Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1882-04-01

demonstrate the truth that the Chinese,
If left to themselves, both can and will
push Americans to the wall in nearly all
trades, industries and occupations. OF
course no considerations of this kind will
appeal with any force to those who hold
that Chinaman is in sll respects as eligi-
BILE as any other man to citizenship, and
that he is calculated to make as good an
American citizen. That, indeed, appears
to be the ultimate outcome of the position
of the Nation, though it does not follow
its argument TO the end. We, however,
must assume that the existing civilization
of the United States is. preferable, so far
as the opinion of the fifty millions of peo-
pie at present occupying the country goes,
to any other form of civilization, and that
consequently when the question arises as
to whether we shall permit American civ.
ilization to be crowded out by an alien
civilization, it is necessary to stand up for
the former. Now the Nation says, in eff.
feet, that under our political system our
politicians would not or could not have stood
up for their own civilization, if the Chinese
had had votes. We believe this to be
true, and we maintain that it shows the
need for reform of our naturalization
laws, but that it has no bearing at all upon
the rightfulness or wrongfulness of anti
Chinese legislation.
Dependence upon universal suffrage
necessarily makes politicians time.servers
and shutters. That is why both parties
always try to dodge every new question
until it has 80 developed that evasion
becomes impossible. That is why it is
possible for clannish voting elements, ne
matter how ignorant, to compel politicians
to fiatter and smile upon them, and even to
violate American principles for the sake of
winning their applause. But the exist
ence of such a condition of things is an
impeachment of the system, and nothing
else. That it should be possible for the
Chinese, by naturalization, to put stop
to an agitation founded upon notorious
evils caused by their presence, could only
demonstrate the defects of the political
machinery which produced such results. It
may also be said to prove the Importance
OF preventing the Chinese from obtaining
the ballot. and the opportuneness of the ju-
dicial decision which made it impossible
for them to defend themselves in that way.
If they had become voters the presumption
is that they would have proceeded much
faster in the work of driving out American
labor and capital, and perhaps the political
agitation would have been checked almost
as much by the exhaustion of fuel as by
any other circumstance. We have not
touched upon the we'll known fact that the
Chinese as rule do not desire to change
their citizenship, though it is essential to
right comprehension of the subjeet As
matter OF fact it Is highly improbable that
one hundred Chinese would have become
citizens had there been no obstacles in
their way, for none OF them come here
with the intention Of staying, and none of
them think American citizenship as honor
able or as good as their own. But we de-
sired to show that the argument of the
Nation from the ballot point is fallacious
even conceding its premises, and we think
that this demonstration has been made.