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In the early twentieth century, mass migration into the United States caused significant upheaval. While the unassimilated masses of Southern and Eastern Europe remain well known, and the hostilities toward the Chinese are taught in schools, the complicated history of early twentieth-century migration from the Philippines remains less discussed. The 1910 census would report only 406 Filipinos in the United States, but this number would balloon to 45,000 by 1930. Most of these new arrivals lived in California and Washington and would bring conflict to the communities they arrived in.
From the 1890s until the 1920s, a huge number of unassimilated foreigners would enter the United States. In 1907 alone, 1.2 million Europeans would enter the United States. During this period, the aliens who arrived were further detached from the demographics of the Founding Stock. From 1900 to 1912, 70% of arrivals were men, and the number of families arriving decreased. These aliens did not learn the language, formed ethnic enclaves, filled both asylums and prisons, and overwhelmed the resources of the United States. As European immigration overwhelmed the country, many Chinese laborers would flood in as well. Businessmen would undermine American workers with these foreign laborers, which eventually led to the first pushback against the invasion. Acts limiting the importation of foreign laborers were commonly violated, and restrictions against the entry of violent criminals were neglected. These unassimilated migrants brought foreign ideologies and ethnic conflicts, and caused endless conflicts within the United States. The endless work of the restrictionist, a diverse coalition including environmentalists and labor organizers, eventually led to the sealing of the border.
First, Chinese women would be restricted, then Chinese men; when one group was blocked, this allowed for further restrictions. In 1917, Congress would override the veto of President Wilson and pass the Immigration Act of 1917. This limited Asian immigration, along with anarchists and the intellectually disabled, and required a literacy test for most arrivals. As Europeans continued to flood into the country, the Emergency Quota Act was born. This act placed limits on immigration and established a quota system to preserve the ethnic homogeneity of the United States. Further acts, such as the Immigration Act of 1924, would restrict Asian immigration for non-American nationals, install further immigration quotas for Southern and Central Europeans, and create a border patrol. This act led to great success in massively restricting immigration, and immigrants once again reflected the Founding Stock.
The United States held control over the Philippines from 1898 until 1946. Filipinos were classified as American nationals until 1934, when Congress passed the Tydings-McDuffie Act. The Tydings-McDuffie Act began the process for an independent Philippines and reclassified Filipinos as aliens. Before the act, Filipinos could move freely between the United States and the Philippines, but the act would restrict the number of immigrants to just 50. These restrictions did not apply to the territory of Hawaii, and workers continued to pour into the territory.
In the early twentieth century, plantation owners in Hawaii focused on recruiting Filipino laborers. These plantation owners worked to bring in Filipinos because they accepted the lowest wages of any workers and were not aware of their rights.
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These businessmen would undercut laborers and break strikes. Because the Filipinos were American nationals, their travel was unrestricted until 1934. When the Tydings-McDuffie Act passed, and Filipino's were reclassified as aliens, all but 50 were barred from entering the United States, but the lobbying efforts of the Hawaiian plantation owners led to a provision permitting Filipinos to continue laboring in Hawaii.
In California, farm owners would bring in Filipino workers to undercut the wages of American and Mexican workers and counter unions. California farm owners preferred Filipinos to other workers because they worked longer hours for the lowest wages. In California, most Filipino workers felt they were temporary workers and so made no attempt to assimilate. As the Great Depression began, tensions flared between American workers and Filipino workers. Due to low wages, Filipinos would reside in small quarters, sometimes twenty workers sharing one room; this led to stereotypes that Filipinos were "half-civilized and half savage".
In October of 1929, American workers would head to a farm to begin work when they learned that the farm owners had instead hired Filipino workers. Without work, the displaced laborers went to a Filipino work camp and assaulted workers there. Around fifty Filipinos were stoned or clubbed, and about two hundred Filipinos were forced to leave the area. Throughout California, various Filipino workers would be attacked in response to farm owners hiring Filipino workers over American workers. Later in October, protesters fired rubber bands at Filipino's attending a social event where young women were paid to dance with Filipinos. During the protest, an American heckler was stabbed by a Filipino worker. Following the stabbing, the police chief C.E. Joyner led a mob of three hundred American men to burn the farm of a rancher known to displace American workers. Joyner would then order the shutdown of a Filipino labor camp. The firefighters would work to prevent further fires and firehosed the protesters. Throughout California, similar conflicts would occur over the hiring of Filipinos. Across the state, signs ordering the Filipinos to be removed appeared, such as one that read "GET RID OF ALL FILIPINOS OR WE'LL BURN THIS TOWN DOWN." These signs further inflamed tensions between the two communities. A county Judge named J.D. Rohrback was an activist against Filipino migration whose views were described by the Evening Pajaronian. Their description, "With the arrival of every boatload of Filipinos says the judge, a boatload of American men and women are thrown out of the labor markets to lives of crime, indolence, and poverty because, for a wage that a American man can not exist on, the Filipinos will take the job and through the clannish low standard mode of housing and feeding practiced among them, will soon be well clothed, and as the judge says, strutting about like a peacock and endeavoring to attract the eyes of the young American and Mexican girls." As the Great Depression advanced, so did tensions between the two groups.
