A TALE OF TWO CULTURES:

The Expulsion of the Chinese from Tacoma in 1885

 

Emma Grunberg

Junior Division

Historical Paper

Completed May 2, 2001

 

Introduction

Imagine a line on a map, separating two countries.  This line is a frontier that changes over time.  But frontiers are not only the borders between countries.  They can also be the lines of contact and struggle between peoples.  America has always been a land of frontiers, even on the Eastern Coast, because it takes very different cultures and throws them together.  As Joe R. Fagin argues in his book “Racial and Ethnic Relations,” there are certain distinct outcomes of the initial contact between cultures: exclusion or genocide, egalitarian symbiosis, or a stratification system.1   As I researched the story of the Chinese in Tacoma with these outcomes in mind, I formed my thesis. 

            When peoples from different cultures are thrown together, they create a frontier, a place where different ways of life and thinking must learn to co-exist.  Often the group with the most social, political and economic power will categorize the subordinate group as the “other” and will ignore the individuality of the members of the group.  The whites did this to the Chinese.

            Tacoma was a geographical frontier as well as a cultural frontier.  Washington hadn’t become a state when the expulsion of the Chinese occurred in 1885. Systems of criminal justice were more fragile because elements of a civil society were not as deeply rooted as they would have been in a more established society.  

Historical Background and Context

The first major wave of Chinese immigrants came to California in 1849. What made them come?  Where did they live?  Americans must have asked themselves these questions as the boats began to land.

Most of the Chinese in the United States originate from Toishan, a southern coastal district about the size of King County.  They came to escape hunger, poverty, and rebellion.²  A pioneering spirit marked these people whose ancestors had once pushed to expand China’s borders, and who now spanned the globe, settling in places like Peru, Australia, Hawaii, and the Western United States in search of the better life promised by the large labor companies.³

The Chinese had come to California to mine, envisioning the “Golden Mountain” of their dreams.  When the gold was gone, they began working on the transcontinental railroad.  Soon that was completed, and they moved to the nearest cities, opening shops, laundries and restaurants. 

In times of prosperity, the Chinese were tolerated as hard workers for cheap wages.  However, in the mid-nineteenth century, the West entered an economic recession, with unemployment and poverty on the rise.  What could white workers do when they turned to the cities and found the Chinese taking jobs thought to belong to whites alone?  Their answer was to turn to labor leaders like the Californian, Dennis Kearney.  Kearney blamed the recession on the Chinese,  who were thought to work cheap and smell bad.  Kearney ended his speeches with “The Chinese Must Go,” which the growing movement adopted as their slogan.⁴  During these times, outbreaks of violence against the Chinese became commonplace in San Francisco and throughout the West Coast.

Now, the process of creating “others” referred to in my thesis was taking hold.  Two groups were being formed—the “whites” and the “Chinese.”  European immigrants, especially the Irish, fought hard against the Chinese, perhaps to get themselves accepted into the “white group” by pushing the Chinese down and blurring other ethnic differences.

The Chinese in Tacoma

             Anti-Chinese feeling in Tacoma was at the forefront of all activities.  The first topic at the first meeting of the first literary society in Tacoma on January 25, 1875 was, “Resolved: That Chinese Immigration has been a menace to the United States.”  ⁵  As Herbert Hunt in “History of Tacoma” points out, “The affirmative won.  It always did.”  ⁶  This took place in a time where you could read in the Encyclopedia Britannica that

The Chinese is cold, cunning, and distrustful, always ready to take advantage of those he has to deal with, extremely covetous and deceitful, quarrelsome, vindictive, but timid and dastardly. ⁷

 

In 1881, Tacoma's population doubled, going from 1098 to 2000. ⁸  Robert Jacob Weisbach, a moderately successful merchant, arrived in Tacoma with the wave of new settlers.  He had tried being a revolutionary in Germany, failed, moved to China, then to the U.S., and eventually settled in Tacoma.  Weisbach, known for his domineering personality and nonexistent sense of humor, was elected Mayor of Tacoma.⁹  His election in 1884 coincided with a downturn in the economy and an expanding population, consisting of the newly merged towns of Old Tacoma (pop. 400) and New Tacoma(pop. 4000).¹⁰ When a meeting was called entitled “Solving the Chinese Problem without Violence,” half of Tacoma’s voting population came to participate.  They decided to boycott all Chinese-owned stores and threatened those who disagreed with “full publicity.” ¹¹   Weeks later, when the Reverend W. D. McFarland preached tolerance toward the Chinese, insulting articles came out about him in the Tacoma Daily Ledger (the leading Tacoma newspaper edited by Jack Comerfield, a very anti-Chinese man).  “Let him preach to empty benches,” said the headline.  And then, the article went on:

…the only violence to be feared in the present crisis  is from pro-Chinese fanatics.  …mouthings of this alleged Christian were so disgusting and offensive …a loud mouthed demagogue who, having an able bodied wife…blames others for the presence of the Chinese here, while his washing is sent regularly to a stinking Chinese laundry…¹²

 

The pro-Chinese were being grouped together and stereotyped along with the Chinese themselves.

