CHINESE NOTES.
—It is not often that the report of a minority of one is invested with so much importance or interest as that found, in an unfinished condition, among the papers of the late Senator Morton. We give a very brief synopsis of its main points:
A cardinal principle in our government is its openness to immigrants from all parts of the world; it is not limited in its statement by color, character or creed. While the Oriental nations have come on to our ground, it is proposed that we should go back to that which they have abandoned, and for the same reasons which they have given up—interference with trade and labor, and corruption of morals and religion.
The security of our nation depends not on material wealth nor general intelligence, but in devotion to the doctrines upon which the government was founded, “And the profound conviction in the minds of the people that the rights of man are not conferred by constitutions or written enactments, which may be altered or abolished, but are God-given to every human being born into the world, and cannot be violated by constitutions, enactments, or governments, without trampling upon natural and inalienable rights.” Growing out of these doctrines is the policy of free immigration, which we are at liberty to regulate, but not proscribe, as we may lay down the conditions of citizenship, but not consistently forbid it. Having given political rights to the negro, it is inconsistent to renew race prejudices, and exclude the Asiatics on the ground of color, civilization and religion. These are the actual grounds of the prejudice. But the question is not one of naturalization, but of permission to come into our country to work, to trade, and to acquire property, though the senator deemed it impossible that they should be protected, save as they should be allowed to become citizens, to vote and to be represented in the government. He refers to the fact that the Chinese take ship from a British port, and that our dealing in regard to their importation must be with the English Government. He brings important testimony to demonstrate the value of their labor in the construction of railroads and in the harvesting of crops. In these especially, by their freedom from combinations to control the price of labor, and as having brought wages to a level, which, though still higher than in other States, makes it possible for Californian manufacturers to compete with those of other States and countries. But for Chinese labor, he says, California would not have more than one-half or two-thirds of her present white population; it is indispensable to farming operations; their labor is as free as any other.
The majority report, in its concluding paragraphs, says that the question that now arises on the Pacific Coast will probably have to be met upon the banks of the Mississippi, and, perhaps, on the Ohio and Hudson. It is a standing menace to republican institutions and Christian civilization. Free institutions, founded upon free schools and intelligence, can only be maintained when based on intelligent and adequately paid labor. Adequate wages are needed to give self-respect to the laborer, and the means of education to his children. Family life is a great safeguard to our political institutions. Chinese immigration involves sordid wages, no public schools, and the absence of the family. They show few of the characteristics of a desirable population, and many to be deprecated by any patriot. This problem is too important to be treated with indifference. Congress should solve it, having due regard to any rights already accrued under existing treaties, and to humanity; but it must be solved, in the judgment of the committee, unless our Pacific possessions are to be ultimately given over to a race alien in all its tendencies, which will make of it practically provinces of China, rather than States of the Union. The committee recommend that measures be taken by the Executive, looking toward a modification of the existing treaty with China, confining it to strictly commercial purposes, and that Congress legislate to restrain the great influx of Asiatics to this country.
—The San Francisco “Workingmen” (?) have, under the lead of professional agitators, become more than ever threatening and incendiary in their language. It was given out that the Chinese passengers of the steamer Tokio would be attacked on their arrival. At this point the authorities interfered. The mayor appointed special police, and the two ringleaders were arrested for conspiracy and misdemeanor, and put under heavy bail. General McComb ordered the entire military force of the city to assemble at the armories, and General McDowell gave assurance that the United States troops would come to their aid if required. Under these conditions the city scum ceased coming to the surface, but settled quickly to the bottom, where it belongs.
—Mr. Luttrell, a democratic member from California, has moved in the House to amend the Steamboat Bill, so as to provide that no American vessel shall employ, in any capacity whatever, a Chinese or Mongolian.
—Treasury statistics show arrivals from China of 160,979 up to 1875. In 1875 the arrivals were 19,033; but in 1876 the immigration fell off to 16,879, owing to the April disturbance in that year in California. For the first quarter of 1877 the number was only 965, but it soon began to rise again, and on June 31 the total immigration was figured at 284,547.
—The figures of the Custom House in San Francisco have been collated to show that, out of a total of $6,692,000 paid for duties on imports of foreign goods introduced during the past year, the Chinese merchants paid $1,756,505, or over twenty-five per cent. During the same time the Chinese paid for rent and water privileges $223,000; for fire insurance, $96,000, and for marine insurance, $86,000; they also paid $100,000 in taxes into the city treasury.
—In 1875, of 7,643 arrests for drunkenness, not one was a Chinaman; of 3,263 paupers admitted to the almshouse, only six were Chinamen; of 83 murderers hanged during the last year in the United States only one was a Chinaman.
—Our antipathy is balanced to some extent by the appetite of Peru, which has 60,000 Chinamen now within its borders, and so eagerly desires more that an agent of the Peruvian Government is visiting San Francisco with inducements to divert Chinese immigration to that country.