Around Town: History informs today’s immigration issues
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank), who represents La Cañada and other area communities in Congress, notes on his website,“It’s clear that our current immigration system is broken and badly in need of change. Congress must turn its attention to the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants currently in the United States and enact reform that provides a path to legalization and eventually citizenship, provided they play by the rules and pay their taxes. It’s important that we approach the issue of immigration with a sense of urgency, a spirit of compassion, and a commitment to security.”
The tension between compassion and security has emerged throughout our region’s history. After the Gold Rush of 1848, California’s booming economy needed workers. Workers arrived from China to work in the mines. When the Gold Rush ended, the Chinese were kicked out of the mines, so they took jobs on the Transcontinental Railroad and in agriculture. Along the way, some workers forgot to get “naturalized.”
Constitutional scholars know that under Article 1, section 8, Congress has the power “to establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization …” Strict constructionists have noted that there was no grant of a power of deportation, but that’s another issue.
When the economy began to fail, a wave of the anti-Chinese hysteria swept Los Angeles. In 1871, a mob lynched 17 Chinese men and boys. One was a renowned physician. This happened down at the site of the original Chinatown, near where Nick’s Cafe is today.
The Los Angeles hangings were shocking, and the story displaced coverage of the Great Chicago Fire. (Charles Dwight Willard, “The Herald’s History of Los Angeles,” 1901).
Cheering the mob as they strung the men up on the gallows was the local sheriff, Major Henry “H.M.” Mitchell.
Mitchell liked to hunt deer in our foothills. He moved to Figueroa Street in what was then a town called Tropico, which was later absorbed by Glendale. Ironically, Mitchell died in a hunting accident. His friend, the city attorney, said that he mistook Mitchell for a deer.
Meanwhile, the rest of the country was concerned about the migration of Chinese workers across the continent. Congress formed a Joint Special Committee to Investigate Chinese Immigration. The members were all men — senators and congressmen. Women couldn’t vote or hold office.
In 1876, the committee took evidence in California.
You’d think the committee would come to Los Angeles, but our burg was too wild in those years. Members of the committee expressed their lack of familiarity with Southern California towns that had sprung up along the railroad lines. “Isn’t there a town called Riverside near the railroad?” asked one member.
The committee convened in San Francisco.
The hero of the story was a Sausalito attorney named Franklin Bee. No other attorneys would represent the interest of the Chinese immigrants. That’s when Bee stepped up.
If you think Twitter trolls are bad, consider this: There was no Internet in 1876. There were more direct means of expressing dissatisfaction. Maybe that’s why the committee didn’t come to the City of the Angels.
One witness was a Central Valley rancher, William Hollister, who testified that without the immigrant laborers, he would not have been successful. According to Hollister, “white” workers were less dependable and cost more.
Hollister’s partners on his Southern California ventures, the Flint and Bixby cousins, did not testify.
Bee tried to hammer away at the “outrages” committed against the immigrants. When one witness gave negative testimony about bad qualities of the Chinese immigrants, Bee cross-examined:
“Q. Is not that very apt to be the case where a few bad men are in a community ? For instance, let me give you an illustration : The testimony here has been given of a certain outrage which happened at Los Angeles, which was very reprehensible. Does not that give a painful impression of Los Angeles to the mind of the person who hears of it?
“A. Yes, sir ; that is true.
“Q. Would it not be unjust to blame the great mass of the people of Los Angeles, although there were men who committed reprehensible acts among them?
“A. Yes, sir.”
The committee was more concerned that the new continental railroad had resulted in migration of immigrants to the rest of the country. This was the key issue — the rest of the country was afraid.
Despite Bee’s best efforts, and the economic necessity presented by the ranchers, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882, which prohibited immigration of Chinese laborers. The ban remained in effect until the Chinese Exclusion Act was repealed — in 1943!
By the early 1890s, mining and agriculture industries in the Southwest began to expand. Workers were needed. The Swedes were, as Hollister explained, too expensive. And so, migrant workers and their families began to head north from Mexico.
--
ANITA SUSAN BRENNER is a longtime La Cañada Flintridge resident and an attorney with Law Offices of Torres and Brenner in Pasadena. Contact her at anitasusan.brenner@yahoo.com. Follow her on Instagram @realanitabrenner, Facebook and on Twitter @anitabrenner.