Collisions at the Intersection of Gender, Race, and Class: Enforcing the Chinese Exclusion Laws

This article explores the ramifications of the intersections of gender, race, and class ideologies for the enforcement of the Chinese Exclusion Laws in the years immediately following their passage. Drawing from government documents and archival data, I argue that the notions of gender, race, and class that permeated the legislative debate contained significant incoherences and self-contradictions, and that many of the dilemmas surrounding the enforcement of the exclusion laws against Chinese women resulted from these collisions. Faced with conflicting mandates derived from, for example, racism and patriarchy, enforcement officers had to choose between equally powerful discourses. Their ad hoc and often pragmatic approach to such dilemmas contrasted sharply with a policy process that otherwise appeared to be driven by unquestioned-and unquestionable-moral mandates. In concluding, I note the implications for our understanding of the contingencies and instabilities of ideology and the legal practices of which it is part. Does this term laborer apply to females, servants, or married women? (San Francisco Customs Collector requesting instructions for implementing the Chinese Exclusion Law, 1882; underlined in handwritten original) What certificate would the Chinese government issue to the wife? A certificate that she is a female? (attorneys for Chinese merchants and steamship companies appealing the requirement that wives of Chinese merchants carry their own certificates) President Chester Arthur signed the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882 (22 Stat. 58) suspending the entry of Chinese laborers into the United States, thereby barring immigrants on the basis of their nationality for the first time in American history. The effort to pass such a law had begun with a massive congressional investigation into the impact of Chinese immigration, had consumed months of congressional debate, and had survived a presidential veto. In the end, supporters of Chinese exclusion were satisfied that what they called the "yellow peril" had been stanched (The New York Times, 9 May 1882, p. 4). Labor historians disagree about the primary reasons for the enactment of the Chinese exclusion, with some emphasizing the role of anti-Chinese racism in the labor movement at a time of economic upheaval and industrial strife (Sandmeyer 1939; Hill 1996; Saxton 1971; Mink 1986; Lyman 2000; Lee 2003), and others insisting that Congress itself had fueled the racism and then strategically come to American labor's "rescue" (Gyory 1998). Putting aside the question of ultimate causes or primary movers, there is no doubt that racism was a denning feature of the debate. Indeed, anti-Chinese racism was an important rhetorical tool that members of Congress returned to again and again in making the case for exclusion. Less conspicuous in the congressional debates and less remarked upon in the scholarly literature, class ideologies permeated and spiked the racist rhetoric. For example, Chinese merchants and others "not in the laboring classes" were exempt from the exclusion. While the exemption for merchants was in part carved out so as not to interfere with the lucrative trade with China (Calavita 2001), it was justified on the grounds that "[t]he Chinese mercantile class is entirely different from the working class" (U.S. Congress 1891:282). Still less visible in these debates were the gender ideologies that nonetheless shaped the legislation and that ultimately caused considerable confusion and turmoil among enforcement officials. This invisibility was related to gendered assumptions about Chinese women-that they were neither laborers nor merchants and thus irrelevant to the matter at hand. While it is true that far fewer Chinese women than men traveled to the United States in this period, those who did arrive came from a wide range of backgrounds and had myriad and diverse motives for their travel. As we will see, the legislative lacuna opened up by Congress's omission meant that enforcement officials had to determine for themselves, for example, whether a woman could ever be considered a "laborer. …