of Commerce of the State of New York

December 5, 1889.
New York:
1889.
Press of De Leeuw & Oppenheimer, 231 William Street, New York.
REPORT AND RESOLUTIONS ADOPTED BY THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, DECEMBER 6, 1889.
The committee on Foreign Commerce and the Revenue Laws, to which was referred a communication from Mr. C. P. Huntington relating to the Chinese Exclusion Act, submits the following report:
by a letter addressed to Mr. A. A. Low, a member of the Chamber, by Mr. C. P. Huntington, also a member, and by Mr. Low referred to the Chamber. As this letter is the basis of our inquiry and embodies the views of many of the people of the United States, it is proper that it should be given in full. It is as follows:
New York, November 24th, 1888.
A. A. Low, Esq., Burling Slip, New York City.
Dear Sir: I do not carry in my mind whether you have altogether retired from the China trade; but I know you still have a keen interest in the national prosperity and in the dignity and honor of this Government. I suppose you felt as most other people did, last summer, when Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, that it was an unworthy proceeding which nothing but the necessities of a partisan struggle could have brought about It may have been foreseen, and perhaps was pointed out at the time, that the Government of China had it in its power to inflict far more serious harm upon our country than we could upon China, even supposing that the coming of the Chinese was the injury to our laboring people which was charged. It seems that without uttering a word or lifting a finger the Chinese are enabled to retaliate effectively against our commerce; so that we have not only offered them a wanton affront, but also injured ourselves la a twofold way, by excluding a tractable and cheap labor which we very much need to build up our desolate places; and by the loss of a valuable trade which we might have kept to the exclusion of our rivals. A gentleman direct from Chinese and Japanese ports tells me that since the news of the passage of the Exclusion Act reached China American agents there have been unable to sell any of the coarser cotton textile fabrics, of which they had been taking large quantities. Their wants are supplied from other sources; England, I suppose. They offer no explanation for this change of policy, but simply say they are not baying. Just as soon as they can supply themselves with petroleum from Asiatic oil wells we may expect that trade to follow. Clocks and machinery can be supplied by the English and Germans who would be glad to relieve us of the trade. The tea, mattings, raw silks and other commodities which we need and can buy nowhere else, Americans will have to pay for in coin, or exchange on London, when we might have paid for them with our own products.