Chinese Immigration: Nora

Nora Mayral Boyle
IHSS
Dr. Roddy
15 April  2020
Chinese Immigration after the Civil War
After the Civil War, the United States saw an incredible surplus of Immigrants coming over. In fact, in only thirty years, from 1870 and about 1900, over twelve million people arrived, from a wide array of countries. In the first 10 years of this ‘immigration boom’, the majority of the immigrants came from western Europe, countries like Germany and England. Up until that point, and for over thirty years before that, since the beginning of the Gold Rush, Chinese  immigrants had been steadily entering the country. However, all this came to a halt, when a law was passed preventing their entry. 
Since the gold rush and until 1882, when the law was passed, many Chinese  immigrants that came over opened their own businesses, or worked in agriculture or the railroad. Unfortunately, this struck a chord with many other immigrants, leading to  hateful riots and the eventual creation of the Chinese Exclusion act being passed in 1882, as previously mentioned. 
In writings and accounts of them written by Mark Twain, and by David Philips, these Chinese  Immigrants were both described as hard-working, regardless of their salaries, and as resourceful people, that would  find ways to use the entirety of a resource or product, as Mark Twain wrote. “What is rubbish to a Christian, a Chinaman carefully preserves and makes useful in one way or another. He gathers up all the old oyster and sardine cans that white people throw away, and procures marketable tin and solder from them by melting.” In Mark Twain’s paper, he  also wrote about his dislike for those who discriminate and mistreat Chinese Immigrants, describing them as “scum”. While David Philip seemed to acknowledge the hard working mannerisms of Chinese Immigrants, and voiced his dislike and confusion for the Exclusion Act, and how surprised he was that “such a harsh and inhuman” was able to pass. Still, his language remained disrespectful, calling them “pig-eyed, pig-tailed, saffron-tinted people”. 
In Constance Gordan’s paper, he discusses how utterly un-American the Exclusion Act was, voicing his dislike for the paper, calling  it “cruel and unreasonable”. At the end of his paper, after several paragraphs dissing the act, he finishes on a solemn note. “The clamour, however, has carried the day, and for the next ten years no Chinese workman may enter the Golden Gates of the American Paradise”. 

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