Japan and the California ProblemIyenaga, T. (Toyokichi)
History
Japan and the California Problem
Iyenaga, T. (Toyokichi)
Japan -- Emigration and immigration; Japanese -- California
For these two chief reasons, and perhaps for many other minor ones, there
arose the persistent social movement for Japanese exclusion in
California, which first took definite shape in 1900, when a mass-meeting
held at San Francisco for the express purpose of more rigidly excluding
the Chinese, adopted a resolution urging Congress to take measures for the
total exclusion of Japanese other than members of the Diplomatic Staff.
Following this came the first of the anti-Japanese messages delivered by
the Governor of California, and of the resolutions voted on by the State
Legislature calling upon Congress to extend the Chinese Exclusion Law to
other Asiatics. The climax of the movement was reached when, immediately
after the earthquake, the Board of Education of San Francisco passed the
"separate school order," and Japan protested. A series of diplomatic
negotiations followed, which finally resulted in the repeal of the school
discriminatory order and the conclusion of the "Gentlemen's Agreement,"
whereby Japan pledged herself to restrict the number of immigrants to the
United States.
Leaving to a later chapter the detailed discussion of the result which the
"Gentlemen's Agreement" has brought about in the status of Japanese
immigration, it will suffice to mention here that the agreement has
faithfully and loyally been carried out by Japan, and that since then the
Japanese problem has in fact ceased to be an immigration issue.
Results.
Twenty years of emigration attempts, chief of which we reviewed in this
chapter, have resulted in failure in every case, and Japan's effort to
plant her race in other lands has proved futile. There are many causes for
this failure, for which Japan is partially, but not wholly, responsible.
But this is a matter which we shall more fully discuss in the next
chapter. Excluded and maltreated wherever they went, the Japanese returned
home with shattered hopes and wounded feelings, and the mooted question of
population once more confronted them with intensified severity. Giving up
as entirely hopeless the attempt at settling in places where the white
races held supremacy, they now appear to have made up their minds to
migrate towards the north, where climatic and economic disadvantages,
together with political revolution in Eastern Europe, have freed the land
temporarily from the strong white grip, offering the line of least
resistance for Japanese.
CHAPTER VI
CAUSES OF ANTI-JAPANESE AGITATION
Modern Civilization.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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