The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, September 17, 1899, Page 23

THE SUNDAY OCALL. 23 TAHT The Chinese MRule Ban Francisco’s Politics! At Each State Election It Will Be One Thousand Stronger and They Will At Ew:ry~ Their Vote Local Election Will Be Two Hundred Stronger Than at the Election Previous. < ; A /" 'Y (..’:3? 9 & g W T » HE political ar of San Franc v offspring of Asia. Now, however, the Aslatic un has girded loins and ! make hi The cluded from citizenship, this inhibition does not extend to thelr progeny born upon American soil. They are, under the conmstitution and laws of the United States, citizens by right of birth. One thousand of these, males and of full voting ege, ars now numbered among the denizens of Ban Francisco’s Chinatown, and scattered throughout the State there are no less than 4000 more. These will all vote in the next election This announcement may be somew! startling to the State and local politi- clans, but their number and character presents & factor to be taken into con- sideration in the making up of the slates of the future. There are 2500 male dren of all ages below malority Ban Francisco, and throughout the Btate there are about 5000 more. Thess were, all born in the United States, and hence are citizens. They are coming to mafority at a rats of about 250 a| year, about 100 of whom are residents of San Francisco. Consequently it may be sald that in every local election the Chi- nese vote will be 200 stronger than at !hs" election previous, and at each State elec- flon it will be 1000 stronger than it was| Chiness chil- in at the preceding count. It c , therefore, that the Chi- nese vote I8 a mos ective be fzed W ters will stand and baflot upon e ciple and every candidate as a unit other vote !s or can be g0 homogene-~ The Irish, German, Scandina votes have certain communal ch they always severally assert »n times, but even their so- guarantee deliverance of a mber of votes. With this| lement the condition may be ex-| ve widely different. Its integrals der the influence of a central will point out to them their | politics and direct them the| hould stand; and it Is beyond | centure of a doubt that these| tials will be gulded by and will s chief. a chlef has already been found 1» organization through which he is with powers s in existence. The | s Robert L. Parke and the corpora- the Tung Yuen Chung Gok, which lish means “ United Parlor of “Sons,” or, as the Incorporation papers have 1t, “Native Sons of the , State.” This organization is the nd of the kind to arise in California. ars ago there was a charter by the Legislature to a Tong of native sons under the leadership of one Ling Yow. The charter gathered under Its folds about 200 members, but the affair 4id not prosper, owing to the detracting influences of Mr. Ling’s business, which was that of & drummer for & fruit can- ning establishment, requiring him to who in Native ) I $03 % 505 Zs, |\ (X = time away m the ¢ hes of this concern grew which was broug another charter, a e from May 11, 1895. Mr. Parke is its president. second floor of a bullding street on the northern edge of for its quarters, and here onc meetings are held h about members gather and Mr. Parke pre: While this parlor has been in existence for three years, it has only been recently that the management has aroused to a definite purpose of going into politics. The first conception was to identify and secure the assemblage of the American born ( se, then get them acquainted with the organization as an Instrument of fraternal amalgamation. The parlor theref. undertook to procure employ- ment for idle members; to assist members who were in poverty, to comfort the sick and bury the dead; In short to distribute as much brotherhood among themselves as the limited funds of the affair, raised from contributions of membership fees, would allow. Alongside of this quality of the assoclation there was bullt up a It has the Powell natown a week on e r Uil strong social flavor. The Chinese are proverblally clannish, but this is shown specifically when they are confronted with interests of other nationalities, between themselves they are selfish, jealous, suspicious and individual enough. It was to overcome these tenden- cles that the soclal phase of the movement was carefully fos- tered. Convivial parties were given, there were crude ‘events” which as- sembled the multitude, a little rice wine was distributed upon occasion, ex- changes of ideas supervened, and ulti- mately the Native Sons acquired the reputation throughout the Kwang Tung province of San Francisco of being a band of jolly good fellows, membership of whose body came to be desired by every American born Chinese In the district, and the ardent ambition of all those whose approaching majority would entitle them to admission. The soclal advantages and felicities as well as the material benefits of the parlor being well established, the movement has lately come to take upon itself the real phase which has all along been the primary object In the mind of its organizer, namely, a political status. The Native Bons have had careful drilling. It has been im- pressed upon them that their condition is different from that of their fathers; that they are entitled to vote and that this means & voice in the Government, its policy and its administrators. Scarcely is there one of them who cannot cite sections of the constitution of the United States by heart, and cannot explain in- telligently the division of powers be- tween the Federal arrangements and the Btates. These jovial youths all speak English; the vernacular of some of them