Another issue came from the fact that only one in fourteen Filipinos was a woman, which led to the men seeking to date American women and Mexican women. These men would pay to dance with American women at social events, and stereotypes of these Filipinos harassing American women became common in the region. A California Judge stated, "The worst part of [the Filipino man] being here is his mixing with young White girls from 13 to 17. He gives them silk underwear and makes them pregnant, and crowds Whites out of jobs in the bargain." The belief that Filipinos were targeting young American and Mexican girls came to a head when, on December 2nd, a sixteen-year-old and an eleven-year-old girl were found in a boarding house with a twenty-five-year-old Filipino named Perfecto Bandalan. It was later discovered that Esther Schmick was engaged to the man, and the eleven-year-old Bertha Schmick was asked to stay with the couple by her mother. This incident outraged the local community and seemed to confirm the fears of many residents.
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In January 1930, at a taxi dance club in the Palm Beach section of Watsonville, around five hundred men came to shut down the club. The local newspaper, The Evening Pajaronian, said of the incident, "Race hatred dominated common-sense last night with the result that several scraps were fought on the streets by Americans and Filipinos, primarily because it is alleged, the Filipinos had been keeping several white girls in seclusion on the premises of a Filipino pleasure club, located outside the city." Believing that young girls were in danger, they ordered the club to be closed, or else they would burn it down. The owner said he would shoot the rioters if they didn't leave. Once the mob refused to leave, the owner opened fire on the protesters. Police would break up this fight by using tear gas, stopping further conflict for the day. Two days later, on the 20th of January, a group of American men and Filipino men fought each other over the incident. The Evening Pajaronian would report that a Filipino threw a rock, which cut an American man's leg, which started one of the fights. A group of Mexicans arrived and involved themselves in the fight on the side of the American men. This fight would quickly turn into a riot lasting five days. During this riot, Filipinos were attacked in their homes and beaten. Businesses employing Filipinos were destroyed, and a twenty-two-year-old was murdered. The violence spread throughout the state, in San Fransico, San Jose, Stockton, and Manila. The city of Watsonville attempted to defend the Filipinos to the best of their ability, and the riot would subside following the murder.
In the following years, Congress would pass the Tydings-McDuffie Act, which cleared the way for the Indepedence of the Philippines. This act classified Filipinos as aliens and allowed only fifty Filipinos to enter the United States a year. While this prevented more from arriving, labor unions and other groups continue to push for further restrictions and limitations. Congress would eventually establish the Filipino Repatriation Act of 1935. The act allowed the government to cover the financial costs for Filipinos wishing to return to the Philippines. Only 2,200 Filipinos would accept the offer, and the Supreme Court would rule the act unconstitutional in 1940.
The relationship between Filipinos and Americans was a tenacious one within the mainland United States. As landowners replaced American workers, the displaced workers began to resent their replacements. Eventually, the tensions would turn to violence between the two groups. Eventually, Congress would take measures to restrict the importation of Filipinos. Following this, they attempted to encourage Filipinos to return to the Philippines, which brought little success.
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This is my first post, so please give me feedback.
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>>4019057Copied it from an article award.
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>>4019078Find the article I copied it from, then. I spent three hours researching this and writing it.
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it's weird because if hostility was so high towards Chinese back then how did so many move to NYC and San Francisco and Seattle?
how did so many of them work on Railroads?
they didn't treat Irish any better than Chinese back then and the Chinese were really really good at handling explosies while the irish guys would end up dead at some point (usually in just a few months)
so it's not like they killed every chinese person coming in. they didn't treat Irish much better.
why doesn't anyone ever talk about the ancestors of the Appalacheon mountains. always brown people
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>>4019111They flooded into places like California and Queensland before the residents had time to react.
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Effort post go up