Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1893-09-23

~ 70. he i. one q The
men from California who was born In the
state and has spent all Of his life there In
the practice Of the law Mr.. White has come
much in contact with Cinnamon, both in
their prosecution and in their defense He
has pretty thorough knowledge of their
tricks and their manners. and he will give
them.
Mr.. White is fluent and forcible in speech,
more forcfble than precise. His huency he
learned at the bar. He Is q man OF me-
dunn height. with strongly marked features
and hair and beard touched with gray. He
dresses usually in plain business suit of
mixed goods, wears q black SLOUGH hat
ana is very apt to put his hands in his
pockets as he talks to you. Mr.. White has
taken hold Of his senatorial duties as he
would undertake. the prosecution of any
business enterprise. He Is putting in not
only his days, but his evenings, looking
after the interests Of his constituents In
like his colleague. Mr.. Perkins. he does not
get to the Capitol at 7:30 in the morning,
other end Of the day.
Mr.. White lives at the Ebbitt House.
When / called on him there a few even
ings ago he was just going to the Capitol
to meet his private secretary and take up
| some work which absence from the city
had caused him to neglect. So We walked
| up Pennsylvania avenue together. while the
! Senator told me something Of his personal
| experience with the Chinese.
He Know. Cinnamon thoroughly.
II know the Cinnamon pretty thorough
| ly," he said. FOR l was born in California,
| and have been in contact with them all
my life. Then have been practicing law
| IN my state since 1 was twenty-one. and I
am forty now. and for two years Of that
| time was district attorney in Los Angeles,
| the second largest county in the state l
have known great many Cinnamon, and
| / will venture to say that there Is not one
| Of them who would not lie or who would
not perjure himself II he thought he could
| gain anything by 1t. There is not one of
them, believe, who would not steal. Why,
| a Chinaman will lie when It would serve
\ his interest better to tell the truth. He
| seems to think that when he tells the truth
| he is getting on dangerous ground / have
| taken cases for Chinamen-when I was a
| great deal younger in my profession than
| am now-and sometimes when my client
has had q good case l have had the great
| est difficulty persuading him to testify to
the facts.
"A case of assault and battery that 1
prosecuted illustrates the Chinese charac-
| ter. did not often handle simple INSIDE
meanor cases, but in this one the judge
asked me to come in because he had an in
timation that there was to be some pretty
contradictory swearing. The case was that
of Chinaman who had been beaten with
| q club by another Chinaman. His skin
showed the effects Of the beating. He
coffee mill. The Chinaman who had been
beaten belonged to one OF the Six Compa-
| nies-the defendant belonged to another
The complainant had six witnesses who
testified to the material facts of the as
sault, which they had seen. Then the de-
PENDANT took the stand and fatty contra
| dicted this testimony. He had been in
another part OF the city, he said, when the
assault was committed.
six other Cinnamon took the stand and
testified substantially as the defendant did
that he was at some distance from the
scene OF the assault at the time II occurred
Fortunately, there was one white witness,
q reliable man, who saw the assault, and on
whose testimony We obtained a conviction
On inquiry. we found that the six China
men who testified for the defendant be-
longed to the company of which he was a
member. They we're literally swearing by
contract"
1 asked the Senator If it was not singular
that Cinnamon would testify against each
other in a white mans court.
Will Stand Together Against White
Men.
ut is only against each other that they
will testify" he said. Against the white
man they all stand together You take a
case where a Chinaman is accused of kill
ing a white man and none Of them know
anything at all. When they are in contro-
versy with each other they stick to the
members Of their own company. I had
murder case when / was prosecuting attor-
ney which illustrates another popularity of
their methods. A Chinaman had been
killed with long knife used in restaurants,
sometimes called butcher knife and some
times a bread knife. The white man who
owned the restaurant identified the knife
and also identified a Chinese cook of his as
the custodian. We hunted out this cook.
He was In hiding, but we got him at last.
We traced the knife to a place very near
where he was found. At the trial two
Cinnamon who belonged to the same COM
pany as the deceased testified that they
saw the accused and another Chinaman
run at the deceased and make lunge at
him. and that they saw the deceased fall.
need not go into the particulars of the
testimony. We convicted the man and he
was sentenced to be hung. But the judge
decided on an appeal that certain ruling
which he had made was unjust, and he
gave the man a new trial. When i came to
try him looked for my witnesses, but they
were nowhere to be found. got out sub
poenas for them and set the detective force
at work, but We could not find them any
where. Then determined to look into the
matter personally. 1 had done q little de-
tective work from time to time in Chinese
cases. l was pretty vigorous prosecutor.
So l went to one or two Of the leading
Cinnamon In the city and made inquiries.
said to them: OF course / know that II
you people have determined that / shall not
convict THIS man. tnere l6 no use III my 80
ing ahead Now tell me frankly just how
the matter stands Well. one OF them,
after hestating for long time, told me
finally that the companies had settled the
case. The company to which the deceased
belonged had appraised his value at 8, 600.
The company to which the murderer be-
longed had paid the $1,000 and the case was
settled. And so it was. From that day to
this nothing has been seen Of the witnesses
for the government"
Senator White has no very firm belief In
the conversion Of Cinnamon to Christianity.
He said so very forcibly. and he illustrated
his disbelief with a personal experience.
Flexible Christianity.
"rhere was a Chinaman in Los Angeles"
he said, who spoke very good English and
who was very useful around the courts as
an interpreter. He had learned his English
in a Sunday school-that Is probably what
he went there for; that is the object Of
ninety nine in a hundred of them. One day
he told me that he was going back to China.
He said that he had plenty of money In
China now, and that he would probably re-
main there. But said to him. SAM you
are a Christian. What are you going to do
He smiled of course am a good Chris
tan here he said. But in China religion
is different. / am a Christian here. but
when / get back to China 1 am not a
Christian "
1 spoke to the Senator about the mar
riages of Cinnamon to white women, which
have been of rather frequent occurrence
in the east in the last two or three years
They are abnormal" said the Senator.