is of the winged pigeon variety, but they can nevertheless make themselves understood, and can with quite agile alacrity ‘“‘catchee on” to the meaning of thelr conversation- ist. Only a few of them are of parents well-to-do, for there are few such in Chinatown; the greater number are poor and of ignorant paternity. TUpon general lines they are ignorant themselves, but epecifically they are bright and ready; this readiness abides In the direction of thelr political interests which it has been the care of Mr. Parke to inculcate in them. f In appearance the native son generally {s not distinguishable from a forelgn born, save through his youth. His occu- pation holding him close to his own peo- ple he wears the conventional attire, in- cluding the queue; a few of them dress in the American garb, and this is disported by Mr. Parke himself, but paternal pre- judice prevalls in most instances and the tonsure, the tunic and the pajamas char- acterize these new Americans as they have for long centuries done their Mongo- lian ancestors. 4 The parlor now includes in its member- ship all the native sons in San Francisco. As yet no attempt has been made to or- ganize branch parlors in other partsof the State, but arrangements are now pending to start one in Los Angeles and one In Sacramento. It 18 expected that each of these parlors will open with 150 members. The office of State organizer is about to be created, and some traveling commer- Jhey clal member, possible Mr. Ling, will be installed in it. He will establish branches wherever thera are enough eligibles to maintain such, and these will all take their mandates from San Francisco. In time, and within a very little time, the native-born Chinese throughout the State will be compactly organized and consoli- dated, ready to swing as a column right or left, however their interests may de- flect them. The identity and character of the in- fluence or force which will =wing this column is a matter of the highest inter- est. Undoubtedly, it will be personal and that person will be Mr. Parke. This {ndi- vidual {8 about 25 years old and was born in Chinatown. His parents were nominals and are now superannuated and shelved. I asked Mr. Parke what his father did; he replied “nothing,” and quickly chang- ed the subject. It was obvious that Mr. Parke’s father not onty does nothing, but is nothing in the estimation of his up-to- date offspring. The Chinese-American has left at right angles that traditional influence which is the heart of the Asi- atic religlon, namely, the worship of an- cestors. He has developed & capacity that is pre-eminently American—that of look- ing at things as they are—and even though such object may be the author of his being he s not swerved by any false notions concerning it. In brief, the whole ganglion of Confu- clan precepts and postulates, with its Joss houses, rice papers and combustible prayers, has been thrown overboard by Mr. Parke, who is not only not a pagan but is a Presbyterian of the full-fledged, dry-wine type, who chants hymns, reads Seripture and has morals as straight as the tight string on a plumb bob. In fact, Mr. Parke is by profession a teacher, and is now about to open a Pres- byterian mission day school in China- town, through which he will teach the future disciples of his political guidance the linguistic intricacles and idioms of the English primer, and the trick of comput- ing numerals with fin-de-siecle lead-pencil facility. The presence of such a character in the practical politics of San Francisco is certainly as extraordinary as the ag- gregation which he heads, and he embod- ies a personage very different from what would commonly be expected to surge to the fore in such a movement. Mr. Parke was the first Chinege to graduate from a grammar school of San Francisco, his alma mater of this grade being the Lincoln Grammar School, whose examination he passed in 1892. There have only been three Chinese graduates from grammar schools in the city since, and they both evolved this year; two of these passed from the Washington Gram- mar and one from the Claremont School. PORKE- THE POLITICAL After getting through the grammar school Mr. Parke attended the high school, and graduated there and finelly took a speelal course at the University of California, which he has just completed. The first suggestions of an educstion as ‘well as the earliest glimmer of the power of politics came to him through Colonel F. A. Bee, for years Chinese Consul of San Francisco. Colonel Bee was an Ameri- can who during the plug-ugly days of Kearneyism took up the defense of the Chinese who were being persecuted by that debauch. So successful was he in this that the Chinese Emperor wrote him a personal letter and rewarded him with the office of Consul, which he retained until his death. Parke was his servant, and being a bright lad the colonel pointed him out a thing or two, sent him to school and predicted that he would grow up to be a great and astute leader of the Chinese Vote as Though One Man. peoples. Whether the colonel's prognosis will be fuilfilled time can prove, but his protege is certainly progressing in the proper direction to realize the most bloom- ing perfection of the colonel’s expecta- tions. “Primarily we shall see that the Chinese citizens are registered,” sald Mr. Parke in discussing the purposes and future of his organization recently. “We ‘are Ameri- cans, end we shall all claim the right of franchise. China is disheveled and break- ing up; who can say he is a member of the Chinese nation or a subject of its Government when the indications are that it will presently