Title: Javi's Blog: Why did Americans pass the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882?
Headings: Javi's Blog
Javi's Blog
Friday, January 17, 2014
Why did Americans pass the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882?

Content: The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 removed Chinese immigration for ten years and declared Chinese as unacceptable for naturalization. According to documents A through D in our Chinese Immigration and Exclusion: Graphic Organizer packet many white Americans supported the Chinese Exclusion Act. The reasons why Americans passed the Chinese Exclusion act of 1882 was because Americans believed the Chinese were bringing competition to them as they flourished into the United States and began to occupy all jobs. In both Document B and D, these documents support the fact that the Chinese were occupying the jobs of other immigrants in the United States. If you take a look at document B a political cartoon by Thomas Nast from 1871 we see an illustration of Columbia defending and comforting a Chinese immigrant from other immigrants such as a gang of Irish and German thugs. He is hated because the Irish and Germans believe the Chinese immigrants are taking their jobs as they enter into the United States. Document D is a passage from Lee Chew's, "The Biography of a Chinaman." In this document the passage states the reasons for why the Chinese immigrants are being hated. Lee Chew states that, "It was the jealously of laboring men of other nationalities---especially the Irish---that raised the outcry against the Chinese."