British Columbia and the “Chinese evil”: Canada’s first anti-Asiatic immigration law

British Columbia and the "Chinese evil": Canada's first anti-Asiatic immigration law JOHN A. MUNRO* In 1885, the Canadian Parliament passed "An Act to Restrict and Regulate Chinese Immigration into Canada." This legislation was the direct result of the findings and recommendations of a two-man Royal Commission on Chinese Immigration appointed by the Macdonald Government in 1884. Here began Canada's history of anti-Asiatic immigration laws and arrangements. More particularly , this Act represented the first stage in British Columbia's successful assertion of her right to be "a white man's country." The Chinese had appeared in the Pacific Province, via California, during the 1858 gold rush. Although they were largely unnoticed in the initial stages of that scramble for fortune , there was small prospect that these citizens of the Celestial Empire would find a climate of opinion in British Columbia more hospitable than the one of unmitigated hostility that they had left behind in California. While the gold rush continued and after, as long as they limited themselves to light labour, laundry work, domestic service and market gardening, they were able to retain a certain public anonymity. There may have been occasions when they were treated as curiosities or with contempt, but there was no concerted effort to harass them, debar them or drive them out. In the early 1870's, this situation changed. Judge Matthew Begbie, a man whose experience in the province's early development was in many ways unsurpassed , wrote: "I do not think that the feeling of the whites against Chinamen has much changed; but I do not recollect anything that *The author would like to express his appreciation to Miss Olena Kaye for her editorial assistance. Miss Kaye is a doctoral student at King's College, London and was a summer Research Assistant to the Resident Historians at the Department of External Affairs, 1968-1970. 42 can be called 'agitation' against them until Confederation." 1 Sir Matthew is borne out by the fact that there was no mention of Asiatic immigration in the discussions surrounding British Columbia's entry into Confederation . The Hon. John Robson, British Columbia Provincial Secretary in 1884, suggested that Chinese immigration "commenced as a political question in 1872." 2 Robson was correct in one sense. The Provincial Legislature dealt with the problem for the first time that year. Resolutions were presented in the Assembly calling for a fifty dollar annual tax on all Chinese in the province and for their exclusion from employment on provincial and federal public works. Neither of these resolutions was successful.3 Mr. Justice Crease of the British Columbia Supreme Court, with perhaps a slight cynicism , gave the matter a more subjective origin: 'The outcry against the Chinese takes its rise in great measure in the efforts of persons , who, for political motives are desirous of posing themselves as friends of the working classes, through their sweet votes to gain political power and influence."4 The courses of action proposed by the 1872 resolutions were directly in the interest of the white workingmen. Chinese were being employed in the early 1870's at a wage considerably lower than that paid to white labour, as for example, in the Dunsmuir mines arou_nd Nanaimo. In 1878, the Workingman's Protective Association was organized in Victoria. It sought "the mutual protection of the working class of British Columbia against the great influx of Chinese; to use all legitimate means for the suppression of their immigration ."5 John T. Saywell, in his article on labour and socialism in British Columbia, has concluded that "increasing competition from Oriental Labour, although often more imaginary than real, aggravated the workingclass , and labour leaders organized in what was considered to be righteous self-defence ."6 It would appear, however, that in spite of Revue d'etudes canadiennes the growing resentment of white labour and the agitation of some politicians, Oriental immigration did not really come into its own as a political issue until the 1880's. It is true that the Provincial Legislature did pass a resolution favouring legislation to restrict Chinese immigration in 1876 and one to prevent their employment on public works in the province in 1878. It is...