But this Chinese question is not to be settled by articles, however able, in the magazines. Nor should it be viewed only from the standpoint of the California workshop. It involves the interests of humanity, and rises high above all local questions of labor and capital. Nor is it a question of today only, but it involves interests as future as the ages. We should look at it from other and better standpoints, and not shrink from the investigation. But before doing this directly, it is due to the excellent article under review that some of its doubtful positions have respectful notice. It must be brief.

"The presence of Chinese in the work shops, in the mines, in all agricultural pursuits, leads to more or less frequent riots, in which they are killed or their houses burned, and is a reason why they should not be allowed to come in numbers."

Their presence in those places may be the occasion of the riots; it is not the cause. This lies in the unwillingness of the rioters to permit other laborers to work where they are wanted, and where they have a right to work if they can find a lawful employer. The logic of the senator is lame. It deprives unoffending people on the other side of the Pacific of the exercise of their natural rights, because outlaw rioters massacre the unoffending on this side. The unwillingness of the colonists to pay taxes without representation was not the cause of the war of the Revolution. The cause was the oppression of the British government-the wrong done to the people who knew their rights. The Chinese are not blameworthy in seeking employment and giving labor for wages voluntarily offered. The wrong is done by the rioters, who forcibly interfere with industrious and honest men exercising their God-given rights. Government should stop the riot and punish the rioters, the wrong-doers, and not do injustice to the innocent.

"The Caucasian race will not allow itself to be expelled from this country, or totally impoverished, without a bloody struggle to prevent it. If the law does not measure the difficulty and obviate it, the laboring masses will." Our senator says this is not a threat,

only a prophecy. Can the wish be the father to the prophecy? By just such sentiments, expressed by senators and others, and echoed by the secular press so freely, rioters and murderers are incensed. With such expressed sentiments by men of influence as a wall of protection behind, the Kearneys and O'Donnells are emboldened in their incendiary harangues.

Says the senator: "The alternative" (of riot, because of their presence) “is exclusion by law." Before this a consideration arises

have we a right to exclude by law? And the assumed right includes power to enforce the law. And this power exercised leads to violence and injustice to the weak and unoffending. But whence is the right derived? Not from the consent of the excluded, who, as men-as children of a common Creator and Father-have the natural right to seek labor and bread wherever they choose to go, provided always they do not trespass upon the rights of others. Not from the consent of the government from which the immigrants come, for the government has not the right to grant power to others to prevent its own people from exercising their own inherent and inalienable rights. Not from the divine Author of all rights, for he is no respecter of persons; and geographical or political lines are of no consequence to the all merciful Father.

But we must distinguish between the Chinese on the two sides of the Pacific. "Right comes by occupation," says Mr. Sargent. Therefore, he argues, those already here have the right to remain, and we must not exclude them; only keep out those not yet in. But a restriction law, or any statute, does not give rights.

Governmental laws only declare what is right. If the Chinese had no right to come, they have no right to stay. If they have the right to remain, they had the right to immigrate. And if these had the right to immigrate, others yet in China have a similar right. For the right of expatriation is not derived from the government left, nor is the right of immigration derived from the government of the country entered. Both are inalienable, inherent in man. God, the

Creator, who bestows this right upon his creatures--the right to choose their own place of abode-in that bestowal knows no political lines. "Right comes by occupancy?" The assumption is a fallacy. Then would the thief have a just claim upon the horse he has mounted! Then had the master a right to the possessed slave bought with his money, and to which purchase the enslaved had given his consent! Then the man who had taken his neighbor's wife as his own is her lawful owner, if her former husband and she consent to the new husband! No! Right comes not by occupancy. Nevertheless it is true, as our good senator probably holds, that as the Chinese now here came by our legal consent, we should not drive them out. This is far more generous and honorable than the doctrine and determination of the old sandlot, "The Chinese must go." But the fallacy lies in the false assumption that the right to come or go the right of expatriation or of immigration -is derived from government. If Senator Sargent should wish to travel or live in Germany, or Italy, or China, to compel him to ask permission of any government, or to forcibly prevent him from so traveling or living, would be a gross act of injustice to him. No right is more inherent or more claimed by the lover of liberty, than that of locomotion and of choosing his own place of residence. And right is of no color or

race.

In the article under review, two things are everywhere assumed-that because of "the incompatibility of the two races," the individuals of the foreign race must be excluded perforce; and that Eastern people, such as Senator Hoar and Henry Ward Beecher, desire the wholesale influx of Mongolians.

