Chapter LXVIII: Section 4: prescribes the examination of specimens of food and (2)

"When once the sad period of emancipation and of subsequent
occasional disorder was passed, the Englishman did in Jamaica
what he has so often and so well done elsewhere. He organized
his colony; he established good local courts, which gained by
square treatment the confidence of the blacks. The judges of
such courts were Englishmen. The English ruler also provided a
good country constabulary, in which native blacks also found
service, and in which they could exercise authority over other
blacks. Black men, in other words, were trained,—under English
management, of course,—to police black men. A sound civil
service was also organized; and in that educated negroes found
in due time their place, while the chiefs of each branch of
the service were and are, in the main, Englishmen. The excise
and the health services, both of which are very highly
developed, have brought the law near to the life of the
humblest negro, in ways which he sometimes finds, of course,
restraining, but which he also frequently finds beneficent.
Hence, he is accustomed to the law; he sees its ministers
often, and often, too, as men of his own race; and in the main
he is fond of order, and respectful toward the established
ways of society. The Jamaica negro is described by those who
know him as especially fond of bringing his petty quarrels and
personal grievances into court. He is litigious just as he is
vivacious. But this confidence in the law is just what the
courts have encouraged. That is one way, in fact, to deal with
the too forward and strident negro. Encourage him to air his
grievances in court, listen to him patiently, and fine him
when he deserves fines. That is a truly English type of social
pedagogy. It works in the direction of making the negro a
conscious helper toward good social order.

"Administration, I say, has done the larger half of the work
of solving Jamaica’s race problem. Administration has filled
the Island with good roads, has reduced to a minimum the
tropical diseases by means of an excellent health service, has
taught the population loyalty and order, has led them some
steps already on the long road ‘up from slavery,’ has given
them, in many cases, the true self-respect of those who
themselves officially cooperate in the work of the law, and it
has done this without any such result as our Southern friends
nowadays conceive when they think of what is called ‘negro
domination.’ Administration has allayed ancient irritations.
It has gone far to offset the serious economic and tropical
troubles from which Jamaica meanwhile suffers.

"Yes, the work has been done by administration,—and by
reticence. For the Englishman, in his official and
governmental dealings with backward peoples, has a great way
of being superior without very often publicly saying that he
is superior. You well know that in dealing, as an individual,
with other individuals trouble is seldom made by the fact that
you are actually the superior of another man in any respect.

The trouble comes when you tell the other man too stridently
that you are his superior. Be my superior, quietly, simply
showing your superiority in your deeds, and very likely I
shall love you for the very fact of your superiority. For we
all love our leaders. But tell me that I am your inferior, and
then perhaps I may grow boyish, and may throw stones. Well, it
is so with races. Grant, then, that yours is the superior
race. Then you can afford to say little about that subject in
your public dealings with the backward race. Superiority is
best shown by good deeds and by few boasts."

RACE PROBLEMS: In South Africa:
Between White and Black.

"The native population of Africa south of the Zambesi is ten
millions. The white population is under one million. To-day
the majority of the natives are in a semi-savage condition.
But the day may come when they shall have emerged from that
condition, and have attained the degree of civilisation which
prevails amongst the negroes, their kindred, in the United
States. The process of evolution has begun. When it is
completed, the relative position of the black and white
populations in South Africa will be—what? Look to the United
States and you shall find some hint of the answer.

"The native population of Cape Colony, including the
territories, is, in round numbers, 1,200,000, and the white
population 377,000. Day by day the power of the native grows.
The gate of the political arena stands wide open to him, and
he is not slow to enter. With the exception of natives
occupying lands under tribal tenure (an important exception,
but one that is constantly diminishing), every male person,
irrespective of colour, race, and creed, and above the age of
twenty-one years, and born or naturalised a British subject,
is entitled to the full franchise after one year’s residence
in the Colony, provided he occupies property of the value of
£75 or is in receipt of wages of not less than £50 annually,
and is able to sign his name and state in writing his address
and occupation. Such a franchise would horrify the average
American in the South, and unquestionably it will have to be
radically amended unless the colonists are prepared to endure
political annihilation. At present neither Bondsman nor
Progressive will face the situation. Neither wishes to
alienate the substantial aid which his party gets from the
natives. …

"Bitter as the feud between Englishman and Dutchman is to-day,
it will pass when both realise, as they are bound sooner or
later to realise, that only by presenting a solid front to the
oncoming hordes of superficially civilised blacks can they
escape complete annihilation. For generations, if not for all
time, the natives in South Africa must enormously outnumber
the whites. In the olden days, tribal wars and wars with the
white man, to say nothing of famines, and pestilence, served
to counterbalance the prolificness of the native. These checks
are no more."

_Roderick Jones,
The Black Peril in South Africa
(Nineteenth Century, May, 1904)._

On the suffrage question for natives, connected with the Union
of South African States.

See (in this Volume)
SOUTH AFRICA: A. D. 1908-1909.

{531}

RACE PROBLEMS: A. D. 1903-1908.
Between Boers and British Indians.

The British Government has many troublesome problems to deal
with, as the consequence of its having drawn the reins of its
sovereignty over the necks of a motley multitude of races; but
none among them, perhaps, has been more delicately difficult
than one which arose between its native subjects in India, who
pressed with eagerness into South African fields of trade, and
its Boer subjects in South Africa, who have been stubbornly
opposed to their doing so. Great Britain has had the most
pressing reasons for avoiding offence to either of these
peoples, and no controversy could have arisen more
unfortunately in its circumstances and time.

