Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1869-07-17

these Asiastics are obtaining strong foot
hold ~ almost all other branches OF labor.
because they answer the requirements
better that any other class Of people
! 1t is therefore not improbably that they
will find their way, IN large numbers. to
this side OF the Rocky Mountains.
IL is probably that the party warfare
Of the country will leave this enormous
quantity Of possible political force in
the latent condition appertaining to ali.
ems?
Gaining the right TO vote means gain
ing citizenship, the removal of disq1alif-
cations, and the protection Of their dis
tinctive interest and customs to degree
proportionate to the number of their
votes. Having obtained these, the Chi
nese emigrant win become, beyond a
doubt, permanent citizen.
With this prospect before us il NAV
not be uninteresting to glance at the
charactcristicts OF this race, both in coun-
tries to which they have emigrated, and
in their own homes.
Twenty years of contract between the
two races in California have done little
toward removing the prejudice against
the Chinese. They have poured steadily
into and ont OF the country: but. sur
rounded by barriers, they have been fore.
ed to form a world of their own. Within
this some tifty thousand men have been
thriving, while many Of them have
amassed large fortunes. Many an enter
prise, too has swamped in failure, which
would have given brilliant returns but
for the tyranny of white workinen who
prevented the employment of cheap Chi
nese labor This tyranny is met with
at every step, from the courtroom, where
the Chinaman is denied the right of Civ
ing evidence in mixed cases of the "goId
diggings," where white rowdies, acting
as selfappointed collectors, levy the min
/ ing tax which is never assessed upon
Americans. Recently, however, various
manufacturers, farmers, and Others,
Drawing that wild beast, the Irish mob,
have begun to employ Chinese labor,
and with such success that capitalists
see in it the sinew and muscle of the Far
West. 81 ~ .7af .o ral.iua
A writer in the "Ocerl1nd Monthly,"
March, l. 1859, says of the Chinaman:
"What they want is employment and
such pay as will support them and some
thing over to send back to the father and
mother, or the wife and children, left at
home. So accustomed have they always
been to give a full and honest days Ia
Dor TO those who have hired them, that
they expect to give their employer the
service of their muscle and their skill
during all the hours of the day, only
asking reasonable time of meals, togather
with the stipulated wages when their
work is DONE"
The owners of woollen factories praise
them as the best of workmen. The Off
GERS and foremen of the Central Pacific
railroad, on which some ten thousand
Cinnamon are said to be at work, speak
no less highly of them. Their work is
tull and honest, no tagging and story
telling, no whiskey drinking, and few
fights. Overseers declare that they can
drill more rock and move more dirt with
Cinnamon than with an equal number of
men who claim this kind of occupation
as their speciality. What they lack in
bodily vigori is made up in persistency
and steadiness.
Indeed, California is just beginning
to feel how suicidal her course toward
Asiatic labor has been, and she is finding
that her material prosperity is increasing
apace with the innovation upon that pol
icy. The Chinese found now in wooden,
paper mills in the borax works; on the
hop plantations, fruit orchards and vine
yards, following the reaping machines
on farms, and working the salt-pits or
the coast, doing almost universally the
cooking, and engaged in hundreds of
branches OF industry that would be i'm
possible without their cheap labor.
The sure result of this will be that, in
few years, the small savings of those
workmen will, by accumulation, trans
form the coolie of to-day into the capita
list, contracting to build railroads, own
ing large farms or factories and lines of
ships, and making great commercial
combinations. This is certain, for no
people on the face of the earth advance
so unswervingly in the accumulation of
capital, and in its Investment from child
hood upward they combine the shrewd-
ness OF the Jews with the many-sided-
ness of the Yankee. What the Jews
have been in banking, the Chinese may
easily become in general commerce and
industry ON the Pacific coast.
On the island OF Java, where they
have long been tolerated, the Chinese
number not far from $50, 900, the greater
part having more or less Jayan blocd.-
The oppression of the Dutch is the cause
of the population not being larger. 'iTbey
are obliged to pay q mulet for leave To-
enter, and larger one for permission to
quite,n besides tpoll-tax none of which
inposts are levied on other foreigners.
During the last century they were So
badly treated that they reyolted, and in
,l740, were attacked in, their quarters in
Batavia, when len thousand of them are
said to have, been slaughtered. Sir
Stamford Rafies, writing in 1917, says:
'""The most numerous and important
class of foreigners in Java are the Chi
.nese, who do not fall short Of loo, 900, and
who, with a system of free trade and j.
free cultivation, would soon accumulate
tenfold, by natural increase within the
island and gradual accessions of new
settlers from home. They arrive at Ba-