The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1913-05-24
The Real Issue

| It must be obvious by this time to all who
have followed closely the trend of negotiations
that the California land bill has been merely
an incidental peg on which the Japanese gov
eminent has seized a hanging place for Its
real cause of complaint against the United
States.
There is no longer serious contention that
the measure just signed by Governor johnson
lis In contravention of any provision OF the
existing treaty between the two countries or
that the State of California has exceeded its
constitutional rights ip the premises. The act
follows the lines of the treaty and its language
is identical with that Of the federal statute
now in force in the District or Columbia and
applicable to all federal territory not yet in
vested with the attributes of Statehood.
What then Is the gravamen Of Japans pro-
test? Why, patiently, none other than that
the laws of congress do not include the people
Of that country within the nationalites or
races whose members are eligible to Ameri-
can citizenship. In exercise OF sovereign
right the United States has declared what
classes of aliens may and which, by exclusion,
may not acquire citizenship by naturalization;
and it is this and this alone which is the cause
of Japans offense-a cause which California
did not create and which 1t Is not in the power
of California to remove, and which California
could not set at defiance II she would.
| Patiently, therefore. the action OF California
is distastefu to the Japanese. not because 1t
violates these treaty rights-for 1t does not;
not because the restrictions placed on land
tenureS are unredSOnaDiy TeSlTiCtFe-4oi they
more liberal than the terms on which
Americans may acquire real property in Japan;
not because California has declared the Japan
csc beyond the pale of acquired citizenship
for that has been done by the law-makins
power of the Union and is operative every
where within its borders 'the supreme law
of the land" but simply because the passing
of any legislation the subject by the State
Of California furnishes the desired occasion for
Indirectly voicing a resentment which long
MT ia California incident, resent
ment exclusively based on the fact that the
United States SUCH not any one integral part
thereof. have decided and proclaimed against
the admission to rights Of citizenship of those
branches OF the human family OF which the
Japanese This Is the wound which
their pride been nursing through the years
since 1t inflicted. This is the point OF
honor involved. The quarrel Is with the au-
thorites at Washington; for 1t was from that
source that the only real prick OF their ma
tional racial vanity proceeded.
| Manifestly had not the federal code con-
tanned proscriptve clauses which left the
| Japanese ineligible to American citizenship,
neither California nor any other State could
have originated such discrimination or based
the conditions of land holding by aliens upon
it California has merely applied to her do
nestle conditions in totidem verbs section
of the United States statutes. and II Japan
has any ground OF grievance it is one for which
the United States is responsible Out OF the
fog of mystery which has hitherto surrounded
the diplomatic interchanges between the two
governments, this fact has at last protruded
itself OF course President Wilson and Secre-
tary Bryan must have discerned long ago that
no matter what California might might not
do, that they would eventually be called on
! to meet the question whether the qualifications
of American citizenship should be determined
at Washington. according to the Judgment of
the American people as registered by their rep
resentatives in congress and the presidency.
or whether those qualifications should be for
muated to accord with the ideas wishes,
ceits ambitions political exigencies OF
foreign powers assuming to demand right
1.-THE dictation of the measure of privilege to be
dispensed to their subjects when domiced
our soil. So markedly put: but one answer con-
sistent with national safety and dignity can be
giyen-Norfolk Virginian-Pilot-