be no more of a nation than the Jews are a nation and when the Government is so weak that it is dying of paresis? If we were not Americans we would be nothing; our fathers are just now in this anomalous predicament. De- nied citizenship of the U.ited States they are in reality denationalized; they are men without a country. “After we get our men naturalized,” continued Mr. Parke, “we will see to it also that each man votes. At least, we will be satisfled that nothing stands in the way of his voting if he wishes to do 80, and our great effort has been to edu- cate our boys that it is not only their right, but it is their duty to vote, even though the exercise of such involves some &gnonfl discomfort and {nconyenience. e shall vote at all elections. We shall ask for a representation in whatever con- ventions we elect to enter, and we pro- pose to assert an influence in the making up of the tickets as well as in the suc- cess of such. Through our votes we shall control the seats from our district in both the supervisorial board and that of education, and I can see no reason why our man may not go to the Legislature from the Chinatown legislative district and we shall have a strong pull on the Senate. Of course I cannot say that the Chinese will vote in every instance as a unit; they may vote as they please; but we are together in a single organization and we shall in all probability make up a ticket from the nominees of the several parties, and the ticket when so made up will be the one we will vote. ‘You can rely upon this.* he continued, “‘that the Chinese vote will never be cast for a man whose record shows him to be or ever to have been against Chinese in- terests. What will we oppose? Primar- ily, of course, the exclusion law We cannot see why our father’s coun should be the victims of such unfair dis- crimination that they are made by the laws a sert of debased race. We cannot travel from one part of this continent to the other unless we are equipped with passports and pictures of ldentification, and if we leave the country we must pro- vide ourselves with a mass of credentials in order to be permitted to return to our homes. This must be done aw: with. If it _cannot be effected through treaties based upon the amicabilities which must follow the extension of American trade in China, then it must be blotted out through the votes of Chinese Americans. “We shall in time demand, too, that the Chinese be admitted to citizenship on the same terms as any other nation. There 18 no reason why in this eountry of gov- ernment by the people a large body of the people should be under the same dis- ability as are paupers, idiots and Indians —not taxed. A man’s right to vote should depend, not upon the site of his birth, but upon his intelligence, his understanding and fidelity to the Government under which he lives. Fifteen per cent of the real estate in Chinatown is owned by resident Chinese. There was a time when 4 per cent of it was so owned, but after the passage of the discriminating laws the situation took on a menacing attitude of persecution and many Chinese capitalists sold out their holdings, re- duced their property to gold and with it sailed back to China. There are 400 stores in Chinatown and their taxable stocks will average $7000 each. I know gentle- men there who pay taxes on $35,000, $40,000 and as high as ,000 worth of goods. Their hands are in their tills to help out every project and enterprise to which their contributions are solicited upon the score of benefits to the city’s welfare; and yet these substantial men are denie & right to_the ballot, while any German- born or Italian-born tramp picked up - DEW Continued From Page Twenty-One. trances, but it was decided to plerce the Dewey arch transversely, so that it > and Twenty- fourth space for each thoroughfare. Extending on Fifth ave- nue in each direction for a disiance of 1e block, they planned a colonnade, heroically designed and lavishly decor- ated. This was one night’s work. The next day the sculptors were hard at work on their designs, and within a wee the models were growing in their studios. To J. Q. A. Ward was naturally in- trusted the task of making the great group for the top of the arch. Prancing sea horses drawing Victory's barge through curling waves, with Liberty at the helm, was his subject. Two weeks he had to complete his model in— work which ordinarily would have oc- cunied as many months. And the task. the glory of the reason for it, inspired him. Done in haste the great group will be but hurried in appearance it will not be. And so with the two. great groups which will appear on the sides of the arch’s downtown front. Niehaus and Karl Bitter took them up with the same impulsive enthusiasm, and the sea war- riors returning to their home with Vie. tory’s wings spread over them will stand out on the Dewey arch not only as evidences of the intense patriotism which animated the idea, but as sam- ples of good art. Phillp Martigni, Dan- fel C. French, F. W. Ruchstuhl, George E. Bissell, Charles A. Lopez, Isadore Conti, and many others—nearly all the members of the Sculpture Soclety, in fact—have done as much. Never have the studios of New York’s workers at Y5 WE this art been so busy. Vacations have been curtailed. Other orders have been put aside. Nothing has been permitted to stand In the way of making the home coming of our great Admiral a beauti- ful as well as an enthusiastic occasion. “All this has another significance,” Mr. Ward said. He was hard at work on the touches needed to finish his great group. His years sit lightly on him. The tale of time told by