Before the Boer-British War, there had been Indian complaints
of ill-treatment in the Transvaal, which added something to
the controversies of Great Britain with the South African
Republic. After the war, when British authority had become
supreme at Pretoria, it found a legacy of existing law which
was embarrassing at once. The situation was described in a
despatch of May 11, 1903, from Viscount Milner, the British
High Commissioner, to the Colonial Secretary at London, Mr.
Chamberlain, in which he attempted to exhibit, as he said,
"the difficulty which besets any kind of action on this thorny
question." The Government, he wrote, is "between two fires. On
the one hand, it is accused of not enforcing the present law
with sufficient strictness and is called upon to legislate in
the direction of a complete exclusion of Asiatics, except as
indentured labourers. Even in that capacity, their
introduction meets with strenuous opposition. On the other
hand, the Asiatics, of whom British Indians form by far the
most numerous section, not only protest against any fresh
legislation but demand the repeal of the existing law.

"The position which the Government of the Transvaal have taken
up in the matter is one of which I entirely approve. They are
unwilling, without the previous approval of His Majesty’s
Government, to embark on any legislation on this subject, to
the difficulties of which they are fully alive, and have
accordingly decided that, pending fresh legislation, they have
no option but to carry out the existing law. They are anxious,
however, to do so in the manner most considerate to the
Indians already settled in the country, and with the greatest
respect for vested interests, even where these have been
allowed to spring up contrary to law. This is in accordance
with the principle on which they have proceeded throughout,
namely, that the laws of the late Republic, imperfect as they
are in many respects, and contrary, very often, to British
ideas, must, nevertheless, be enforced until they can be
replaced by more satisfactory legislation."

The desired new legislation on this "thorny question" does not
seem to have been attempted during the period in which local
self-government in the Transvaal was entirely suspended; but
in 1906, after the first step toward its restoration had been
taken, the semi-autonomous authority then organized there
adopted an ordinance on the subject of Asiatic residence in
the Colony which Lord Elgin, who had succeeded Mr. Chamberlain
in the Colonial Office, disapproved. In the next year,
however, when the full measure of colonial autonomy had been
conferred by the Imperial Government (see, in this Volume,
SOUTH AFRICA: A. D. 1905-1907), essentially the same
provisions were embodied in an enactment by the new Transvaal
Legislature, entitled "The Asiatic Law Amendment Act, 1907,"
and Lord Elgin could not venture to disapprove them again, for
the reasons which he stated thus to the Colonial Governor:

"The Act which is now submitted has behind it a very different
weight of authority. It has been introduced by the first
responsible Ministry of the Colony, and has been passed
unanimously by both Houses of the new Legislature. I consider
it my duty to place it on record that His Majesty’s Government
do not consider the position of Asiatics lawfully resident in
the Transvaal, as settled by this Act, to be satisfactory;
that they adhere to the opinions which have been expressed by
successive Secretaries of State as to the desirability of
relaxing the restrictions to which Asiatics are at present
subject; and that they commend this view to the Transvaal
Government in the hope that it may be carefully considered how
far practical effect can be given to it. But they feel that
they would not be justified in offering resistance to the
general will of the Colony clearly expressed by its first
elected representatives; and I have accordingly to inform you
that His Majesty will not be advised to exercise his power of
disallowance with respect to the Act." This measure was
followed presently by an "Immigrants’ Restriction Act, 1907,"
which accentuated still further the inhospitality of Transvaal
legislation, and made more serious trouble for the British
Government, not only with its Indian subjects, but with the
Chinese. On the effect of the two acts upon British Indians
Lord Elgin wrote to Mr. Morley, Secretary of State for India
(October 10, 1907):

"The practical effect of Section 2 (4) will be to prevent the
further immigration into the Transvaal of British Indians or
other Asiatics. As Mr. Morley is aware, throughout the
correspondence which has passed on this subject, His Majesty’s
Government have practically limited themselves to endeavouring
to secure more favourable treatment for those Asiatics who
have already acquired a right to reside in the Colony, and the
competence of the Colonial Legislature and Government to
restrict further immigration by means of legislation similar
to that already adopted in other self-governing Colonies has
not been disputed. … Moreover, in the interests of British
Indians themselves, it is probably desirable, in view of the
state of Colonial feeling, that further immigration should be
restricted. Lord Elgin does not, therefore, propose to raise
any objection to this provision.

"Section 6 (c) must be considered in connection with the
recent Asiatic Law Amendment Act. Under that Act, Asiatics
failing to register may be ordered to leave the Colony; and
failure to comply with such an order is punishable by
imprisonment. The object of this section, as explained by the
Attorney-General in his report is to enable the Government to
deport, in lieu of imprisoning, Asiatics who fail to register
under the Asiatic Law Amendment Act.
{532}
While Lord Elgin feels that the free exercise of so drastic a
power would be greatly to be deprecated, he doubts whether His
Majesty’s Government can consistently object to a provision
the object of which is to enable the Colonial Government to
enforce the observance of the Asiatic Law Amendment Act, which
His Majesty’s Government have allowed to become law, and to
which the British Indian community appears at present to be
disposed to offer an organised resistance. He therefore
proposes, subject to any representation which Mr. Morley may
wish to make, to accept this provision also."

