There are many insects from which we shrink with loathing. But here comes the naturalist who takes his lens and pours in upon the insect the solar ray, and we stand back in amazement at the beauty and perfection of the work of God. It is the duty of us all to act the part of the naturalist towards these despised races—these degraded classes. Let us put them under the lens of that wonderful utterance: “Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of these ye did it unto me.” Pour into that lens the light of the last day, and we shall see them endued with the majesty of the Most High God.
I believe this the pressing duty of the hour. If we shall take counsel of our fears—if we are afraid to let Christianity grapple with infidel Romanism, even with heathenism, God will remand us back to forty years in the wilderness, but will bring in our children to drive out these Anakim of our faithless terror.
ADDRESS ON CHINESE MISSIONS IN AMERICA.
REV. E. S. ATWOOD.
I am requested to add to the written report a few words, which will be unreasonably brief, in view of the importance of the subject. I count it a great misfortune that we should have been obliged to postpone to the last, weary, unenthusiastic hours of our meeting, the consideration of a subject which is one of the great problems this Association is set to solve. It would have been well for us if we had been allowed time to open the information that is accessible to us on this subject. There are many who think the Chinese question a very small affair. We get but faint rumors of it on these Eastern shores. Yet that little cloud on the Western horizon, not larger than a man’s hand to-day, is destined to cover the whole land, and will either be found to be filled with tempests or refreshing rain, according as the people meet the exigencies of the hour. The Chinese question will by-and-by, I believe, assume a proportion quite equal to that of the negro question. There is this peculiarity about it—almost every other department of work in this Association is amply provided for. The question of the evangelization of the Indian is comparatively a temporary question; for not many generations will pass before only a scattered remnant of Indian tribes will be left in this land. The welfare and lifting up of the black race is continually under consideration. But who cares for the Chinese? The discussion in regard to them is limited and local. And yet their presence on this continent is a matter of national interest. It starts grave problems, that have somehow to be studied and solved.
There are three classes in the land to-day who are studying this question, and are giving us their conclusions upon it. First of all, we have the Communists, east and west, who are trying to grapple with the question, and settle it. We have one Dennis Kearney going up and down the land, and men say he is a loud-mouthed demagogue, whose utterances have no weight of public opinion behind them. Not at all, Mr. President. Dennis Kearney is a representative man—a John the Baptist, crying, “Prepare ye the way of the Devil, and make his paths straight.” Communism, as a whole, proposes to deal with the Chinese, by driving them out from the land. If you doubt that assertion, look at the facts. Documentary statements in regard to the matter, compiled by B. S. Brooks, an eminent counsellor on the Pacific Coast, have been presented to a Joint Commission of both Houses of Congress. I wish they could be put into the hands of every Christian man. Unfortunately, the books that give any real information on these statistics are somehow not easily accessible. This setting forth of facts in the documents of Mr. Brooks, shows incontrovertibly that Communism in California is murderous in its intent towards the Chinese.
It has put its intention into acts. It has outraged unoffending men, and struck them down relentlessly in the public street. Violence of that sort is comparatively safe. The testimony of the Chinaman cannot be taken in opposition to the white man. The only chance a Chinaman, who is about to be murdered, has to obtain justice, is to secure a white witness to see it done. The rougher element on the Western coast is bound to annihilate the Chinaman. And all for no good reason. They are not numerous. There are only 100,000 Chinamen scattered up and down the coast. They foment no disturbances. There are only two offenses charged against them—grave offenses—and these are, that they live economically, and don’t get drunk; and so are able to work for lower wages than the masses of the Irish and native-born population.
There is another power trying to solve this problem, and that is the politicians. They are no more successful than the Communists. They have secured the enactment of certain statutes, but those statutes are often iniquitous. The Legislature of California has enacted what seems to me the most infamous laws that ever disgraced any statute-book. The Fugitive Slave Law was a Golden Rule in comparison. Let us see. It is well known that the Chinamen are laundry men. They do their work in their shops, and carry it out themselves. Forthwith, the Legislature of San Francisco enacts that every laundryman who carries his work out with a horse shall pay a dollar a month; but every laundryman who carries it out by hand shall pay fifteen dollars a month.
The Chinese are gregarious. They crowd together in tenement-houses, from which people of other nationalities are excluded. By Section Second of an Act approved April 3, 1876, by the Legislature of California, it is provided that “Any person or persons found sleeping or lodging, or who hires or uses for the purpose of sleeping, any room or apartment which contains less than 500 cubic feet of space in the clear, for each person so occupying such room or apartment, shall be deemed guilty of misdemeanor, and shall, upon conviction, be punished by a fine of not less than ten, or more than fifty dollars, or by both such fine and imprisonment.” That is, says Mr. Brooks, as a penalty for lodging in rooms containing less than 500 cubic feet of space, they are to be thrust into prison cells of less than one-fifth the dimension. Certainly