Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1878-10-28
THE CHINESE QUESTION.

Ihere seems to be no doub:, if we may be-
lieve the utterances of the San Francisco
press, but the people of the Pacific slope are
Enthusiastically opposed to the further ilnpor-
tation of the Chinese. Probably Col. Bee,
the attorney of the Chinese Six companies,
did not realize how much of breeze he was
raising when he entered upon q defense of
the heather to Washington reporter. Thet
which, in ordinary communities would have
been passed over with a laugh or paragraph
Of ridicule, seems to have stirred the edito-
rial souls of San Francisco to their very
depths, and provoked perfect avalanche of
wrath, finding expression in the most scath-
ing denunciation and the bitterest invec-
tive.
Although the Chinese population of Cali
fornia is but little more than 10000, the
people there seem to be filed with grave ap-
prehensions of the evil consequences that
will result from its increase. That insignif-
cant number OF foreigners from any other
nation in the world would scarcely be noticed
their effect would not be felt either in pol
ltics or industry. But in California every
circle of society seems to be profoundly a;
tated on the subject of Chinese cheap labo !,
and has united to demand the cessation of
immigration of these Mongolians. Tire
sandlot orator and the hoodlum, the politi-
clan and the priest the legislator and the
merchant, the banker and the mechanic all
declare as with one voice, "The Chinese
must co." There is cause for this unan-
unity of sentiment that does not appear on
the surface, aside from race prejudice, and
which must not be ignored in making up
verdict in regard to the matter.
In The fret place, she Chinese never
become American citizens. They cling to
the customs of their native land
with utmost tenacity. and learn nothing
from their association with Americans save
that which is evil. They live by themselves
in filth and squalor, eating the refuse of all
food. They live cheaply, and can, therefore,
afford to work cheaply, and thus drive from
the labor market civilized white men. Living
in filth they contract the most loathsome dis
eases, which they disseminate around them,
causing suffering and crime. They are not
a desirable class of people in any respect,
and but for the fact that the cheapness Of
their labor renders them useful to few man
ufacturers, who entertain the belief that
laboring mans place is that of a vassal, they
would not be tolerated fer day in this
country.
It is not the present number of celestials
here that excites alarm, however, but the
possibility of the immigration of vast hordes
from the overcrowded kingdom, and the
consequent disaster such an influx would en-
tail. Five Or six millions of the heather
might be taken from China and placed
upon our shores without creating percepti-
bic diminution of the population of that
kingdom. But that number, thrown upon
the labor market of America, would cause
the utmost decentralization and distress.
Each Chinaman here would represent white
man out of work, with his family suffering
to permit such calamity to befall this coun-
try. The very life of the government de-
ponds upon the prosperity, independence
and intelligence of the laboring men, and if
we strike them down, or seek to lower them
in the social scale, we strike blow at the
very foundations of republican government.
We must guard against even the possibility
of such result, by placing restrictions upon,
if we DO not wholly prohibit, Chinese immi-
grafton. Every part of the country is in
terested in the matter as deeply as is the
Pacific coast