The state-sponsored discrimination and denial of civil rights to Chinese immigrants compromised fundamental values America had been founded upon.
With the installation of the Statue of Liberty in 1886, some expressed discontent with the United States' hypocrisy.
“E Pluribus Unum (Except for the Chinese)” was a deliberate stab upon hypocritical Americans who forgot their own immigrant history. 1882. ("Illustrating the Chinese Exclusion")
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"...Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" -"The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, engraved on the Statue of Liberty (NPS) |
"The Only One Barred Out." A Chinese man is shown being denied entry to the "Golden Gate of Liberty." 1886. ("Illustrating the Chinese Exclusion")
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"We have boasted, for a century past, that this is a land of refuge for the oppressed and down-trodden of all nations; that under our flag the family of man might gather, assured of 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.' Let us stand by these grand old truths, and bid the Chinaman... welcome."
-David Phillips, 1887 ("Letters from California") |
Columbia, the feminine symbol of the United States, reminds that "America means fair play for all men." 1871. (Harper's Weekly)
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"I am a Chinaman, a republican, and a lover of free institutions; am much attached to the principles of the United States... You argue that the Constitution admits of no asylum to any other than the pale face. This proposition is false to the extreme, and you know it. The declaration of your independence, and the acts of your government, your people, and your history are all against you."
-Norman Asing, 1852 ("To His Excellency Gov. Bigler") |
In resistance, the Chinese-American community used the American court system and protection of the Constitution to challenge Exclusion laws. They filed over 10,000 lawsuits against legislation that had compromised justice.
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Wong Kim Ark, a cook born in California, was denied reentry to America after visiting his parents in China. Wong sued the government under the Fourteenth Amendment and, in 1898, the Supreme Court established that those born on American soil, regardless of race, are constitutionally protected citizens.
"No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
-Fourteenth Amendment (U.S. Constitution) |
Wong Kim Ark. 1898. (Chinese Historical Society of America)
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1898. (National Archives)
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"It took the Supreme Court to remind the government that the words of the Fourteenth Amendment meant just what they said. A person born in America was American."
-Bill Moyers (PBS) |
"It's very ironic for Congress to deny what is fundamental in democracy: the right to vote. We stripped the Chinese of citizenship and therefore the right to vote."
-Ling Chi Wang ("The Chinese Exclusion Act Official Trailer") |
"The struggles of the Chinese against these exclusion laws... laid down the foundations of civil rights law."
-Iris Chang (The Chinese in America)
-Iris Chang (The Chinese in America)