            The educated class of Tacoma, distinct from Tacoma’s local government, realized that if they called more public meetings, the “mob” would take over the proceedings.  Accordingly, they scheduled another meeting by invitation only, to discuss more important things to be worried about than the Chinese.  After all, said an upper-class Reverend, a Chinese brothel is a threat to the community, but white brothels are more numerous!  These select citizens formed the Tacoma Law and Order League.  They awoke the next morning to find themselves and their newly formed group in the morning news.  The Ledger called them various names, including “a cackling sisterhood of impractical reformers.”  Following this public ridicule, the Law and Order League went the way of Reverend McFarland: banished from the public eye.¹³

Along with the efforts of the newspapers, other groups were busy agitating against the Chinese.  Stores advertised in the papers with “The Chinese Must Go!”  A local International Workingmen’s Association (IWA) was formed (different from the Marxist organization of the same name) and adopted the cause.  Then the IWA, the Brotherhoods, the unions, the fire department, the Labor Party and the Germanic Society merged to create the Tacoma Anti-Chinese League.  Mayor R. Jacob Weisbach was president-elect.¹⁴  The Chinese were taking the workingmen’s jobs.  The town had hit hard times, and the dominant “white group” responded by choosing the “heathen” Chinese as their scapegoats.  They were an easy group to recognize.  They wore their hair in “queues,” or long pigtails.  They ate bottomfish instead of the more popular fish and dressed in blue cotton jackets and trousers that looked like pyjamas.

            The city council finally responded to the pressure from the media and the people, issuing a decree that copied San Francisco in demanding 500 feet of living space for every person.  Many Chinese couldn’t afford to meet that requirement.  The League now was in possession of a justification for anti-Chinese action.  When agitators from Seattle held an anti-Chinese congress of Puget Sound, Tacoma sent the largest delegation.  The Committee of Fifteen was formed, which included Mayor Weisbach.  This committee was charged with the expulsion of the Chinese from Tacoma.  Secretly, a circle of nine also pledged to expel the Chinese, and probably was more active than the Fifteen.¹⁵

            The Chinese were given a month to leave Tacoma.  One hundred and fifty simply left quietly, anticipating the events ahead.  Two hundred stayed and had to face an intimidating mob.  At 9:30 a.m., November 3, 1885, in the Ledger’s words, “The shrieking of shop whistles suddenly rent the air”¹⁶ and a crowd of 500 men began to march down Pacific Avenue.  They reached almost every Chinese dwelling in the city, and, for the most part, the Chinese left, though with reluctance.  Some had barricaded their houses, but the sound of 500 angry men made them comply.  One hundred and ninety-seven were packed off to Lake View that day, 150 had left earlier, and 40 left the next day.¹⁷  The mob forced many to walk the nine miles to Lake View in the pouring rain, and two died of exposure.¹⁸   The Chinese either stayed in Lake View or traveled to other communities.  Some Chinese had to walk all the way to Portland.  Rev. McFarland questioned whether this was really America, but his friend persuaded him not to do anything, because, “ It don’t matter what you do…you’d just make it worse.”  ¹⁹

            Not all whites agreed to fire their Chinese workers and houseboys.  One woman, Mrs. Ezra Brown, grabbed a broomstick and faced the mob, as her Chinese houseboy cowered under the sink. 

            “Let him go!” yelled the mob.

            “I won’t!”

            “Let him go!”

                With this, the woman charged into the rows of men with a broomstick.²⁰

            Lum May owned the largest Chinese shop in Tacoma.  Here is his retelling of the events when the mob stood outside his house:

When the doors were locked they broke forcibly into the houses, smashing in doors and breaking in windows.  Some of the crowd were armed with pistols, some with clubs.  They acted in a rude, boisterous, threatening manner, dragging and kicking the Chinese out of the houses.  My wife refused to go and some of the white persons dragged her out.  She lost her reason and has ever since been hopelessly insane.²¹

 

This story contrasts very sharply with the peaceful, nonviolent tale

 

that appeared in the Ledger the next morning.