The incompatibility of the two races is undeniable. They are very dissimilar. In the present state of society and in the condition of both races, they are not likely to assimilate. They should not. And yet time and Christianity are great levelers. The people of the two nations are very wide apart, not because they are of different races, but because of the great difference in their civiliza

tions and their religions. The present great incompatibility might almost disappear, under favorable circumstances, if the pagan race were thoroughly molded by Christian influences and Christian graces. Besides, the incompatibility of some of the classes of our own race in the United States is almost as great. What concord, what association, is there between Italians in Boston and the Puritans of that city? What affiliation is there in San Francisco between the Portuguese and New Englanders or native Americans ? Even between Irish, or French, or Spanish Catholics or American Protestants there is almost no affiliation. It is not because either is in the fault; but the religions, or the language, or the national customs, of the two are so different. The incompatibility is so great we cannot expect association. Does it follow that we American-born citizens may enact restriction laws, and close our ports against the people of any land—pagan, Jew, Catholic, or freethinker? If serious evils are occasioned by the excessive influx of foreigners from either Europe or Asia, let those evils be met, resisted and overcome by the intelligence and religion of the people of a Protestant nation. The first, the most essential thing is, to do right. Doing this, we may expect the blessing of Him whose divine aid Christian patriots have ever invoked.

The other assumption is certainly a mistake. It is not probable that any, whether in the East or on this Coast, whether as Christians or humanitarians, desire the influx of Chinese. It is more probable that Eastern senators and Eastern clergymen, and the whole class, east or west, to which they belong, only ask that no wrong be done to humanity, and that the reciprocity of nations be respected. The writer of this is probably a fair specimen of the class to which Mr. Sargent alludes; and he (the writer), as a Californian, wishes to say here, that he does not favor the influx of Chinese, or indeed of any foreigners. Especially does he fear the constantly incoming tide of foreigners who are not capable of soon becoming such citizens as are needed to build up a great and permanent Christian commonwealth. Senator Sargent must know that

in the tides of immigration from some European States there are elements far more threatening to the well-being of our country, and to Christian and civil institutions, than any that are borne to us by the western waves. These are foreboding: those are fearfully threatening. No: we do not desire, from either Asia or Europe, any overflow of peoples who, for want of those influences that led to the founding of our Christian nation, are incompatible with the children of the founders. But there is another and better way of solving the great problem before the American people. And the evils that are feared as consequences of unrestricted immigration must be met and overcome by other ineans. They are within our reach, if we choose to use them. It is only asked that in all our acts of legislation, State or federal, right be done that the law of the God of Heaven and the Arbiter of Justice be accept ed as supreme, higher than all human statutes. In this voluntary acceptance lies our strength, our highest good.

There is no force in the supposed parallel of "European States emptying their prisons and lunatic asylums upon us." One nation

and government should prevent attempted wrong by another. European States should be made to punish their own criminals and feed their own paupers. And so should we do, if the Chinese people or government should send to us their prisoners or their lunatics. But the immigrants from China are laborers, and come voluntarily, and only in the exercise of their own rights. Besides, if England's poor miners, or Ireland's poor farmers, or Germany's poor and lovers of freedom come voluntarily to us to seek la bor and food, for mercy's sake don't say, You can't come. Let God and the poor of any land be the judge. You may do well to persuade them to stay at home, but the earth is the Lord's, and he has given it to the children of men-not to Protestants or Catholics, not to Christians or to Jews, or to unbelievers, not to pagans or to Yankees, but to men. If evils, great or small, flow from or accompany excessive immigration, battle with them, repress them, overcome them as other evils, but never by wrong. Certainly, the descendants of the Puritans of England and of the Covenanters of Scotland may dare to do right.

J.

Charles S. Greene.

For a long time prior to 1839, the Chinese Government had made efforts to prevent the importation of opium into the Central Kingdom, as the Chinese call their country. As early as 1821, the foreign opium vessels at Whampoa were subjected to such serious annoyances from the authorities, that they were removed to the island of Lintin, in Macao Roads, at the mouth of the Canton River, where permanent storeships were established. But though they were removed so far from Canton, the trade suffered hardly any diminution. The Chinese dealers paid for the opium at Canton, and received orders by which they obtained the drug at the fleet in their own boats,-the silence and inaction of the mandarins being secured by bribes. It is evident that the universal corruption among the Chinese officials rendered the efforts of the emperor to check the use and abuse of opium among his people almost nugatory, however sincere they may have been.

