The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1873-07-24
The Chinese in California.


The Chinaman has taken deeper root
on the Pacific coast than is generally
known to the people east of the Rocky
Mountains. He has evidently come to
stay, and he demonstrates his ability to
stay by making himself indispensable
in almost every occupation from the
highest to the lowest, in spite of the
universal prejudice against him. He
can live comfortably on little, and per-
forms equal labor for one-third the
wages demanded by Americans and
Europeans. He excels the laborer of
all other races in those employments
wherein attention, patience, and manual
dexterity are of more Importance than
knowledge and judgment. Asa manip-
ulator of machinery he is unequalled,
and hence enjoys the preference over
the white operative in the wooden and
cotton mills of California. The Chinese
make the shoes worn by almost every
one on the Pacific coast. The first Chi
naman tried his hand at cigar making
in San Francisco in 1860, and now there
are nearly six thousand of them who
monopolize this industry exclusively.
They operate and repair sewing-ma-
chimes of every description; and there
are now 2,100 Chinese sewing-machine
operatives in San Francisco, taking the
place of sewing-girls, who are almost
unknown in that city. As launderers,
domestic servants, farmers, gardeners,
BARRIERS, and laborers, they pervade
every employment on the Western
coast with such efficiency and at such
wages as often hopelessly to defy white
competition.
But the wonderful aptitude of this
strange people is best shown by the ra-
pidity with which their numbers have
increased in some occupations since
| 1870. According to the census of that
year there were 296 Chinese shoemakers
in San Francisco now there are 3,700.
The butchers have increased from IA to
| 100 the tailors have multiplied from
to 1913, and the cigar-makers have rolled
up from !, ,657 to $500. In all employ
ments wherein dexterity and patience
are the prime requisites the Chinaman
seems to gain ground inevitably.
All that has been said about the
degradation and the criminal propensi-
ties of the lower class of Chinese is
mainly correct, and it is no matter for
surprise that the people of California
should look with jealously upon their
invasion of the industry Of the State
But the Chinese merchants of San
Francisco are very far superior to the
Chinaman of the more numerous class
in California. They are affable, oblig-
an aggregate capital of about S25, 900,
600 they control almost the entire
Chinese trade of the country, and as
this trade increases they must continue
to grow in wealth and influence.
Chinese immigration is not a pleasant
subject of contemplation for the average
American laborer, and the question has
generally been settled in this part of
the country by making things too hot
for the tastes of the few Pacific Celes-
tials who have been imported to dis
place white labor. But it is evident that
the Chinese feel uncomfortably crowd
ed at home, and that the European
races have henceforth a new rival to
encounter in settling the unoccupied
lands of the Pacific coast and of Central
and South America. Nor is it improb-
able that the Southern negroes will in a
few years have to contend against the
man of peculiar ways and bland smile
for predomiAance in the cotton fields.
The question of supplying the place OF
the negro with the Chinaman was wide
ly discussed at the South some years
ago; and when the Southern Pacific
Railroad shall be completed the way
will be open for practical trial of the
experiment. Whether the negro is evel
displaced by the Chinese or not, il
would still be an easy matter to double
the cotton crop by accessions of Chinese