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Opium Wars
"High taxes from the Opium Wars forced many peasants and farmers off their land."
- PBS Chinese Immigrants and the Gold Rush -
Gold Discovered in Califonia
"In 1849, prospectors came from everywhere to try to make their fortunes. More than 100,000 people arrived in California."
- America's Story from America's Library -
Taiping Rebellion
The Taiping Rebellion "devastated southern China…It was a social catastrophe; the rebellion and its suppression completely destroyed the rural economy and killed more than twenty million people."
- James Olsen and Deborah Samuel of Yale Initiative on Chinese Immigration, Exclusion and the Chinese-American Experience -
Wave of Chinese Immigrants Arrived
"Several years of floods and droughts led to economic desperation. Then merchant vessels brought news of Gam Saan, or gold mountain. The majority of Chinese men who sailed to California were illiterate, but dreamed of new possibilities."
- PBS Chinese Immigrants and the Gold Rush -
Foreign Miners' Tax
"In 1852, a special foreign miner's tax aimed at the Chinese was passed by the California legislature. This tax required a payment of three dollars each month at a time when Chinese miners were making approximately six dollars a month."
- California Museum -
Central Pacific Company Hired Chinese Workers
"The Sacramento Union reports that approximately 4,000 men, “mostly Chinese,” are at work on the Central Pacific Railroad."
- Stanford University, Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project -
Burlingame Treaty
"In 1868 the Burlingame Treaty was entered into between the United States and China. It provided for reciprocal exemption from persecution on account of religious belief, the privilege of schools and colleges, and in fact it agreed that every Chinese citizen in the United States should have every privilege which was expected by the American citizen in China."
-San Francisco Museum -
Cubic Air Ordinance
"A city ordinance requiring 500 cubic feet of space for every person residing in a lodging...Thousands of Chinese were jailed under a public health law driven by anti-Chinese sentiment."
- U.S. National Library of Medicine -
Laundry Ordinance
"The Laundry Ordinance of 1870 required laundries employing horse-drawn vehicles to pay $1 tax per quarter; those with no vehicles paid $15."
- PBS SoCal -
Queue Ordinance
"The Queue Ordinance of 1873 outlawed the wearing of long braids by men, a Chinese custom."
- Library of Congress -
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882
"The Chinese Exclusion Act, signed into law on May 6, 1882, by President Chester A. Arthur, effectively halted Chinese immigration for ten years and prohibited Chinese from becoming US citizens. The Chinese Exclusion Act was the first major law restricting immigration to the United States."
- Harvard University Open Collection Immigration to the United States 1789-1930 -
Rock Spring Massacre of 1885
"150 white miners in Rock Springs, Wyoming, brutally attack their Chinese coworkers, killing 28, wounding 15 others, and driving several hundred more out of town."
-This Day in History -
Yick Wo vs. Hopkins
"All laundries in wooden buildings had to get the approval of the Board of Supervisors in order to obtain a license...every Chinese laundry owner in the city was denied a permit. Every white-owned laundry was granted a permit. Yick Wo took his case to the Supreme Court which determined that the ordinance was unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment’s “equal protection” clause."
- The Constitution Project -
Seattle Riot of 1886
"February 7, 1886, was one of the worst days in Seattle’s history. It was the day that Seattle settled the “Chinese Question” by having a mob of 1,500 force out the Chinese from Seattle."
- International Examiner -
Scott Act
"In 1888, Congress took exclusion even further and passed the Scott Act, which made reentry to the United States after a visit to China impossible, even for long-term legal residents."
- Office of the Historian -
Geary Act
"The Geary Act, passed in 1892, required Chinese aliens to carry a residence certificate with them at all times upon penalty of deportation. Immigration officials and police officers conducted spot checks in canneries, mines, and lodging houses and demanded that every Chinese person show these residence certificates."
- Mintz, S. & McNeil, S. Digital History -
United States vs. Wong Kim Ark
"Born in San Francisco to Chinese immigrants, Wong was denied re-entry to the United States after a trip to China...The U.S. Supreme Court issued its landmark decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, holding that children born in the United States, even to parents not eligible to become citizens, were nonetheless citizens themselves under the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution."
- Asian Americans Advancing Justice -
San Franciso earthquake
"In 1906, the San Francisco earthquake and fire destroyed local public records...many Chinese claimed that they were born in San Francisco. With this citizenship the father then claimed citizenship for his offspring born in China. Sons who entered the country in this fashion were known as “paper sons.”"
- Virtual Museum of the City of San Francisco -
Angel Island Opened
"Angel Island was created to keep Asians out."
- Judy Yung, Historian -
Asiatic Barred Zone Act
"The 1917 Act implemented a literacy test that required immigrants over 16 years old to demonstrate basic reading comprehension in any language. It also increased the tax paid by new immigrants upon arrival and allowed immigration officials to exercise more discretion in making decisions over whom to exclude. Finally, the Act excluded from entry anyone born in a geographically defined "Asiatic Barred Zone” except for Japanese and Filipinos."
- Office of the Historian -
1921 Emergency Quota Act
"The objective of this act was to temporarily limit the numbers of immigrants to the United States by imposing quotas based on country of birth. Annual allowable quotas for each country of origin were calculated at 3 percent of the total number of foreign-born persons from that country recorded in the 1910 United States Census."
- University of Washington Library -
Immigration Act of 1924
"The Immigration Act of 1924 limited the number of immigrants allowed entry into the United States through a national origins quota. The quota provided immigration visas to two percent of the total number of people of each nationality in the United States as of the 1890 national census. It completely excluded immigrants from Asia."
- Office of the Historian -
World War II Begins
"The repeal of the Chinese Exclusion law was managed with very narrow implications so it was presented as being necessary in a time of war to really consolidate the alliance between China and the United States against the Japanese enemy."
- Madeline Hsu -
Magnuson Act of 1943
"In 1943, Congress passed a measure to repeal the discriminatory exclusion laws against Chinese immigrants and to establish an immigration quota for China of around 105 visas per year."
- Office of the Historian -
Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965
"The 1965 legislation was named the Hart-Celler Act for its principal sponsors in the Senate and House of Representatives. It abolished the quota system, which critics condemned as a racist contradiction of fundamental American values. By liberalizing the rules for immigration, especially by prioritizing family reunification."
- Center for Immigration Studies -
Congressional Apology for Anti-Chinese Laws
“We must finally and formally acknowledge these ugly laws that were incompatible with American’s founding principles. We must express the sincere regret that Chinese deserve. By doing so, we will acknowledge that discrimination has no place in our society and we will reaffirm our strong commitment to preserving the civil rights and constitutional protections for all people of every color, every race and from every background.”
- Judy Chu, Congresswoman