his gray hair and pointed white beard is belied by the athletic lines of his active fig- He is no plush-jacketed sculptor dabbling dainti He wore a white, clay-spattered undershirt that day, and his trousers iwere the overalls of the hard-working hod-carrier. He profess- edly was pleased with all parts of life except his own group (which stood in brown, shining clay behind him on a turning standard), and modesty alone made him slight the merits of that. Two assistants were working with the mud which filled the great clay chest in one corner of the enormous room, and they were visibly proud of their master and of his work. Mr. Ward beamed benignly. “It all means more than we ses on the surface,” he admitted. “It means the coming of a great thing to New York and to America. From time im- memorial it has been said that we lacked public spirit and especially that as a people we lacked artistic appre- ciation. What could be more public- spirited than the way the country is preparing to receive the man who took the Philippines? What could more clearly Indicate artistic appreciation than the wn.g in which the city of New York met the sculptors’ offer of free work and appropriated $150,000 for material and labor? LCOME I “Dewey’s coming has a significance which none of us dreamed it would have. He brings with him not only the laurel wreaths of a fighter's vic- tories but he has started a movement, without knowing it himself, which will be of incalculable artistic benefit to the American people. Our cities have been by no means as slow in such mat- ters as they have been credited with being. Every American city of size has many things to its credit on Art’s books. But nothing of the magnitude of these Dewey decorations has ever been started on pure enthusiasm in any city in America. The whole thing will be an object lesson to the sculp- tors. It will prove to them that the people and those who are elected to govern them are not wholly out of sympathy with artists and art feeling as they have been supposed to be. It will be an object lesson to the people. It will show them how greatly art can add to a demonstration of this kind, and will also prove to them that the artists of New York are as patriotic as any one is and more than ready to co-operate with other citizens in add- ing to the glory of a great national event.” The construction of this arch s much more interesting than the build- ing of any other similar structure has been, because of the great haste with which it is being done. It was only three weeks ago that the first inclos- ure of pine boards was put up in the street where the arch now stands, al- most completed. At that time the sculptors had not entirely finished any of their models and all that could be erected before these were finished was the bare framework of the arch. At the same time that this board fence N NEW was put up in the middle of Fifth ave- nue, the basement of Madison Square Garden was turned into a great and interesting workshop. It was there that the sculptors’ models were to be enlarged from small clay images ‘Into heroic figures ready for position on the arch. From twenty to sixty men were employed in this work and their manner of going at it was strange to the layman’s eye. First of alla small square frame was put over the artist's This was notched by inches mofel. and from each notch a plumb line of black thread was dropped - until it struck some important point on the model itself. After these had been carefully adjusted a similar and much larger square frame was built and hung at a height somewhat above the point where the completed statue was to reach. From this plumb lines ex- actly corresponding to the little ones hanging from the smaller square were dropped, and these marked the relative positions of the measured points in the larger statue. There was no chipping of marble, no delicate chiseling with fine tools in this vast sculptors’ studio. The mass of the figures was built up of common excelsior dipped in plaster. ‘White spattered workmen piled hand- ful upon handful of this crude mate- rial up until it approximated the shape .of the figure to be imitated. After this was accomplished they took any road to Rome. With chisels and knives they chipped the plaster off; with hatchets they hacked at it; with saws they sawed it; with round-ended sticks they modeled it; with brooms they swept it. Then came the artists themselves. Sculptor Ward in his studio, wearing his undershirt and his YORK = overalls, was carefully dressed when compared to the artists after they be- gan their work in Madison Square Garden. Attendants stood by with pans of plaster as the sculptors jump- ed about putting the fin, touches on their tributes to Dewey's great- ness. No man held himself down to his own figure. They were all work- ing together with one object in view— the completion of a great whole to do honor to a great occasion. they could be of use they worked. No spectators were permitted to bother them, nor even friends to visit them. How closely they have had to figure in order to complete the work in time is shown by the fact that the last fig- ures will not leave Madison Suaare Garden finished until the day Dewey lands in New York City and the day before the great parade of which the arch is to be the feature. Whether or not the enthusiasm which has carried the plans for the reception of Dewey so far with a rush will last long enough to raise the $750,- 000 necessary to make the arch per- manent is extremely doubtful. “Even if it is,” sald. Mr. Ward, “many things will need to be considered carefully. First, of course, the design