 

            Although a few pro-Chinese spoke up, they were no match for the mob, and the expulsion of the Chinese from Tacoma went smoothly.  The anti-Chinese feeling was so deeply engrained in many Tacomans’ minds that even the so-called pro-Chinese protested quickly that they had “no special love for a Chinaman…” ²²

                What happened to the Chinese who were forced to leave Tacoma?  Theresa C. Pan, president of the Chinese Reconciliation Project Foundation, says that the expulsion may have been a family shame.  “It’s a cultural thing,” she said, “something that you don’t want to bring out.  So your children may not know what happened to you.” ²³

            Many conditions were present in Tacoma that allowed the expulsion to take place.  For instance, the economy entered a recession, and the Chinese were blamed for the loss of jobs.  This, however, accounted for much of the violence throughout the West Coast.  Why was the expulsion so successful in Tacoma?

            Firstly, the non-Chinese residents of Tacoma had not taken the time to learn about the Chinese or their culture.  Instead, they turned to common stereotypes: the Chinese were docile, dirty, heathen and dishonest.

Secondly, Tacoma’s officials lacked the vision and courage to provide the good leadership Tacoma needed.  A leader is one who can point the community in the direction that is best for all and not just what is best for a few.  Even the Tacoma Law and Order League, who disapproved of the expulsion, were more concerned with themselves than anyone else.

  Thirdly, the press only served as a tool to promote anti-Chinese action.  Instead of reporting actual news, the Tacoma Daily Ledger and sometimes the Tacoma News filled their front pages with editorials condemning the Chinese and their supporters.

            Fourth, since Tacoma was a frontier town, Tacomans thought of themselves as “a place beyond the rule of law.”  ²⁴  They disregarded the wider society and placed the rule of law into the hands of the mayor and other local politicians.  Publications like the West Shore and Overland Monthly had flowery names for Tacoma, like “City of Destiny” and “Jewel of the Pacific.”  Eastern papers saw the town differently: “The hoodlums and ruffians who infest most frontier places and all rapidly growing towns in the far West set up the wild crusade…  [the mayor is] a brutal foreigner...”²⁵

            Additionally, the people of Tacoma lacked the time to work out their differences.  Sometimes after many years, different groups can learn to tolerate each other, but Tacoma was a young frontier town, and the Chinese and whites had only just come into contact. 

            Months after the expulsion, twenty-seven of the key participants and leaders were sent to trial, but a biased jury let them off.²⁶  Up until five years after the expulsion no politician who opposed the expulsion won office.²⁷ 

Conclusion

The politicians in Tacoma nurtured popular fears and used the public’s ignorance of the Chinese to their own advantage by fostering an ‘us’ and ‘them’ atmosphere.  This process of creating “others” still goes on today, though it does not always result in expulsion.  But how many “others” do we create today, whether the group in question is the “poor”, “blacks”, ”gays”, etc., attributing emotions and characteristics to them collectively?  We fail to see each person’s individuality. 

Today, the frontier between the Chinese and white Americans is like a peaceful border between the countries on a map.  The Chinese community in Tacoma is much smaller than that of other coastal cities, but it has tried to involve the Chinese families by organizing get-togethers and teaching the Chinese language.

            Nevertheless, it is not just negative outcomes that can occur on the frontier between two cultures.  It is also possible that with time, education and good leadership, discrimination and hostility can give way to understanding and reconciliation.  For instance, in this state with its history of discrimination against the Chinese, we have elected the first and only Chinese-American governor in the nation, Governor Gary Locke.  As he states,

Today, my family and I live in the Governor’s Mansion—just a mile away from the house where my grandfather swept floors, cooked, and washed dishes.  I often comment that it has taken my family over 100 years to travel one mile.  It has been a journey of hope, hard work, and faith.  My family faced poverty and predjudice, but my parents held fast to their belief in America’s essential goodness, doing all they could to contribute to it.²⁸

 

            A frontier between two cultures can also be an opportunity for people from different backgrounds to learn about each other’s culture.  Soon, near the place that once was a Chinatown on the waterfront in Tacoma, the Chinese Reconciliation Project Foundation is building a multicultural center for, in their own words, “exploring and celebrating cultural diversity as well as common humanity.”  ²⁹

The expulsion of the Chinese from Tacoma was once called the “Tacoma Method” and was the model for other towns when they wanted to get rid of their own Chinese.  Maybe now other cities can look to the new “Tacoma Method” as an “example of reconciliation.” ³⁰

 

Endnotes