Chinese Emigration and Immigration: Difference between revisions

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 ==Emigration to America==
-The Chinese were the first Asian immigrants to enter the United States. The first documentation of the Chinese in the United States begins in the 18th century. These first immigrants were well and widely received by the Americans. However, they were wealthy, successful merchants, along with skilled artisans, fishermen, and hotel and restaurant owners.
+*The first Chinese immigrants arrived in 1820, according to U.S. government records. 325 men are known to have arrived before the '''1849 California Gold Rush''', which drew the first significant number of laborers from China who mined for gold and performed menial labor.
+*There were 25,000 immigrants by 1852, and 105,465 by 1880, most of whom lived on the '''West Coast'''. They formed over a tenth of California's population. *Chinese workers migrated to the United States, first to work in the gold mines, but also to take '''agricultural jobs, and factory work, especially in the garment industry.'''
-Large-scale immigration began in the mid-1800s due to the California Gold Rush. After a much larger group of coolies (unskilled laborers who usually worked for very little pay) migrated to the United States in this time frame, American attitudes became more negative and hostile. By 1851, there were 25,000 Chinese working in California, mostly centered in and out of the "Gold Rush" area and around San Francisco. More than half the Chinese population in the United States lived in that region.
+*Nearly all of the early immigrants were young males with low educational levels from six districts in '''Guangdong Province'''. The '''Guangdong province''' experienced extreme floods and famine in the mid-nineteenth century. The instability caused by these events led to mass political unrest in the province in the form of the '''Taiping Rebellion'''. Most Chinese came from Southern China looking for a better life to escape a high poverty as a result of the Taiping Rebellion.
+*These Chinese immigrants were predominantly men. By 1900 only 4,522 of the 89,837 Chinese migrants that lived in the U.S. were women. The lack of women migrants was largely due to the passage of U.S. anti-immigration laws.
-These Chinese clustered into groups, working hard and living frugally. As the populations of these groups increased, they formed large cities of ethnic enclaves called "Chinatowns." The first and most important of the Chinatowns belonged to San Francisco. If researching Chinese who immigrated to the United States in the mid-1850s, this would be a place to begin the search.
+*Upon arrival to the U.S. Chinese men and women were separated from each other as they awaited hearings on their immigration status, which often took weeks.  Ninety percent of the Chinese women who immigrated to the US between 1898 and 1908 did so to join their husband or father who already resided in the U.S.
+*In the 1850s,  Chinese immigrants were particularly instrumental in '''building railroads''' in the U.S. west. The Central Pacific Railroad recruited large labor gangs, many on five-year contracts, to build its portion of the Transcontinental Railroad. The Chinese laborers worked out well and thousands more were recruited until the railroad's completion in 1869. Chinese labor provided the massive workforce needed to build the majority of the Central Pacific's difficult route through the Sierra Nevada mountains and across Nevada.
-Occupations can also direct a search for Chinese immigrants. The Chinese did not only mine for gold, but took on jobs such as cooks, peddlers, and storekeepers. In the first decade after the discovery of gold, many had taken jobs nobody else wanted. By 1880, one fifth of the Chinese immigrants were engaged in mining, another fifth in agriculture, a seventh in manufacturing, another seventh were domestic servants, and a tenth were laundry workers.
+*As Chinese laborers grew successful in the United States, a number of them became entrepreneurs in their own right. As the numbers of Chinese laborers increased, so did the strength of anti-Chinese attitude among other workers in the U.S. economy. This finally resulted in legislation that aimed to limit future immigration of Chinese workers to the United States through the Chinese Exclusion Act.
+*Nativist objections to Chinese immigration to the U.S. took many forms, and generally stemmed from economic and cultural tensions, as well as ethnic discrimination.
-An estimated 30,000 Chinese worked outside of California in such trades as mining, common labor, and service trades. During the 1860s, 10,000 Chinese were involved in the building of the western leg of the Central Pacific Railroad (for more information/resources, see the article [[Chinese Railroad Workers]]). The work was backbreaking and highly dangerous. Over a thousand Chinese had their bones shipped back to China to be buried. See the article [[China Burial Traditions]] in this outline.
+*Most Chinese laborers who came to the United States did so in order to send money back to China to support their families there. At the same time, they also had to repay loans to the Chinese merchants who paid their passage to North America.
+*From the 1850s through the 1870s, the California state government passed a series of measures aimed at Chinese residents, ranging from requiring special licenses for Chinese businesses or workers to preventing naturalization. Because anti-Chinese discrimination and efforts to stop Chinese immigration violated the 1868 Burlingame-Seward Treaty with China, the federal government was able to negate much of this legislation.
-As time passed, the resentment against the Chinese increased from those who could not compete with them in the workforce. Acts of violence against the Chinese continued for decades, mostly from white urban and agricultural workers. . Mob violence steadily increased against the Chinese until even employers were at risk. Eventually, laws such as the Naturalization Act of 1870 and the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 restricted immigration of Chinese immigrants into the United States.
+*The Chinese population rose from 2,716 in 1851 to 63,000 by 1871. In the decade 1861–70, 64,301 were recorded as arriving, followed by 123,201 in 1871–80 and 61,711 in 1881–1890. 77% were located in California, with the rest scattered across the West, the South, and New England.
+*In 1882, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, which suspended the immigration of Chinese laborers (skilled or unskilled) for a period of 10 years. The Act also required every Chinese person traveling in or out of the country to carry a certificate identifying his or her status as a laborer, scholar, diplomat, or merchant. The 1882 Act was the first in American history to place broad restrictions on immigration.
-The Naturalization Act of 1870 restricted all immigration into the United States to only "white persons and persons of African descent," meaning all Chinese were placed in a different category that made them ineligible for citizenship from that time until 1943. The law was the first significant bar on free immigration in American history. It made the Chinese the only culture to be prohibited to freely migrate this country during that time.
+*In 1888, Congress took exclusion even further and passed the Scott Act, which made reentry to the United States after a visit to China impossible, even for long-term legal residents. The Chinese Government considered this act a direct insult, but was unable to prevent its passage. In 1892, Congress voted to renew exclusion for ten years in the Geary Act, and in 1902, the prohibition was expanded to cover Hawaii and the Philippines, all over strong objections from the Chinese Government and people. Congress later extended the Exclusion Act indefinitely. The Chinese Exclusion Acts were not repealed until 1943, and then only in the interests of aiding the morale of a wartime ally during World War II. <ref>"Chinese Americans," in Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Americans, acessed 2 June 2021.</ref>
-Despite the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Chinese population in the United States continued to increase. After the Chinese population reached its peak in 1890 with 107,488 people, their population began a steady decline. These descending numbers reflect not only the severing effect of the legislation on the influx of Chinese immigrants, but of the many returning back to China due to the disparity in the male-to-female ratio (which was 27 to 1 in 1890) and their desire to take back monetary support for their families in China. In actuality, many of the Chinese immigrants who migrated to the United States initially had no intention of permanent residency in this country.
-As decades passed, the situation of the Chinese in America improved. Such events as the Chinatowns being able to turn from crime and drug ridden slums to quiet, colorful tourist attractions; well-behaved and conscientious Chinese school children begin welcomed by public school teachers; and China becoming allies with the United States during World War II, all paved the way for the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act. As immigration from China resumed, mostly female immigrants came, many who were wives of Chinese men already in America. Many couples were reunited after decades apart.<br>
 [[Category:China Emigration and Immigration]]
 [[Category:Chinese Genealogy]]