failed, but as a result of that attempt the whole question of Chinese immigration was fully presented to Congress for the first time.

In 1880 a new treaty with China was concluded, in which that country agreed that "the Government of the United States may regulate, limit, or suspend such coming or residence, but may not absolutely prohibit it.”

The first exclusion act was passed in 1882. As originally enacted it prohibited the immigration of Chinese laborers for a period of twenty years. This bill was vetoed by President Arthur, who, following the example of President Hayes in the matter of the so-called Fifteen Passenger bill (1879), declared that the Exclusion bill violated the treaty, inasmuch as neither contracting party had contemplated so long a suspension as twenty years, or would have considered such a period a "reasonable" suspension or limitation. The bill was immediately amended to limit the period of suspension to ten years. In this form it was reenacted and approved by the President (May 6, 1882).

In 1884 the Exclusion Act was amended to prohibit the entry of Chinese not only from China but also from "any foreign port or place." Other defects in the law became apparent, and in 1888 a bill was passed regulating the conditions under which a Chinese laborer, having left the United States, should be permitted to return. Notwithstanding all efforts to insure absolute exclusion, the Census of 1890 showed an increase of 2,000

Chinese in the United States (total 107,000), as compared with the figures of 1880.

In 1891 the Legislature of California passed an exclusion law, in accordance, presumably, with the policy of admonition previously adopted. Of course this second adventure into the realm

of federal jurisdiction met the fate of its predecessor. It would seem, however, that the admonition was not entirely in vain.

In 1892 the Geary Act was passed. This measure extended the original exclusion law and all supplementary legislation for an additional period of ten years. In 1893 the McCreary Act was passed, extending the time allowed for registration and discontinuing all proceedings for violation of the former act. In 1894 a treaty between the United States and China was adopted, in which the latter country agreed to the exclusion laws. In 1902 the present Chinese Exclusion Act was passed, renewing for an indefinite period all laws prohibiting and regulating the coming of Chinese laborers from China, from any foreign port or place, and from or to the Island territory of the United States.

On many occasions during the long discussion of the subject reference was made to the Japanese, varied by the use of the terms, "Asiatic" and "Mongolian." But for the question of "practical politics" the demand for exclusion would have included the Japanese. The latter were omitted from the exclusion laws, not because of any distinction in their favor but solely because it was deemed wise to concentrate effort upon the actual evil of Chinese immigration rather than risk failure by an attempt to forestall events.

Japanese immigration has passed the stage of potential evil. The conditions created by the presence of the Japanese in many localities have raised issues in every respect much more acute than those of the past. The present agitation is but a repetition in aggravated form of the history of Chinese immigration. The most important lesson which we gather from

that history is that as the solution of the problem can only be accomplished through exclusion by federal enactment, the continued failure of Congress to exercise its authority, thus leaving the people of the States to their own

THE

devices, will increase public resentment in the respective localities and proportionately complicate the real problem by involving in its discussion many matters of an extraneous or at best incidental nature.

HE full significance of the present agitation in California against the influx and settlement of Japanese can not be appreciated unless we understand that it is only a phase of two larger issues: the issue of Asiatic immigration, from whatever source, into the United States; and the even larger issue of colored immigration into lands of white settlement throughout the world. For the last half-century the relations of the white and non-white races have been growing both closer and more critical, until today they constitute unquestionably the gravest problem which confronts the world.

These relations are the logical outcome of the past four centuries of world history. During the last four hundred years the whites have spread broadcast over the globe, occupying its empty regions, like America and Australia, and building up a civilization. characterized preeminently by high standards of living. Down to the last few decades of this long period the non-white races were practically passive, staying in their ancestral homes and filling those regions with dense populations characterized by low standards of living. But of late years

1 Author of: The French Revolution in San Domingo (1914), Present-Day Europe-Its National States of Mind (1917), The Stakes of the War (1918), Harper's Pictorial Library of the World War (vol. 6, The World at War), (1919), The Rising Tide of Color against White WorldSupremacy (1920.) The EDITOR.

the non-white races have begun to stir. They hear about rich, thinly-peopled white men's lands. They learn the ease of ocean travel. They chafe at their pinched, crowded existence and long to enter those newer white men's lands whose ampler opportunities render them a veritable earthly paradise. They begin to cross the white world's frontiers. But the white inhabitants of these frontier regions at once take alarm. Relatively insignificant in numbers, they see themselves menaced by countless hordes of colored men threatening them with the destruction of their living standards, with numerical submersion, with social sterilization, and with ultimate racial extinction. Naturally the whites resolve that this shall not be. They resolve that the lands won by their pioneering enter prise shall remain their possession and the heritage of their children. They erect legal barriers debarring the colored immigrants from their soil. The colored man is thus balked in his dearest hopes. He strives to evade these legal barriers, and to a certain extent succeeds. The whites are still further alarmed. The barriers are still further strengthened. The colored pressure against them grows in turn. Passions become more and more inflamed. Both sides invoke the elemental principle of self-preservation. Both sides threaten to make good their

cause by the ultimate argument of force-i.e., war.