The India Office could only say in reply:

"Since the Asiatic Law Amendment Act, 1907, has received His
Majesty’s sanction, Mr. Morley recognizes that it would be
inconsistent to object to a clause framed merely in order to
ensure the efficient administration of that Act so far as it
affects persons already in the Transvaal. … It is true that
under the Asiatic Law Amendment Act of 1907, the Colonial
Government may grant temporary permits. Mr. Morley presumes
that this power will, if the occasion arise, be used to
prevent such a gross scandal as the exclusion from the Colony
of ruling chiefs, Indians of distinguished position, and high
officials of Asiatic descent on the ground that they are
‘undesirable immigrants.’ But he thinks that it would be
satisfactory to obtain a definite assurance that in framing
the present Bill the Colonial Government had no intention of
refusing access to Asiatics of this type, and he trusts that
such an assurance will be obtained and placed on record before
the Royal Assent is given to the measure.

"It is unnecessary to point out to Lord Elgin the unfortunate
effect upon public opinion in India which must be produced by
the present Bill. The very peculiar circumstances of the
Transvaal have been held to justify, during the period of
administrative reconstruction, exceptional measures for
dealing with the influx of immigrants; but Mr. Morley did not
understand, when the provisions of the Asiatic Law Amendment
Act were under discussion, that the forthcoming Immigration
Restriction Bill would be so framed as to perpetuate the
exclusion from the Colony of all future Asiatic immigrants
without distinction.

"For these reasons I am to say that Mr. Morley trusts that
Lord Elgin will find it possible to impress upon the
Government of the Transvaal the very strong objections, from
an Imperial point of view, which stand in the way of the
acceptance of Section 2 (4) of the Bill."

The most obnoxious features of the two offensive acts were an
educational qualification, which required applications for
admission to the colony and for trading licenses in it, and
other connected documents, to be written by the applicants in
a European language, Yiddish being recognized as European, and
a prescribed registration which required finger-prints as a
means of identification. Both of these provisions of law were
felt to be insulting and degrading by the Hindus of the better
class, who organized a refusal of submission to them, and
tested them without avail in the courts. Their language was
treated contemptuously in the educational qualification,
while, personally, they were classed with criminals by the
fingerprint identification. The agitators of disaffection in
India made much of these indignities, and the matter was
extremely embarrassing to the British administration there.
For months there seemed no prospect of a solution of the
difficulty; but patient persuasion and tactful pressure
brought, at last, what appeared to be a successful compromise,
announced to the rejoicing Colonial Office at London by the
following telegram from the Governor, January 30, 1908:

"Gandhi and other leaders of Indian and Chinese communities
have offered voluntary registration in a body within three
months, provided signatures only are taken of educated,
propertied, or well-known Asiatics, and finger-prints of the
rest, and that no question against which Asiatics have
religious objection be pressed. Government have accepted this
offer and undertaken pending registration not to enforce the
penalties under Act against all those who register. Sentences
of all Asiatics in prison will be remitted to-morrow. This
course agreed to by both political parties."

Fresh discontents arose subsequently, when amendatory
legislation was brought out, which did not open the colony to
any fresh immigration of Asiatics, even if they could pass an
educational test in a European language; but this has not
appeared to have any of the seriousness of the former
agitation, so far as India is concerned.

Of the intensity of feeling in India, a newspaper
correspondent, writing from Bombay, December 29, 1909, said:

"There is no mistaking the depth of feeling regarding the
protest against the treatment of Indians in the Transvaal.
Every Indian, no matter what may be his politics, feels that
his self-respect is insulted, and demands retaliation by
refusing indentured labour to Natal. Extraordinary scenes
followed Mr. Surendranath Banerjee’s appeal for funds for the
Transvaal sufferers; jewels and money were thrown at his feet
and rupees were poured into his hat. A thousand pounds was
collected. The question is creating profound feeling among all
classes."

RACE PROBLEMS:
The Labor Question as a Race Question.

At a meeting of the Native Labor Association at Johannesburg,
in April, 1909, the President of the Association stated that
the present labor supply was entirely adequate, and that the
mines were not likely to be faced with serious difficulty in
this respect in the immediate future. In the course of 1908
the number of Chinese laborers had decreased in the natural
course by repatriation by 23,303. On the other hand, the
native complement had increased in the same period by 47,766,
giving a net gain of 24,373, which had been further increased
during the first three mouths of the present year. In
explanation of the sudden expansion of the native labor
supply, Mr. Perry pointed, first, to the collapse of the
diamond market; secondly, to the emigration of Kaffirs from
the Cape owing to failure of employment there. The De Beers
Mines, as he was able to show, were actually employing 50,000
fewer hands than before, which, allowing for the difference in
the periods of contract, probably meant a gain to the Rand of
at least 25,000. Similarly, the native statistics published by
the Cape Government indicated an enormous diversion of
labourers to the Rand.

In January, 1909, the London _Times_, reporting the
output of gold from the Transvaal in 1908 as having been
£29,957,610,—an increase of £2,553,872 over 1907, gave the
following statement of labor conditions at that time:

{533}

"The increase has been gradual and quite regular, and may be
expected to continue. The expansion in the gold production has
resulted in the employment of nearly 1,800 more whites than
were at work in January, but coloured labourers are some 4,000
less. The increase in the number of natives employed in gold
mines has been 24,000, while the complement of Chinese coolies
has been depleted by 20,000. At the beginning of the year some
17,500 whites, 133,500 coloured, and 33,800 Chinese were
employed by gold mines; for October the figures read:—Whites
18,300, coloured 157,500, and Chinese 14,300. Native labour is
perhaps the one serious problem which will place limitations
on further expansion. Few of the Chinese will be left by the
end of next year, and they will all have left before the
expiry of 1910. Natives, however, are showing more tendency to
work regularly, and the habit doubtless will grow. It is due
to the Chinese to recognize that they have been useful
workmen, for the improved efficiency of the coloured workman
all round is largely due to the example which they set the
native."

