THE CHINESE QUESTION 143
gent of California, which, in the form
finally adopted by the House on
June 17, recommended that the President
open negotiations with China
to secure a change or abrogation of
existing treaties that permitted the un-
limited immigration of its citizens.29
Evarts had to await the arrival of two
Chinese ministers in Washington,
Chen Lan Pin and Yung Wing, on September
21 before he could even
act upon the demands of Congress. Then
he hesitated until November
21 before he finally inquired whether
their government wished to revise
treaty relations with the United States.
They replied that China wanted
to maintain its treaties with the United
States and that they had no in-
structions to negotiate on Chinese
immigration. They reminded Evarts
that if such immigration was
unacceptable, the Americans had only them-
selves to blame, for it was by the
efforts of the American people and their
former minister to China, Anson
Burlingame, that the treaty had been
arranged. Moreover, they did not believe
that the Chinese population of
the United States would grow as fast as
alarmists predicted because their
government did not encourage emigration
and because many immigrants
returned home.30
Although the attitude of the Chinese
ministers to treaty revision was
discouraging, Hayes maintained a facade
of public optimism. In his second
annual message, he announced the
establishment of the permanent Chinese
legation in Washington. "It is not
doubted," he added, "that this step will
be of advantage to both nations in
promoting friendly relations and re-
moving causes of difference."
Beyond this hope, he recommended no con-
crete solutions; nor did he even refer
to Chinese immigration specifically
by name.31 Again the Pacific
Coast felt slighted. Philip Roach of the Demo-
cratic San Francisco Daily Examiner wrote
Senator Thomas F. Bayard of
Delaware that "the quickest and
surest way of dealing with the problem
is by Executive Action; and President
Hayes should be held responsible
for not suggesting a modification in his
Annual Message. In 1874 Grant
did so."32
When Congress assembled in January 1879,
the House committee on
education and labor submitted a report
that criticized Presidential inac-
tion. It also urged Congress to pass a
bill allowing no master of a vessel
to take on board at a foreign port more
than fifteen Chinese passengers
with intent to bring them to the United
States.33 The fifteen passenger
bill passed the House on January 28 by a
vote of 155 to 72, and the Senate
on February 15 by a vote of 39 to 27.
The Senate added an additional
provision to the bill requiring the
President to abrogate Articles V and
VI of the Burlingame Treaty. The bill
was overwhelmingly favored by
western Senators, and also won the
support of eastern, southern, and mid-
western Senators such as James G. Blaine
of Maine, Lucius Q. Lamar of
Mississippi, and Allen G. Thurman of
Ohio.34
Soon after the House passed the bill,
newspapers throughout the country
began to speculate on the possibility of
a Presidential veto. Hayes's staff
filled page after page in one of his
scrapbooks with editorials on the sub-
ject. These indicate that major papers
of both parties throughout the East
144 OHIO HISTORY
unanimously favored a veto but that the
Pacific Coast overwhelmingly
supported the bill. Most midwestern and
southern papers supported the
veto with such notable exceptions as the
Chicago Tribune, Cincinnati
Enquirer, St. Louis Globe Democrat, and Richmond Dispatch.
"On the
whole," declared the Chicago Tribune,
"the legislation is justifiable, is
demanded by public sentiment, is free of
all moral, political, and com-
mercial objections." But few people
east of the Rocky Mountains agreed
with it.35
Letters and telegrams, as well as the
newspapers, kept Hayes informed
of public opinion on the fifteen
passenger bill. These show that even
though many eastern opponents of the
bill favored restrictions on Chinese
immigration, they opposed the
legislation because it involved a unilateral
modification that could be construed as
abrogation of the Burlingame
Treaty by the United States. One of
Anson Burlingame's friends reminded
Hayes that the people of the United
States could alter their Constitution
at pleasure, "but to change a
treaty requires also the consent of the For-
eign Power with whom it has been
made."36 John A. Dix, formerly Sec-
retary of the Treasury under Buchanan,
minister to France, and governor
of New York, urged Hayes not to sign
because there was nothing worse
than a breach of faith on the part of
the government. He accused "aspir-
ants for political preferment" of
dishonoring the nation by catering to
the laboring classes in order "to
conciliate them & gain their votes."37
Others believed that free immigration
was a basic principle of the coun-
try. George William Curtis thought it
amazing "that the Republican party
should be the first to shut the gates of
America on mankind."38 For the
United States to exclude immigrants,
wrote the president of Amherst Col-
lege, would be "to embody that
spirit of the Chinese themselves which the
civilized world has protested against
and fought against and which having
broken down in the Chinese we now adopt
as the principle of our own
national life!"39 One
religious paper expressed the forebodings of many:
"It is a dangerous precedent; for
with such discriminations once permitted,
some partisan outcry may call for the prohibition
of German, or Irish, or
English immigration."40
Religious leaders feared that China
might retaliate by disregarding treaty
protection accorded American
missionaries. "But the great consideration,
touching the heart of the whole Christian
Church of every devotion," a
Washington clergyman warned Hayes,
"is the danger of retaliatory action
in China."41 Fifty members of the
Yale faculty reminded him that the bill
would furnish China "all the
example and argument needed, according
to the usages of international law, to
justify it in abrogating this principle
of ex[tra]-territoriality. To do so will
throw out our countrymen living
in China from the principle of our
laws."42 The American Missionary As-
sociation and the Missionary Society of
the Methodist Episcopal Church
urged him to veto the bill,43
and Henry Ward Beecher, the eloquent
Brooklyn preacher, assured him that a
veto would receive the support of
ministers of the Gospel, teachers, and conservative men
of property.44
Eastern merchants also feared
retaliation. The Philadelphia Maritime