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Finding Aid to the Asiatic Exclusion League Records
larc.ms.0145  
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Collection Details
 
Table of contents What's This?
  • Preferred Citation
  • Availability
  • Restrictions
  • Acquisition
  • Related Materials
  • Processing Information
  • Context and History of the Asiatic Exclusion League
  • Scope and Contents

  • Title: Asiatic Exclusion League records
    Date (inclusive): 1906-1910
    Creator: Asiatic Exclusion League
    Extent: 1.25 Cubic Feet 3 boxes
    Collection number: larc.ms.0145
    Accession number: 1985/003
    Repository: Labor Archives and Research Center
    J. Paul Leonard Library, Room 460
    San Francisco State University
    1630 Holloway Ave
    San Francisco, CA 94132-1722
    (415) 405-5571
    larc@sfsu.edu
    Abstract: The bulk of the Asiatic Exclusion League records span the years 1906-1910 and consist of the minutes and proceedings of monthly meetings and the first convention of the League, which had the explicit goal of discriminating against Asian workers. The collection also contains the proceedings of the first two conventions of the Anti-Japanese Laundry League founded in 1908; the transcript of a debate at St. Ignatius College; and a detailed index to its contents. A pamphlet by Samuel Gompers on Asian workers entitled "Meat vs. Rice: American Manhhod Against Asiatic Coolieism, Which Shall Survive?" contains the term "coolie," which is considered to be a derogatory racial slur against Chinese workers referring to a form of debt slavery outlawed in California in 1879. In addition to these items, photocopies of selected articles on Asian exclusion from the Labor Clarion between 1904-1915 were added to the collection in 2006. Content warning: This collection contains racist historical materials that resulted in the discrimination, murder, and incarceration of Asian immigrants in the United States.
    Languages: Languages represented in the collection: English.

    Preferred Citation

    [Identification of item], Asiatic Exclusion League Records, larc.ms.0145, Labor Archives and Research Center, San Francisco State University.

    Availability

    Collection is open for research.

    Restrictions

    Copyright has not been assigned to the Labor Archives and Research Center. All requests for permission to publish or quote from materials must be submitted in writing to the Director of the Archives. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the Labor Archives and Research Center as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the reader.

    Acquisition

    The records of the Asiatic Exclusion League (originally known as the Japanese and Korean Exclusion League) were donated to the Labor Archives and Research Center by the San Francisco Labor Council, October 1985, accession number 1985/003.

    Related Materials

    See Labor Archives Ephemera/Print File materials under Asian Exclusion and Japanese Americans; in the book collection, see A History of the Labor Movement in California, by Ira Cross, and The Indispensable Enemy: Labor and the Anti-Chinese Movement in California by Alexander Saxton.

    Processing Information

    The material is printed and was clipped together as a hardcover volume. The cover has been removed and the contents placed in folders. The collection was processed by Suzanne Forsyth, November 1987; finding aid revised in 2020 in accordance with anti-oppressive archival description protocols.

    Context and History of the Asiatic Exclusion League

    During the Gold Rush, men from China were solicited to work as laborers in the United States. However, when the economy entered into a depression following the Civil War, labor leaders saw the Chinese immigrants as a threat to the white working class. Driven by economic precarity and racism, many labor groups began producing anti-Asian propaganda and performing hate crimes against Asian immigrants. Following the first ethnically based immigration law, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, groups such as the Asiatic Exclusion League (AEL) formed to fight for the "white man's country," actively discriminating and committing violence against people of Asian descent.
    The Asiatic Exclusion League was founded in 1905 in San Francisco, California, as the Japanese and Korean Exclusion League. In 1908 the organization changed its name to the Asiatic Exclusion League. Participants in the founding convention were mostly delegates from trade unions and included Andrew Furuseth and Walter Macarthur for the San Francisco Labor Council, and P.H. McCarthy and Olaf A. Tveitmoe for the San Francisco Building Trades Council. The Cooks' and Waiters' union was also especially active due to the significant number of Japanese employed in restaurants.
    The building trades unions were a dominant force in the League, and Tveitmoe assumed the presidency. Tveitmoe, a Norwegian immigrant, began as a leader of the Cement Workers' Union in San Francisco and rose to prominence as secretary of the San Francisco Building Trades Council and editor of its newspaper, Organized Labor, eventually becoming financial secretary of the California Building Trades Department.
    The purpose of the League set forth in its constitution was the exclusion of Asian immigrants through legislation. The League hoped to "educate" people so as to "create a sentiment which will prove to the Congress of our country the necessity of the enactment of a law for the preservation of our race." The Preamble to the League's Constitution claimed that "The Caucasian and Asiatic races are unassimilable. Contact between these races must result, under the conditions of industrial life obtaining in North America, in injury to the former, proportioned to the extent to which such contact prevails."
    The anti-Japanese activists campaigned to abolish Japanese-language schools and segregate the public schools, prohibit Japanese from commercial fishing, and forbid Japanese land ownership and long-term leasing. In response to the efforts of the AEL, the State of California increased enforcement of laws prohibiting Asian people from owning property. The Asiatic Exclusion League and similar groups successfully lobbied for laws restricting immigration from Asian countries such as the Immigration Act of 1917 and the Quota Act of 1921.
    The League was financed by the voluntary contributions of affiliating organizations, which numbered about 200. Over half of these organizations were labor unions, although the League also received money from fraternal and community organizations, businesses, and individuals.

    Scope and Contents

    The bulk of the Asiatic Exclusion League records span the years 1906-1910 and consist of the minutes and proceedings of monthly meetings and the first convention of the League, which had the explicit goal of discriminating against Asian workers. The collection also contains the proceedings of the first two conventions of the Anti-Japanese Laundry League founded in 1908; the transcript of a debate at St. Ignatius College; and a detailed index to its contents. A pamphlet by Samuel Gompers on Asian workers entitled "Meat vs. Rice: American Manhood Against Asiatic Coolieism, Which Shall Survive?" contains the term "coolie," which is considered to be a derogatory racial slur against Chinese workers referring to a form of debt slavery outlawed in California in 1879. In addition to these items, photocopies of selected articles on Asian exclusion from the Labor Clarion between 1904-1915 were added to the collection in 2006.
    Content warning: This collection contains racist historical materials that resulted in the discrimination, murder, and incarceration of Asian immigrants in the United States.

    Subjects and Indexing Terms

    Chinese -- California -- San Francisco -- History.
    Japanese -- California -- San Francisco -- History.
    Japanese Americans -- Employment -- History.
    Asian Americans -- Employment -- History.
    California -- Race relations -- History -- 20th century.
    Foreign workers, Chinese -- United States -- History.
    Foreign workers, Asian -- United States -- History.
    Foreign workers, Korean -- United States -- History.
    Foreign workers, Japanese -- United States -- History.
    Racism.
    Segregation.
    Racial discrimination.
    Hate groups -- United States -- 20th century.
    White supremacy movements -- United States.
    Japanese and Korean Exclusion League
    Anti-Japanese Laundry League