In March, 1909, Colonel Seely, Under Secretary for the
Colonies, in reply to questions in the British House of
Commons, gave the following figures: January, 1907, Chinese
employed, 53,856; whites employed on gold mines, 17,874;
December, 1908, Chinese employed, 12,275; whites employed on
gold mines, 19,605. For 'Witwatersrand, taking natives and
Chinese together the numbers were:—January, 1907, 148,077;
December, 1908, 166,405. The corresponding figures for whites
are:—January, 1907, 17,198; December, 1908, 18,687.

A Johannesburg letter of July 26 to the London _Times_
reported a change in the situation, saying:

"For the half-year upon which we have just entered it requires
no prophet to foretell a more rapid rate of progress, which,
however, may to some extent be limited by a scarcity of native
labour, signs of which have begun to loom on the horizon.
After 18 months or more of steady increase in the number of
native labourers available for work in mines, an increase
which more than counterbalanced the outflow of Chinese labour
through repatriation, the pendulum has begun to swing the
other way, and already the pinch is beginning to make itself
felt in certain mines. During the last two months the excess
of time-expired natives and wastage over the number recruited
has been more than 8000, and repatriated Chinese brings the
total up to 10,000. Considering that the total coloured labour
force employed on the Witwatersrand was over 180,000 in April,
this comparatively small decline under normal conditions
should hardly make itself felt at all. But the conditions are
not normal. An era of expansion set in some 18 months ago
which has been steadily growing, and which has called for an
ever-increasing labour force and in the near future must
require still more and more. How that demand is to be met is
by no means clear."

RACE PROBLEMS: In the United States:
Between its White and Black Citizens:
Booker T. Washington’s solution in progress at Tuskegee.

See (in this Volume)
EDUCATION: UNITED STATES: A. D. 1906.

RACE PROBLEMS:
The "Niagara Movement."
A National Committee for the Advancement of the Negro Race.

In July, 1905, a conference of colored men from North and
South, among whom Professor W. E. Burghardt Du Bois, of
Atlanta, appeared to be the leading spirit, was held at
Buffalo, New York. Its outcome was an organization which has
taken the name of "The Niagara Movement," and which has had
some growth. At the latest annual meeting of the organization,
in Sea Isle City, New Jersey, in August, 1909, ten States were
reported to be represented, and the total membership of the
"Movement" was said to be three hundred, distributed in forty
States. Its objects are indicated in the following passages
from an Address which this meeting adopted:

"For four years the Niagara Movement has struggled to make ten
million Americans of negro descent cease from mere apology and
weak surrender to aggression, and take a firm, unfaltering
stand for justice, manhood, and self-assertion. We are
accumulating property at a constantly accelerating rate; we
are rapidly lowering our rate of illiteracy; but property and
intelligence are of little use unless guided by the great
ideals of freedom, justice, and human brotherhood.

"As a partial result of our effort we are glad to note among
us increasing spiritual unrest, sterner impatience with
cowardice, and deeper determination to be men at any cost. …

"That black men are inherently inferior to whites is a
wide-spread lie which science flatly contradicts, and the
attempt to submerge the colored races is one with world-old
efforts of the wily to exploit the weak. We must, therefore,
make common cause with the oppressed and down-trodden of all
races and peoples; with our kindred of South Africa and the
West Indies, with our fellows in Mexico, India, and Russia,
and with the cause of the working classes everywhere.

"On us rests to no little degree the burden of the cause of
individual freedom, human brotherhood, and universal peace in
a day when America is forgetting her promise and destiny. Let
us work on and never despair because pigmy voices are loudly
praising ill-gotten wealth, big guns, and human degradation.
They but represent back eddies in the tide of time."

Programme of future work adopted included the publication of a
series of small tracts and an almanac, the founding of a
monthly publication, and the purchase of a permanent place of
meeting where an annual Chautauqua will be held.

A Conference of people of both races who are desirous of
organizing more effective endeavors to better the status of
the negro citizens of the United States was held in New York
in May, 1909. It adopted a resolution providing for the
"incorporation of a national committee to be known as a
committee for the advancement of the negro race, to bring that
race from slavery to full citizenship with all the rights and
privileges appertaining thereto," and another resolution for a
Committee of Forty charged with the organization of the
national committee, with power to call the convention in 1910.

{534}

Among other resolutions discussed and adopted were the
following:

"As first and immediate steps toward remedying … national
wrongs, so full of perils for the whites as well as the blacks
of all sections, we demand of Congress and the Executive:

"(1.) That the Constitution be strictly enforced and the civil
rights guaranteed under the Fourteenth Amendment be secured
impartially to all.

"(2.) That there be equal educational opportunities for all
and in all the States, and that public school expenditure be
the same for the negro and white child.

"(3.) That in accordance with the Fifteenth Amendment the
right of the negro to the ballot on the same terms as other
citizens be recognized in every part of the country."

RACE PROBLEMS:
Anti-Negro Riot at Atlanta.