That, in brief, is the situation which has developed between the teeming populations of awakened Asia and the frontier populations of the white world. Its most acute phase, to be sure, is today seen in California, and it is to that phase that this paper will be chiefly devoted. The reader should remember, however, that what he learns concerning the Japanese in California holds good for all types of Asiatic in other states of our Union, in Canada, in Australia, in South Africa and in every other region of white settlement where the man of color attempts to penetrate. It is a true world-problem which confronts us, and it must be considered in this broad way.

California, however, presents the best epitome of the problem of colored immigration into white territory. It was in California that Asiatic immigration was first clearly recognized to be a "problem," and it is California which has been the special goal of all three of the Asiatic migratory races-Chinese, Japanese and Hindus. In fact, the present Japanese immigration is a secondary phenomenon in the history of Asiatic penetration of California. Chinese immigration was the first phase, and the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1892, taken in conjunction with the "Asiatic Barred Zone" clause of the Immigration Act of 1917 by which Hindu immigration was likewise stopped, together suggest workable means for dealing with the Japanese question.

Chinese immigration into California began shortly after the gold rush of 1849. In the year 1854 more than thirteen thousand Chinese arrived, and so great was the influx in succeeding years that the white settlers grew gravely alarmed. The Chinese worked

so hard and lived so cheaply that white labor simply could not compete against them, and with human reservoirs of over 400 million to draw on it soon became clear that the Chinese immigration threatened to swamp California's small white population and turn our Pacific Coast into a yellow man's land. Accordingly, California began appealing to Washington for exclusionist legislation, reënforcing its arguments by a popular referendum held in 1880, which showed the inhabitants of the state overwhelmingly in favor of Chinese exclusion. Meanwhile Congress had appointed a special commission to investigate matters on the spot, and its report, together with the appeals from the Coast, finally convinced Congress that the Chinese influx must be stopped. Accordingly, a series of measures was passed culminating in the Geary Act of 1892. This exclusionist legislation worked. The Chinese population of the United States is today only about one-half what it was in 1890, and it continues to diminish so steadily that within. another generation the Chinese element here will have dwindled to the vanishing point.

This Chinese prologue to the present Japanese problem bears upon that problem not only as illustrating the efficacy of exclusion legislation but also because the whole question of the legal status of Asiatics in the United States was threshed out out and judicially settled. The founders of our Republic had obviously intended America to be a white man's country, the Naturalization Acts of 1802 and 1804 stating that only "free white persons" were capable of naturalization. After the Civil War naturalization was thrown open to Africans, but the Supreme Court held that this extension was restrictive and did not apply to Asiatics, who were thus incapable of becoming citizens,

albeit the children of Asiatics born on American soil were eligible. Furthermore the broad principles underlying the questions of immigration and naturalization were clearly defined. It has always been the contention of most international jurists that a sovereign state is the sole judge as to whom it shall admit either to entry or to citizenship, such prerogatives being an inherent part of its sovereignty and necessary to its self-defense. These contentions have been upheld by our Supreme Court.

These decisions are of fundamental importance. They prove that our action towards Asiatic immigration, settlement and citizenship can be considered purely as matters of policy, undisturbed by questions of legal right or obligation. Asiatics, particularly Japanese, are continually asserting that we have no "right" to discriminate be-, tween Asiatics and Europeans as regards either immigration or citizenship. Such contentions are, however, wholly baseless. On the contrary, both national and international law concur in giving us an absolute right to determine whom we shall admit to our territory and our franchise. It is one of the bright spots of the present situation that the legal bases have been so thoroughly established.

