|
|
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
|
Denis Kearney and the California Anti-Chinese Campaign
|
|---|
| Parent(s) |
Party
|
| Contributor | BrentinCO |
| Last Edited | BrentinCO Jun 16, 2023 04:25pm |
| Logged |
0
|
| Category | History |
| News Date | UTC0:0 |
| Description | Denis Kearney was one of most important leaders of the anti-Chinese campaign in California. Kearney was born in Ireland in 1847 and spent his youth at sea. He arrived in San Francisco in 1868, entered the draying business in 1872, married and started a family. In 1877, he became active in the labor movement, and was known for his impassioned, vitriolic speeches. He attracted large crowds and his orations were reprinted in the daily papers. Kearney and others in the Workingmen’s associations blamed the owners of large businesses and factories ("Capitalists") and Chinese immigrants for keeping jobs scarce and wages low. Kearney called for lynching the rich bosses and burning their property, and he began and ended every speech with the slogan "The Chinese Must Go!"
In the summer of 1877, a workingman’s association was established in San Francisco, with Kearney elected secretary. It formed in response to high unemployment and in sympathy with the nation-wide railroad strike of that year. The meetings took place next to City Hall, in a spacious vacant area called the "Sand Lot." At the first meeting, members passed resolutions supporting the striking railroad workers, calling for an end to government subsidies of railroad companies and to military intervention against strikers, insisting on an eight-hour day, a confiscatory tax on wealth, and other demands. The crowd became agitated against the Chinese immigrants and went on a rampage that lasted three nights, killing several Chinese, destroying Chinese laundries, and raiding the wharves of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, which transported Chinese immigrants to America. The rioters burned adjacent lumberyards and hay barns, but were unable to burn the company’s steamships.
Workingmen’s unions formed across the state, followed by the creation of the Workingmen’s party of California. Along with the labor planks, the new party endorsed the abrogation of the Burlingame Treaty. The Workingmen’s party s |
| Share |
|
|
2¢
|
|
| Article | Read Full Article |
|
| Date |
Category |
Headline |
Article |
Contributor |
|
|