"On the 22d and 23d of September [1906] anti-negro riots broke
out in Atlanta, resulting in the death of twelve or more
negroes and the injury of a great many. There had been an
unusual number of reports of attacks upon white women and
girls by brutal and criminal negroes in the vicinity of
Atlanta during the previous days and weeks. Every report of
this kind had been flaunted with great headlines in a
sensational afternoon newspaper of Atlanta, as if to arouse
the less orderly and thoughtful element of the white
population not merely to the lynching of offenders but to an
attack upon innocent and law-abiding colored people. For a
time the riot was furious and negroes were indiscriminately
assailed. It would seem that most of those who were killed
were absolutely innocent of any offense whatsoever. Their
crime consisted merely in belonging to the negro race. It
would be the height of silliness for criticism to take on a
geographical character. White people in the North are no more
considerate of people against whom they may have a grievance
or a prejudice than are white people in the South. The problem
of adjusting the relations of two races so totally different
as the white race and the negro race where they have to live
together in the same communities is difficult under any
circumstances, and it becomes increasingly so where the
inferior race is present in large numbers and where many of
its members are ill-disciplined, idle, and of criminal
instincts."

_American Review of Reviews,
November, 1906._

"Wherever a colored man was seen he was attacked. The mobs
closed in upon the trolley-cars and dragged the colored
passengers, unprepared for the onslaught, from their seats. A
riotous crowd broke into a shop where there were two negro
barbers, beat them to death and mangled their bodies. One
negro was killed in the shadow of a monument; another was
stabbed to death on the post-office steps. The Governor
mobilized the militia, but the mobs, taking it for granted
that the militiamen were in sympathy with them, showed little
fear of the soldiers. The Mayor of the city remonstrated with
the rioters, but with little result. He called out the fire
department, which cleared the streets by turning the hose on
the mobs. But this only resulted in diverting the riot from
one place in the city to another. Only a rain on Sunday
dampened the ardor of the rioters. Order was outwardly
restored by Sunday evening, but even thereafter negroes were
killed. Even though the riot differed from the Russian variety
in that it was not instigated and abetted by the Government
and the military, it brings nothing but shame to this Nation."

_The Outlook,
September 29, 1906._

RACE PROBLEMS:
The Georgia Railroad Strike.

One of the meanest of recent exhibitions of race animosity was
presented in May and June, 1909, on the occasion of a strike
of white men employed as firemen on the Georgia Railroad
against the employment of blacks in the same capacity.
Generally, the southern railroads have employed, for years,
both white and black firemen. On the Georgia Railroad there
were about sixty of the former and forty of the latter. The
white firemen were eligible to promotion to be engineers; the
blacks were not. By an unwritten law they were excluded from
the higher and better paid service; but as firemen the best
among them had gradually won promotion to the better trains
and better "runs" on the road. It was this fact which caused
the strike of their white associates. As a labor strike it
would have caused little trouble; as a race and color question
it inflamed the State and the South, and disturbed the country
at large for several weeks. The conflict of the railroad
company was not with its own employees but with mobs along its
line, always ready to be maddened by the thought of a negro in
any place which a white man wanted.

A mediation in the matter undertaken, at the instance of
President Taft, by the United States Commissioner of Labor,
Dr. Charles P. Neill, and the Chairman of the Interstate
Commerce Commission, Mr. Martin A. Knapp, succeeded, with much
difficulty, in arranging a reference of the dispute to
arbitration. The chosen arbitrators were Hilary A. Herbert,
named by the railroad company, T. W. Hardwick, named by the
employees, and Chancellor David C. Barrow, of the University
of Georgia, selected by these two. This board of arbitration
gave hearings to both parties and rendered its award on the
27th of June. The main proposition submitted to it by the
employees was in these words: "That the Georgia Railroad
Company and its terminals at Atlanta will not use negroes as
locomotive firemen on the road or in the yards, nor as
hostlers nor assistant hostlers."

On this its decision was as follows: "The Georgia Railroad,
when using negroes as locomotive firemen on the road or in the
yards, or as hostlers, or as hostlers’ helpers, shall pay them
the same wages as white men in similar positions." But the
representative of the employees dissented from this decision
in part, explaining his view, as follows: "In so far as the
above finding permits the continued employment of negro
firemen by the Georgia Railroad, I dissent therefrom, because
I believe from the evidence that such employment is a menace
to the safety of the travelling public. In so far as such
finding requires that when negroes are so employed they shall
receive wages equal to those paid white men, I concur therein,
believing that such requirement, by removing the principal
incentive for their employment, will result in the speedy
elimination of this cheaper labor, and a consequent
improvement of the service."

On most of the minor points in controversy the arbitrators
were agreed in their conclusions, and the settlement of the
whole matter was complete.

{535}

RACE PROBLEMS:
Oriental Labor in Competition with Western Labor.
The Force of the Economic Objection to it in
a Country under the Protective System.

"Behind the economic antipathy to Oriental laborers there is
a justifiable feeling. Where there is established a system of
protection, it is only just that it benefit not only the
capitalist but also the laborer. If the American laborer must
contend as best he can with the laborer whose standard of life
is lower, then the American manufacturer, in fairness, ought
to be let alone in his contest with the foreign manufacturer
who does not pay so much for his labor. _The Outlook_
believes that a condition of such open competition as has
prevailed between the States of the Union would be wholesome
between the nations of the world. But at present the
protective system prevails and apparently is firmly
established in America. So long, therefore, as American
capital is protected, it is a benefit for the whole country to
have American labor protected. And certainly if there is any
body of laborers against which the working people of America
need protection, it is the coolie labor of Asia. The fact that
the Japanese and Chinese laborers enter industries in which
there is a scarcity of whites does not affect the case, for it
is not the direct loss of jobs, but the lowering—or at least
the changing—of the standards of living that brings injury to
the mass."