Early in 1839, more vigorous measures were taken by the emperor for the enforcement of his prohibitory orders. Lin, a director of the Ping-Poo, or Board of War, and governor-general of the ancient provinces of Tso, was invested with the red seals of a High Imperial Commissioner, and sent to Canton to bring the traffic in opium to an end. He arrived in that city on the 10th of March, 1839, and at once took the most rigorous measures to execute his imperial master's commands. It is hardly necessary to say that his acts, although vigorous, were characterized by all the arrogance, conceit, and ignorance of the power of the Western nations, which then marked the conduct of Chinese officials. The selection of Lin for this task was a wise one, however, as the earnestness of that officer was undoubted; he having sworn not to return until all opium was banished from the Central Kingdom. He not only exerted all his power to

VOL VI.-37.

prevent the importation of the drug, but also endeavored to accomplish a thorough reform among the Chinese who were in the habit of using it.

On the 18th of March, Lin issued his first proclamation to the foreigners, demanding the absolute surrender of all opium then in their possession; and on the next day, the Chinese superintendent of maritime customs issued an order, forbidding all foreigners to leave Canton. There were about three hundred foreigners in the city at this time, and they at once became close prisoners in the foreign hongs (factories or commercial establishments) which fronted on the river. All streets communicating with the city were closed with bricks and mortar; soldiers were posted on the adjacent buildings, and triple rows of boats were stationed on the river to prevent any escape in that direction. All Chinese compradors and servants were commanded to leave the buildings, and no one was permitted to furnish provisions of any kind to the imprisoned foreigners, who thus saw themselves threatened with starvation.

On the 26th of March, Lin issued his second proclamation to the foreigners, giving four reasons why they should surrender their opium at once. The next day, Captain Elliot, the British superintendent of trade. made a public declaration that he was forcibly detained by the provincial government, and commanded the British merchants and shipmasters to surrender all opium in their possession on behalf of the British Govern

But this Chinese question is not to be settled by articles, however able, in the magazines. Nor should it be viewed only from the standpoint of the California workshop. It involves the interests of humanity, and rises high above all local questions of labor and capital. Nor is it a question of today only, but it involves interests as future as the ages. We should look at it from other and better standpoints, and not shrink from the investigation. But before doing this directly, it is due to the excellent article under review that some of its doubtful positions have respectful notice. It must be brief.

"The presence of Chinese in the workshops, in the mines, in all agricultural pursuits, leads to more or less frequent riots, in which they are killed or their houses burned, and is a reason why they should not be allowed to come in numbers."

Their presence in those places may be the occasion of the riots; it is not the cause. This lies in the unwillingness of the rioters to permit other laborers to work where they are wanted, and where they have a right to work if they can find a lawful employer. The logic of the senator is lame. It deprives unoffending people on the other side of the Pacific of the exercise of their natural rights, because outlaw rioters massacre the unoffending on this side. The unwillingness of the colonists to pay taxes without representation was not the cause of the war of the Revolution. The cause was the oppression of the British government-the wrong done to the people who knew their rights. The Chinese are not blameworthy in seeking employment and giving labor for wages voluntarily offered. The wrong is done by the rioters, who forcibly interfere with industrious and honest men exercising their God-given rights. Government should stop the riot and punish the rioters, the wrong-doers, and not do injustice to the innocent.

"The Caucasian race will not allow itself to be expelled from this country, or totally impoverished, without a bloody struggle to prevent it. If the law does not measure the difficulty and obviate it, the laboring masses will." Our senator says this is not a threat,

only a prophecy. Can the wish be the fathe to the prophecy? By just such sentimen expressed by senators and others, and ected by the secular press so freely, rioters and murderers are incensed. With such e pressed sentiments by men of influence a a wall of protection behind, the Keame and O'Donnells are emboldened in the incendiary harangues.

Says the senator: "The alternative" riot, because of their presence) “is exclusi by law." Before this a consideration as -have we a right to exclude by law? Ar the assumed right includes power to enfor the law. And this power exercised leads violence and injustice to the weak and offending. But whence is the right derivei Not from the consent of the excluded, as men-as children of a common Car and Father-have the natural right to labor and bread wherever they choose provided always they do not trespass the rights of others. Not from the const of the government from which the im grants come, for the government has not right to grant power to others to preve own people from exercising their own i rent and inalienable rights. Not from divine Author of all rights, for he is to specter of persons; and geographica political lines are of no consequence all merciful Father.

But we must distinguish between the nese on the two sides of the Pacific. E comes by occupation," says Mr. Sarg Therefore, he argues, those already here the right to remain, and we must not ex them; only keep out those not yet in. a restriction law, or any statute, de give rights. Governmental laws only d what is right. If the Chinese had to come, they have no right to stay. have the right to remain, they had the: to immigrate. And if these had the n immigrate, others yet in China have a right. For the right of expatriation derived from the government left, the right of immigration derived fr government of the country entered are inalienable, inherent in man. Go