California should apologize for persecution of Chinese immigrants, legislator says

[AlphaCentauri]

Source: Mercury News

California should formally "express regrets" to the Chinese immigrants who were historically persecuted and abused while they helped build the Golden State's railroads, mines and agricultural fields, said a state legislator who is promoting legislation that would lead to the first-ever government apology to Chinese-Americans.

Assemblyman Paul Fong, D-Mountain View, the grandson of a Chinese immigrant who was interned at Angel Island, said his goal is to eventually convince the federal government to also issue an apology, and then legislate redress for the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, which specifically barred Chinese immigrants from the U.S. It was repealed in 1943.

The first Chinese immigrants to California

— who called it "gam saan," or Gold Mountain — faced discriminatory laws that prevented them from marrying or owning property. They were paid less and taxed more while children were denied access to public schools. They were forced out of towns, and in one case in San Jose's old Chinatown, burned out of their enclaves. And at Angel Island in San Francisco Bay, the "Ellis Island of the West," tens of thousands of Chinese immigrants were detained for months, and sometimes years, separated from their families.

"Those who know history will know that those laws were discriminatory," Fong said. "Those who don't know will be informed of it for the first time."



Read more: http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_12572795?source=most_emailed

[Cant trust em]

1. I'm Chinese, but I think that the state has bigger fish to fry right now. nt

[Libertas1776]

3. yeah

like forming a blueberry commission.

[Cant trust em]

4. Do I even need to comment on that?

:eyes: is really all I have to say.

[Captain Hilts]

2. And Japanese immigrants that set the stage for their incarceration. Read this

1943 article by Eleanor Roosevelt that outlines the bigotry against Asians in California:

http://www.gwu.edu/~erpapers/documents/articles/challengetoamerican.cfm

I can well understand the bitterness of people who have lost loved ones at the hands of the Japanese military authorities, and we know that the totalitarian philosophy, whether it is in Nazi Germany or in Japan, is one of cruelty and brutality. It is not hard to understand why people living here in hourly anxiety for those they love have difficulty in viewing our Japanese problem objectively, but for the honor of our country, the rest of us must do so.

...

We have in all 127,000 Japanese or Japanese-Americans in the United States. Of these, 112,000 lived on the West Coast. Originally, they were much needed on ranches and on large truck and fruit farms, but, as they came in greater numbers, people began to discover that they were competitors in the labor field.

The people of California began to be afraid of Japanese importation, so the Exclusion Act was passed in 1924. No people of the Oriental race could become citizens of the United States by naturalization, and no quota was given to the Oriental nations in the Pacific.

...

The large group of Japanese on the West Coast preserved their national traditions, in part because they were discriminated against. Japanese were not always welcome buyers of real estate. They were not always welcome neighbors or participators in community undertakings. As always happens with groups that are discriminated against, they gather together and live as racial groups. The younger ones made friends in school and college, and became part of the community life, and prejudices lessened against them. Their elders were not always sympathetic to the changes thus brought about in manners and customs.

[WriteDown]

6. Sounds like this Eleanor Roosevelt person was a....

racialist. Maybe she knew Von Brunn. :)

[MADem]

5. They're too busy installing the new homophobic Miss California!

What's happened to California? I always thought they had their Republicans, but were a bit more moderate, if not liberal, than they seem to be coming across lately. I suppose it's the Ahhhhhh-nuld effect? It's such a beautiful state, too. Such a shame....

[Cant trust em]

8. The problem is a few things...

1. We have a 2/3rds majority needed to pass any budget. The republican minority is holding us hostage.

2. Gerrymandering has essentially solidified democratic districts and republican districts, making it so that we only have extremes. There are only right-wing republicans left. If they stray from party orthodoxy and propose a new tax so that we don't have to make insane cuts, they will be excommunicated.

3. Too much of the electoral process is given away to average citizens through direct democracy. We give important decisions to people who don't know what the fuck they're doing.

There are more things here, but those are the major things that need to change.

[MADem]

9. I hope you can fix it. Like I said, beautiful state. I enjoyed my time there.

I lived in the south and the north--beautiful weather, nice people.

[Cant trust em]

11. California doesn't just need some adjustments.

It's time for radical change. We need a new state constitution.

[MADem]

15. Is there any motivation for such a thing?

I still can't get over the way Darryl Issa rode Gray Davis out of town on a rail, and then Ahh-nuld stole his ice cream after the shithead spent all that money! Between Gary Coleman and the hookers and all the oddball gubernatorial candidates, it was pretty...absurd.

[Cant trust em]

17. People are talking about it. Maybe not too seriously, but it is getting discussion.

2003 was a really shitty year politically.

[MADem]

21. Well, that's a start, anyway. Journey of a thousand miles, and all that... nt

[closeupready]

14. Beautiful state, but I would never want to live there. And Prop 8 is only part of why.

n/t

[MADem]

16. Prop 8 shocked me. I guess I thought CA was more "with it" than they actually are. NT

[closeupready]

18. As I understand it, outside Los Angeles and San Francisco, it's quite conservative.So, LA or SF only

would be the only places in CA I would consider, as they are reliably liberal.

[Cant trust em]

19. Tell me about it. What a fucking embarassment.

Just goes to show that like America, there are two Californias. The liberal coast and then the deep shade of red that runs through the center of the state.

[Cant trust em]

10. dupe

[NBachers]

13. Amen. The "Initiative" process is a failure

Astroturf organizations put on a Happy Face front and hide the insidious stuff behind the small print. Then they finance campaigns of lies, and hire hoards of signature-gatherers that descend on you in public like locusts. Often times, these are marginalized people, and the trend is to sign whatever they put in front of you out of sympathy. "At least this person is working to better themself." And you don't find out, until it's too late, that you've endorsed & voted for something that's an unmitigated disaster.

The initiative process of participatory democracy has proven to be an epic fail. I wish it didn't exist.

[Cant trust em]

20. Concerned Citizens for Puppy Dogs and Rainbows

Sure, I'll sign whatever you want.

They're actually a front group for radical hate legislation.

[izquierdista]

7. When you are up to your ass in alligators....

It's time to remember those who were oppressed ages ago.

Personally, if I were about to be evicted from a foreclosed house, I think I would make amends to the Moors who were driven out of Spain. :silly:

[struggle4progress]

12. It may seem long ago to you, but there are still people living who were affected by it

Oyama v. California, 332 U.S. 633 (1948)
http://supreme.justia.com/us/332/633/case.html

Morrison v. California, 291 U.S. 82 (1934)
http://supreme.justia.com/us/291/82/case.html

[izquierdista]

22. There are things they are more affected by

Like maybe trying to use any of the services that are going to be cut by Ah-nold.

[struggle4progress]

23. I'd agree with that. But I'm speaking as a person who wasn't affected. There's enormous

truth in Faulkner's "The past is never dead -- it's not even past." I know various people who remember Civil War veterans or former slaves. When Waco refused to apologize a few years ago for the grisly lynching of Jesse Washington in 1916, the town was sending a message to people who could still remember being terrorized by the event and to people whose parents had been psychologically traumatized by that horror. Plenty of people still living remember California's anti-oriental laws. It's cheap and easy for me to say: it was a long time ago, and you should get over it