_The Outlook,
September 21, 1907._

RACE PROBLEMS:
Existing Treaties between the United States and China
concerning the Admission of Chinamen.
Enactments of Law on the Subject.
Correspondence of Wu Ting-fang with Secretary Hay.

For a proper understanding of the questions of national honor
and official civility that are involved in the existing laws
and regulations of the United States which govern the
admission of Chinamen to the country, either as visitors or
immigrants, some attention must be given to a series of
engagements by solemn treaty between the Governments of China
and the United States, respecting the hospitality which each
has pledged itself to give to the citizens of the other. Three
of those treaties remain partly or wholly in force. The
abrogation of the fourth one has a significance of its own.

The earliest of these treaties, negotiated in 1858,
superseding one of 1844, provided very carefully for the good
treatment of American citizens in China, but contains nothing
on the subject of Chinamen in America, probably for the reason
that few of that people had yet travelled so far abroad. The
rights it stipulated for the American who visited or sought
residence in the Celestial Empire were as follows:

"Article XI.
All citizens of the United States of America in China,
peaceably attending to their affairs, being placed on a common
footing of amity and good will with the subjects of China,
shall receive and enjoy for themselves and everything
appertaining to them the protection of the local authorities
of government, who shall defend them from all insult or injury
of any sort. If their dwellings or property be threatened or
attacked by mobs, incendiaries, or other violent or lawless
persons, the local officers, on requisition of the consul,
shall immediately despatch a military force to disperse the
rioters, apprehend the guilty individuals and punish them with
the utmost rigor of the law. Subjects of China guilty of any
criminal act towards citizens of the United States shall be
punished by the Chinese authorities according to the laws of
China. And citizens of the United States, either on shore or
in any merchant vessel, who may insult, trouble or wound the
persons or injure the property of Chinese or commit any other
improper act in China, shall be punished only by the Consul or
other public functionary thereto authorized according to the
laws of the United States. Arrests in order to trial may be
made by either the Chinese or the United States authorities."

Treaty of Peace, Amity, and Commerce, 1858
(Compilation of Treaties in Force, 58th Congress,
2d Session, Senate Document Number 318, page 138).

Ten years later, in 1868, another treaty was negotiated, not
to supersede that of 1858, but to supplement it; and in this
agreement the reciprocation of hospitalities is pledged in the
following distinct and cordial terms:

"Article V.
The United States of America and the Emperor of China
cordially recognize the inherent and inalienable right of man
to change his home and allegiance, and also the mutual
advantage of the free migration and emigration of their
citizens and subjects, respectively, from the one country to
the other, for purposes of curiosity, of trade, or as
permanent residents. The high contracting parties, therefore,
join in reprobating any other than an entirely voluntary
emigration for these purposes. They consequently agree to pass
laws making it a penal offence for a citizen of the United
States or Chinese subjects to take Chinese subjects either to
the United States or to any other foreign country, or for a
Chinese subject or citizen of the United States to take
citizens of the United States to China or to any other foreign
country, without their free and voluntary consent,
respectively.

"Article VI.
Citizens of the United States visiting or residing in China
shall enjoy the same privileges, immunities or exemptions in
respect to travel or residence as may there be enjoyed by the
citizens or subjects of the most favored nation. And,
reciprocally, Chinese subjects visiting or residing in the
United States shall enjoy the same privileges, immunities, and
exemptions in respect to travel or residence, as may there be
enjoyed by the citizens or subjects of the most favored
nation. But nothing herein contained shall be held to confer
naturalization upon citizens of the United States in China,
nor upon the subjects of China in the United States.

"Article VII.
Citizens of the United States shall enjoy all the privileges
of the public educational institutions under the control of
the Government of China, and, reciprocally, Chinese subjects
shall enjoy all the privileges of the public educational
institutions under the control of the Government of the United
States, which are enjoyed in the respective countries by the
citizens or subjects of the most favored nation. The citizens
of the United States may freely establish and maintain schools
within the Empire of China at those places where foreigners
are by treaty permitted to reside, and reciprocally, Chinese
subjects may enjoy the same privileges and immunities in the
United States."

_Treaty of Trade, Consuls, and Emigration, 1868
(58th Congress, 2d Session,
Senate Document Number 318, pages 157-158)._

{536}

That this treaty, as well as that of 1858, is still obligatory
in its hospitable spirit and intent, is a fact certified by
the language of the preamble of the treaty negotiated next, by
President Angell, of Michigan University, and other
Commissioners, in 1880. The recital in that preamble of the
purpose of the new agreement was this:

"Whereas, in the eighth year of Hsien Feng, Anno Domini 1858,
a treaty of peace and friendship was concluded between the
United States of America and China, and to which were added,
in the seventh year of Tung Chih, Anno Domini 1868, certain
supplementary articles to the advantage of both parties,
_which supplementary articles were to be perpetually
observed and obeyed:_ and Whereas the Government of the
United States, because of the constantly increasing
immigration of Chinese laborers to the territory of the United
States, and the embarrassments consequent upon such
immigration, now desires to negotiate _a modification of the
existing Treaties which shall not be in direct contravention
of their spirit:_ Now, therefore," &c. The following are
the four articles of the treaty thus explained:

"Article I.
Whenever in the opinion of the Government of the United States
the coming of Chinese laborers to the United States, or their
residence therein, affects or threatens to affect the
interests of that country, or to endanger the good order of
the said country or of any locality within the territory
thereof, the Government of China agrees that the Government of
the United States may regulate, limit, or suspend such coming
or residence, _but may not absolutely prohibit it. The
limitation or suspension shall be reasonable, and shall apply
only to Chinese who may go to the United States as
laborers,_ other classes not being included in the
limitations. Legislation taken in regard to Chinese laborers
will be of such a character only as is necessary to enforce
the regulation, limitation, or suspension of immigration, and
immigrants shall not be subject to personal maltreatment or
abuse.

"Article II.
Chinese subjects, whether proceeding to the United States as
teachers, students, merchants or from curiosity, together with
their body and household servants, and Chinese laborers who
are now in the United States _shall be allowed to go and
come of their own free will and accord, and shall be accorded
all the rights, privileges, immunities, and exemptions which
are accorded to the citizens and subjects of the most favored
nation._

"Article III.
If Chinese laborers, or Chinese of any other class, now either
permanently or temporarily residing in the territory of the
United States, meet with ill treatment at the hands of any
other persons, the Government of the United States will exert
all its power to devise measures for their protection and to
secure to them the same rights, privileges, immunities, and
exemptions as may be enjoyed by the citizens or subjects of
the most favored nation, and to which they are entitled by
treaty.

"Article IV.
The high contracting powers having agreed upon the foregoing
articles, whenever the Government of the United States shall
adopt legislative measures in accordance therewith, such
measures will be communicated to the Government of China. If
the measures as enacted are found to work hardship upon the
subjects of China, the Chinese minister at Washington may
bring the matter to the notice of the Secretary of State of
the United States, who will consider the subject with him; and
the Chinese Foreign Office may also bring the matter to the
notice of the United States minister at Peking and consider
the subject with him, to the end that mutual and unqualified
benefit may result.

This is the latest of the still obligatory engagements by
treaty that bear on the admission of visitors or immigrants
from China to the United States. A fourth treaty, pressed on
the Chinese Government in 1894, permitted the United States,
during a period of ten years, to prohibit entirely the coming
of Chinese laborers within its territory; but the concluding
article of that treaty was as follows:

"This Convention shall remain in force for a period of ten
years beginning with the date of the exchange of
ratifications, and, if six months before the expiration of
said period of ten years, neither Government shall have
formally given notice of its final termination to the other,
it shall remain in full force for another like period of ten
years." The Chinese Government did give the formal notice of
termination within the stipulated time, and the treaty became
void on the 7th of December, 1904.

Hence the Government of the United States is now under the
engagements which it made with the Government of China in
1880, which included an engagement to be faithful to the
hospitable spirit of the compact of 1868. When one has looked
over those engagements of national honor, it seems hard to
harmonize them in spirit, or even in letter, with some of the
enactments which are regulating, at the present day, the
treatment of people from China who venture to approach the
entry ports of the United States. Such, for example, as the
following, from "the Act of May 6, 1882, as amended and added
to by the Act of July 5, 1884," which, according to a recent
official publication of "Laws and Regulations governing the
Admission of Chinese," was "continued in force for an
additional period of ten years from May 5, 1892, by the act of
May 5, 1892, and was, with all laws on this subject in force
on April 29, 1902, reënacted, extended, and continued without
modification, limitation, or condition by the act of April 29,
1902, as amended by the act of April 27, 1904":

"Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled, That from
and after the passage of this act, and until the expiration of
ten years next after the passage of this act, the coming of
Chinese laborers to the United States be, and the same is
hereby suspended, and during such suspension it shall not be
lawful for any Chinese laborer to come from any foreign port
or place, or having so come to remain within the United
States."

"Section 2.
That the master of any vessel who shall knowingly bring within
the United States on such vessel, and land, or attempt to
land, or permit to be landed any Chinese laborer, from any
foreign port or place, shall be deemed guilty of a
misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by
a fine of not more than five hundred dollars for each and
every such Chinese laborer so brought, and may also be
imprisoned for a term not exceeding one year." …

{537}

"Section 6.
That in order to the faithful execution of the provisions of
this act, every Chinese person, other than a laborer, who may
be entitled by said treaty or this act to come within the
United States, and who shall be about to come to the United
States, shall obtain the permission of and be identified as so
entitled by the Chinese Government, or of such other foreign
government of which at the time such Chinese person shall be a
subject, in each case to be evidenced by a certificate issued
by such Government, which certificate shall be in the English
language, and shall show such permission, with the name of the
permitted person in his or her proper signature, and which
certificate shall state the individual, family, and tribal
name in full, title or official rank, if any, the age, height,
and all physical peculiarities, former and present occupation
or profession, when and where and how long pursued, and place
of residence of the person to whom the certificate is issued,
and that such person is entitled by this act to come within
the United States.

"If the person so applying for a certificate shall be a
merchant, said certificate shall in addition to above
requirements, state the nature, character, and estimated value
of the business carried on by him prior to and at the time of
his application as aforesaid: _Provided_, That nothing in
this act nor in said treaty shall be construed as embracing
within the meaning of the word ‘merchant,’ hucksters,
peddlers, or those engaged in taking, drying, or otherwise
preserving shell or other fish for home consumption or
exportation.

