Chinese Immigration To U.S.

There were many reasons for the Chinese to come to America. Overcrowding, poverty, war, and other catastrophes in China were all reasons (push) for traveling to America, as well as effective external influences. The discovery of gold was a major pull for Chinese peasants in coming to the West Coast. America's labor needs were the most important external catalyst for immigration. However, there were very few ways of traveling to the United States. With loans from the Six Companies, Chinese were able to afford fare to America, and they traveled here to work primarily as gold miners, fishermen, or agricultural workers; later settling into laundry services and restaurant work (Tsai, China overseas 12-13).

In order to cultivate and develop the vast amount of Western land and resources they had obtained, develop industry, and build a rail system for transportation and communication, and to create a network of communication with China, Americans were searching for labor, people to carry out these tasks. The hard-working nature of Chinese made them natural targets for such laborious tasks, and this helped create a pull for the Chinese willing to travel to America for work (Tsai, China overseas 12).

An entrepreneur by the name of Elmer C. Sandmeyer saw transportation companies as a powerful promotional influence. The transportation of Chinese laborers between Hong Kong and San Francisco accompanied by high passenger rates allowed American ship owners to make a nice profit (Tsai, China overseas 12-13). The Six Companies played a large part in this process, as a benevolent organization that was devoted to helping immigrants, the sick and poor, and conveying the bodies of dead persons back to china. Immigrants who were too poor to pay the travel expenses had to find collateral to cover the fees, and the Six Companies provided the immigrants with money by negotiating contracts with the mining corporations (Tsai, China overseas 35). Some immigrants had saved money; others sold property, including farm animals, while others borrowed money from friends or relatives, and some even pledged their families in order to obtain the loans. "The fare, at the lowest estimate, amounted to forty dollars for transportation to San Francisco and twenty dollars for the return trip... During the year 1852 alone, thirty thousand Chinese who embarked at Hong Kong for San Francisco paid $1,300,000 for the voyage. At the beginning of 1856, William Speer calculated that all Chinese in California had paid a total of $2,329,580 for the trip" (Tsai, China overseas 13).

Frequently exploited by American capitalists, Chinese laborers were whipped to dig in gold mines, build railroads, and plant crops. Industry boomed in Western America as the Chinese toiled ceaselessly. Free immigration was suggested by the United States in the 1868 Burlingame Treaty because of the need for labor in America and the potential benefits of trading with the Chinese. Labor was cheap, and many forms of fraud and propaganda were employed to bring Chinese laborers to the United States. The discovery of gold was also very beneficial in enticing the Chinese (Tsai, China overseas 13).

The Chinese were perfectly suited for many different jobs at a time when labor was scarce in the West. California's wheat growers were among the Caucasian employers who hired these people. After the transcontinental railroad was completed, California farmers gradually switched from wheat to more perishable products such as grapes, fruit, and vegetables. Once more, the Chinese were the source of the most available, reliable, and satisfactory labor in the planting, grafting, pruning, and harvesting of these crops, which are very labor-intensive (Tsai, Chinese Experience 20).

Some Chinese turned to agricultural labor to replace mining and railroad work, yet many found employment in factories in cities such as San Francisco and other California cities. The Chinese immigrants of the nineteenth-century never ventured into the cattle industry; rather, they did make significant contributions to America's merchant marine service and fishing industry (Tsai, Chinese Experience 22). The Chinese became adept fisherman, once again arousing opposition from the competition. The white fishermen accused the Chinese of destroying young smelt, killing baby fish, and harvesting small abalones. In 1860 a discriminatory tax of $4 a month was imposed on all Chinese-American fishermen. This law was repealed in 1864, but the California legislature eventually chose to restrict the use of mesh nets and limit the shrimp fishing season. These new limitations on Chinese fishermen were ineffective, and so a law was passed in 1905 to ban the exportation of dried shrimp from California. As if this was not enough, Chinese fishermen often reported intimidation and violence; boats were frequently sunk and their nets slashed. After the 1882 Exclusion Act, fewer Chinese fishermen were able to continue the business established by experienced fishermen. Only a few decaying Chinese fishing camps remained on Pacific shores by 1900 (Tsai, Chinese Experience 24).

Until the 1890's, when there was an influx of Japanese workers, the Chinese were the main source of labor for sugarcane production. In Hawaii, Americans owned the majority of sugarcane plantations and dominated the sugar industry throughout the islands by the 1820's. By the 1850's, Hawaii's economy was dominated by the sugar industry; early Chinese immigrants to Hawaii were brought there for work on sugarcane plantations. In 1887 the Hawaiian government followed in the footsteps of the rest of America, completely excluding the Chinese. Between 1884 and 1890, Hawaii's Chinese population dropped by 2,600; a petition was later accepted in 1895 that allowed Chinese to work in Hawaii as agricultural laborers, and an amendment to this petition allowed them to bring family with them as well (Tsai, Chinese Experience 30).

Undoubtedly, the 1882 Exclusion Law and other restrictions played a part in the social-economic conditions of the Chinese. Many Chinese moved away from Hawaii, causing the ratio of urban to rural Chinese to increase markedly throughout the rest of the United States between 1880 and 1900 (Tsai, Chinese Experience 32).

Chinese living in this country tend to live together. In any city with a Chinese population there can be found a Chinese colony; also called "Chinatown." This social bond exists mainly to create a sense of community, and partly to be able to provide assistance to one another better. The connection between these two motives for the existence of such a community must be understood. When the residents moved to this country, they were mostly lower class, blue collar workers. The Chinese were not welcomed by the rest of the community