The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1870-08-25
Colonel WitEiers ON Chinese Immisra.
ton.
From the Lyncbburg News.
CHINESE IMMIGRATION.

The New / DIX ITlOftne Is uot pieitSeu
with Horatio Seymour's recent letter on
Chinese immigration. 1t considers all his
positions identical in spirit with the old
policy.of exclusion, prescription, and bigot-
nv advocated by the Know n othings. Mr..
Seymour was never Know-Nothing, but,
in sympathy with the Democratic party,
has always welcomed the white lmmigra-
ton from Europe as a contribution to our
civilization, our industry, growth, and
greatness. But in all its political and social
bearings there is startling difference be-
tween Chinese immigration and that which
we receive from Germany, Ireland, or any
other foreign country. That the Tribune IS
unable to discover or unwilling to acknowl-
the coolie as cordially as the German. MAY
not show the estimate put upon the latter
bv the Radicals, but it does expose the low
standard by which they measure the value
of every immigrant. ''How much money
can be made out of his labor? "-that is the
only question they care to ask, and there
fore they demand the admission Of the coolic
on an equal footing with the offspring of
the proudest and noblest races in the world.
Whether the new infusion will dilute and
deteriorate the national composition, or
morality of the country whether it will
depreciate the average national character
for intelligence and virtue, or Will refuse to
blend with the mass Of our populati on and
remain forever a separate and disturbing
element in our political system, are ques-
tons which the Radicals never considered
in their efforts to bring down the wages Of
labor.
When, says the Louisville Courier-Jour-
nal, the Radicals set about striking the
word "white" out of the naturalization
poLt ~o
teenth amendment they undertook to en-
courage African and Asiatic immigration,
they thought of nothing but the reduction
of wages. Fearing that the poor white me-
chanic might organize and strike for some
share of the enormous profits secured by
the tariff to capital invested in various man.
ufacturing monopolies, they forbid any State
law taxing or excluding any colored immi-
grants, and all the excitement produced by
coolie importation they denounce as a revi-
val of the old Known othing spirit. To
cheaper labor and to control the white
workingmen they are importing coolies and
opening this country to an invasion by $50,
900, 900 Of Chinese to whom fourth part of
the wages paid in this country is vision OF
wealth.
1.-THE Chinese came here merely to accu-
mulate and to return to the flowery kingdom
with their earnings, certainly every theory
in regard to the protection of home indus:
try which the Tribune has SO long advocated
requires that our home labor shall be pro-
tected from these importations. II 1t is
right to protect home industry by laying
heavy imDosts upon articles manufactured
by pauper labor,'' it is right to protect it by
excluding the importation and taxing the
temporary employment of that "forelgn
pauper labor" in this country. If, on the
| other hand, they come here to reside and to
| be followed, as in that case they inevitably
will be followed, by millions of their co!ln'
| trymen, the movement is one OF appalling
| significance. In all parts of the world they
| remain the same that their fathers were III
the earliest ages of mankind. They, never
change. In this country they will even
tually form separate nationality, clinsine
to their own religion, language, and civil!
cation, and entering into our political liz
as unit, powerful, incongruous, and dan
gerous. We have already an element thai
we can never assimilate. New England
speculative enterprise introduced it among
us to deluge the land with blood and re
main still political problem. II her more
modern cheap labor enterprise shall glu
our labor market and make our western
| plains swarm with the bloodlest pagans OF
earth, It viii not be the first time that hel
greedy self-assertion has raised difficulties
| that nothing but war and suffering cai
settle.