Japanese immigration did not become noticeable until the year 1900. In that year over twelve thousand Japanese entered the country. At this practically unheralded influx California instantly took alarm. The history of Chinese immigration had taught Californians the almost uncanny way in which an Asiatic influx could suddenly increase from nothing to portentous proportions. By 1905 the Japanese in California had become an international question owing to the diplomatic crisis over the San Fran

cisco school segregation episode. This crisis, together with the rising tide of Japanese immigrants and the consequent alarm of the Pacific Coast, convinced the Federal Government that quick action was imperative. The upshot was the "Gentlemen's Agreement" of 1907-an attempt by our government to stop Japanese immigration without wounding Japanese susceptibilities. By this Agreement the Japanese Government agreed to discontinue the granting of passports to laborers.

Agreement"

The "Gentlemen's (which still governs Japanese immigration to the United States) at first seemed to meet all expectations. In 1907, the year of its making, over thirty thousand Japanese entered this country. In 1908, the number of Japanese immigrants was only eighteen thousand, and in 1909 it fell to a trifle over three thousand. That, however, was the low-water mark. During the past decade Japanese immigration has been steadily rising, until in 1919 the number admitted was over sixteen thousand. The "Gentlemen's Agreement" has, in fact, satisfied neither the inhabitants of the Pacific Coast nor the experts of our Bureau of Immigration. Our Government, in negotiating the Agreement, aimed at restricting the influx of Japanese to a point similar to that already attained by the Chinese Exclusion Act; i.e., to travellers, students, teachers, scientists and merchants engaged in international trade. But, by the terms of the Agreement, Japan limits her refusal of passports only to "laborers." To all other classes there is no bar. For example, farmers (as contrasted with farm laborers) do not fall within the prohibited class; and it is precisely these Japanese farmers who have been so active in that acquirement of agricul

tural land which has so alarmed the Coast and has led to California's restrictive legislation.

Not merely California but adjacent western states have sought by legislative measures to stop the development of Asiatic agricultural colonies on their soil. In 1912, for example, Arizona passed such legislation. It was, however, California's famous Heney-Webb Land Act which brought on a diplomatic crisis between the American and Japanese governments more acute even than that of 1905. Japan protested strongly against such legislation, but the Federal Government upheld California as being within her legal rights. It is interesting to observe that the Californians were strengthened in their determination by the influx of a third type of Asiatic-the Hindu. The number of Hindus actually admitted was small, but the only reason was the uncompromising attitude of the immigration officers, who invoked every legal technicality to bar them out. These intensely objectionable Asiatics were desperately anxious to get in, and they were but the pioneers of countless swarms, eager to come to America. Here was another Asiatic reservoir of over 300 million souls threatening to deluge the Coast. What wonder that the Coast became more determined than ever that Asiatics of whatever breed must be rigorously excluded if the Coast was to be kept a white man's country? What wonder that anti-Japanese sentiment grew ever stronger, especially when it became evident that the "Gentlemen's Agreement" failed to exclude and that the Japanese were gaining, both by immigration and by birth, an ever stronger hold on the land?

It was the latter element-the American-born Japanese which was most disquieting to Californians. The

early Japanese influx, like the still earlier Chinese influx, had been one of male laborers, bringing few or no women. But as time passed the Japanese, settling on the land, sent for their wives or contracted marriages by proxy with girls in the old country, the courtship frequently consisting in an exchange of photographs—whence the term "picture brides." These women bore their husbands many children, who, being born on American soil, were American citizens, untouchable by any anti-Asiatic legislation. It was, in fact, by grants to these children. that the Japanese were mainly able to circumvent the Heney-Webb Land Act prohibiting the ownership of land by aliens ineligible to citizenship.

The renewed anti-Asiatic efforts of the Coast first showed in the "Barred Zone" clause of the Immigration Act of 1917. This clause, embodied in Section 3 of the Act, excludes from the United States natives of the territories included within such zone not belonging to certain specified classes such as government officials, travellers for curiosity or pleasure, and persons of certain specified professional occupations. This Barred Zone includes the greater part of Asia. Japan lies outside of it. Nevertheless, it strikes indirectly at Japanese immigration by the fact that, taken in conjunction with the Chinese Exclusion Act, it debars virtually all Asiatics except the Japanese, who are still covered by the "Gentlemen's Agreement." Thus Japanese immigrants have become exceptions to our Asiatic exclusionist rule. The Hindus, for instance, are henceforth automatically excluded. Furthermore, the experts of our Immigration Bureau heartily endorse the Barred Zone idea and recommend that it be extended to cover not merely the whole of Asia but all of the rest of the non-white world.