"If the certificate be sought for the purpose of travel for
curiosity, it shall also state whether the applicant intends
to pass through or travel within the United States, together
with his financial standing in the country from which such
certificate is desired.

"The certificate provided for in this act, and the identity of
the person named therein shall, before such person goes on
board any vessel to proceed to the United States, be viséd by
the indorsement of the diplomatic representatives of the
United States in the foreign country from which such
certificate issues, or of the consular representative of the
United States at the port or place from which the person named
in the certificate is about to depart; and such diplomatic
representative or consular representative whose indorsement is
so required is hereby empowered, and it shall be his duty,
before indorsing such certificate as aforesaid, to examine
into the truth of the statements set forth in said
certificate, and if he shall find upon examination that said
or any of the statements therein contained are untrue it shall
be his duty to refuse to indorse the same.

"Such certificate viséd as aforesaid shall be prima facie
evidence of the facts set forth therein, and shall be produced
to the Chinese inspector in charge of the port in the district
in the United States at which the person named therein shall
arrive, and afterward produced to the proper authorities of
the United States whenever lawfully demanded, and shall be the
sole evidence permissible on the part of the person so
producing the same to establish a right of entry into the
United States; but said certificate may be controverted and
the facts therein stated disproved by the United States
authorities."

It will be observed that Article IV. of the Treaty of 1880
provides that, if measures enacted in the United States "are
found to work hardship upon the subjects of China, the Chinese
minister at Washington may bring the matter to the notice of
the Secretary of State of the United States, who will consider
the subject with him." One who consults the annual reports
that are published, of "Papers relating to the Foreign
Relations of the United States," will find that the Chinese
Minister at Washington has had occasion very often to bring
cases of the kind thus referred to in the Treaty to the notice
of the Secretary of State, and discovered, when he did so,
almost invariably, that under the enactments complained of the
Secretary of State had no power even to "consider the subject"
of complaint with him. The highly intelligent and keenly
logical Mr. Wu Ting-fang, who represented China at Washington
in 1900-1902, had much correspondence on such matters with
Secretary Hay, whose sympathetic friendliness to China was
well proved; but Mr. Hay could never do more than refer Mr.
Wu’s representations to the Treasury Department and its
officials, who held all authority in the matter, and politely
return to the Chinese Minister such responses as they put into
his hands. The following is one example of Mr. Wu Ting-fang’s
communications. It is dated at Washington, December 26, 1900:

"I have received from the imperial consul-general and from
reputable Chinese merchants in San Francisco such urgent
complaints that I feel it my regrettable duty to again address
you on the subject of the manner in which the immigration laws
of Congress are being enforced against Chinese subjects. They
represent what I set forth in my note of the 30th ultimo, that
under the rulings of the authorities of the port of San
Francisco Chinese students holding certificates in conformity
to the treaty and law of Congress are virtually debarred from
entering the United States, it being held by the said
authorities that such students must come here with a knowledge
of the English language and with an education that will permit
them to forthwith enter a college or take up an advanced
professional course of study. They further represent that
under the act of November 3, 1893, the Government of the
United States issued certificates of residence to a large
number of Chinese persons, not laborers—merchants and others—
and that the rights acquired under these certificates are
being entirely ignored. Holders of such certificates desiring
to make a temporary visit to China are denied the privilege,
and persons who have departed holding such certificates are
denied the privilege of reentering the United States. They
state that merchants returning to San Francisco after a
temporary visit to China are often imprisoned in the detention
dock for weeks and months pending their landing. Their
Caucasian witnesses are put to all sorts of inconveniences and
annoyances and treated with suspicion and discourtesy. When
present to sign identification papers they are compelled to
await the pleasure of the Chinese bureau for examination, and
are plied with all sorts of immaterial questions from an
inspector, who assumes the character of an inquisitor.
{538}
The result of this is that it is now very difficult for
Chinese desiring to visit their native land to obtain the
necessary signatures for their identification papers, thus
causing them untold mental and financial suffering. They
report that it has been heretofore the custom in San Francisco
for years to allow the attorney for the persons desiring to
enter the United States to be present at the Chinese bureau
pending the taking of evidence on their behalf, thus affording
a protection to the Chinese applicants and operating as a
restraint upon overzealous subordinate officials. It has just
been ordered by the port authorities that henceforth no
attorneys shall be allowed to be present at the taking of such
testimony, or of any testimony on behalf of Chinese desiring
to enter that port. They assert that this action makes the
immigration inspector, whose avowed policy is to cause the
return to China of every Chinese he possibly can, the master
of the situation and throws all Chinese applicants at his
feet."

_Minister Wu to Secretary Hay, December 26, 1900
(Foreign Relations, 1901, page 64)._

In a previous communication the Chinese Minister had expressed
the opinion that the matter demanded the attention of the
President; to which Secretary Hay replied that "in the
Department’s view the immigration acts do not confer upon the
President any power to interpose in the matter. The act of
August 18, 1894, provides that ‘in every case where an alien
is excluded from admission into the United States under any
law or treaty now existing or hereafter made, the decision of
the appropriate immigration or customs officers, if adverse to
the admission of such alien, shall be final, unless reversed
on appeal to the Secretary of the Treasury." On this statement
Mr. Wu now remarked: