The herald., 1893-07-13
ANOTHER PULPIT ORATOR ON THE
RAMPAGE.

Rev. W. G. Clarke, of Chicago, went
after the Geary bill last Sunday with
the usual stock OF ignorance and pre-
sumption exhibited by eastern parsons
on the subject OF Chinese exclusion leg.
islation. This reckless critic said, in
the course of his politico-religious ser.
mon, that prejudice is so little and
malicious that 1t inficts upon the
Chinese taxation that amounts to
robbery, and treats him with brickbats
and lynch law with scarce q restraint"
All this asserted persecution of the
Chinese is the harvest, says our
veracious preacher. ''of the seeds sown
in the sandlots years ago."
The truthful historian will say that
the sandlots were the outgrowth OF the
ills and evils which unrestricted Mon
golian immigration had brought upon
the laboring classes of California. The
sandlots were not graceful or nice in
their presentation of their grievances,
but they were accepted by intelligent
people as the symptom of a very dan
gerous condition of things produced by
the irruption upon California Of un-
limited hordes of Chinase. Where the
reverend orator got his authority for say
ing that the Asiatics were subjected to
taxation that amounted to robbery, we
cannot imagine; but had he carefully
examined the facts, he would have
known that he was making an assertion
that was not true. Nor is it true that
the Chinese in this state have been
treated as a rule with brickbats and
lynch law. Lynch law as administered
on this coast has in fact been impartial
in the selection of it's victims, and has
not, as far as we know, been carried out
on purely racial principles.
But perhaps the disengenuousness Of
Mr.. Clarke in treating the Chinese
question on other lines is as marked as
the ignorance he betrays on the sub.
ject of their persecution by our local
laws. He says that "men seek to
justify this prejudice by the claim that
the Chinese never assimilate, that they
form no permanent ties to bind them to
this country, and continue from choice
to remain aliens" OF course, Mr..
Clark follows this with the stock con-
clusion that they have had no chance,
oe account of their treatment here, to
assimilate or form permanent ties.
1t needs no argument to prove to any
one at all acquainted with the habits
and fixed character of the Chinese that
they are incapable Of assimilating with
American civilization or of being
digested permanently into the
body of the people. They have
been colonized in California for
nearly fifty years, and they are
the came in all racial respects today
that they were at first. They have
never contributed to the prosperity of
the state by building up homes or rails.
ing families like other foreigners. The
establishment of the Monaghan as a
permanent factor in our labor system
means the wiping out of homes and the
crippling of our schools to the extent
that the Chinese substitute the Anglo
Saxon race in the settlement of the
country.
This is fact that nobody pretends to
dispute, and this fact alone would justify
the Geary bill and its strict enforce
ment. When any American is prepared
to abandon the home as the basis of our
civilization, he is ripe to welcome the
Mongolian or any other undesirable race
to take possession of this country.