of the arch has been hurriedly decided upon and might be afterward much im- proved. . Second, it is by no means certain that the location is the best that could be selected. All these mat- ters must come up for discussion later.” In view of the trouble New York found in ralsing the money for Grant's tomb and the $100,000 for the Washing- ton memorial arch, it {s by no means certain thas er effort will be taken up at all Wherever | t this new and much xruz.l about the docks, who has been naturalis- ed, may go up to the polls and vote with- out any questioning as to his fitness or his promptings, which are frequently ex- pressed by two round dollars in _his pocket, put there by some heeler whom he votes to serve. It is nonsense to pre- tend that under proper educational and other tests the Chinese would not make citizens in_every way acceptable to the republic. Yes, we would have our labor- ers use the ballot ignorant Can- tonese-talking C just as fit and proper a person to vote as your densely ignorant negroes and European whites. All of this sort of vote is bad; such people are entirely unfitted to exer- cise the franchise; vet vou persist in per- mitting them to do so, and if black igno- rance is good enough voting material for the republic, why is not yellow ignorance just as good? ““Yes, these are Federal matters rather than local questions,” assented Mr. Parke, when I called his attention to this faot. “The larger sphere of our being is natur- ally related to the Federal Government, yvet there will be local Interests whic engage our attention as well. There have been times in the past when, if we had been a voting force, Chinese people would have received more consideration from city departnrents. Very recently the Fire Department notified Chinatown residents to remove the wooden bars from their windows; they did so and put up screens; then the police came along and prohibited the use of screens. If it were not that the Chinese, as allens, have a standing In the United States court they might some- times go bare of justice. We think if the head of a department realized that thers were a thousand votes hung up on a nail to be lodged against him at the next elec- tion If he acted unfairly with any one in Chinatown, there would be more care exs ercised with the rights and feelings of Chinese.” Mr. Parke In conclusion admitted that his Americanized name was not alto- gether a translation from Chinese. If he were In China his name would be Len Parke, the family name being Len. He has adopted the surname Robert out- right and contracted his family name to his middle initial, using the Chinese sur- named Parke as a Christian name. He has a brother who is a seaman on the United States steamer Albatross who is also a native son. He declares the native sons are Intensely patriotic; during the war nearly all of them wore decorations of American colors, and one of the most treasured possessions of the parlor are three shells taken by Dye He a member of the tong, from one of the Spanish craft at Manila shortly after the battle, Dre being on the Boston and having taken part in that battle. Certain of the municipal authorities, however, do not take kindly to this san- guine project of Mr. Parke's of register- ing all the nat! born Chinese and ‘‘ses ing that they vote.” ‘It opens the door, sald Registrar J. Steppacher, “ to end- less fraud and something will certainly have to be done about it if Parke at- tempts the ons t on the registration books which b id to contemplate. Who can tell who is a native born Chi- nese and who is not? There is no dis- tinguishing between the two. Some whom I know to be native born have never as- soclated with whites, and they under- stand little or no English, besides many of thofe born in China speak our lan guage quite plainly. If we could be satis- fled with the statements of the witnesses upon all occasions all would be well, but we know that ‘for tricks that are vain, the heathen Chinee is peculiar.” “I will say, however,” continued the Registrar, “that I do not belleve that any of the Chinese natives who have regis- tered thus far are improperly registered or that the witnesses have stated any- thing but the truth. Last year we had only six Chinese on the books. This vear, thus far, and since this movement f)?a,n, we have nearly forty, and they are till coming in. As long as there are no frauds connected with it we are all right, and, as I have stated, we know of none thus far.” Gavin McNab said the theme and the situation e entirely new, and required the most careful consideration. He had no doubt the Chinese vote would be a homogeneous one—that they would each vote the sentiments of their leader. He thought the man who could impllcitly control the polling of a thousand votes would be the strongest political force in San Francisco, and would have to be reckoned with in every move made either in city or State politics. The favor of that man would in 1896 have placed Cali- ifornia in the Democratic ranks and changed eight votes from McKinley to Bryan. In the Tilden-Hayes contest this change would have elected Mr. Tilden. Mr. McNab did not think that this influ- ence, resident in a single individual, was at all healthy from the standpoint of the common weal. The theory upon which the franchise is granted is that its exer- cise shall express the individual, inde- pendent sentiments of the voter. In the case, however, of men who cannot speak the English language and who must have everything political translated for them v their confidant and leader, this indi- viduality cannot in the nature of things be manifest. As to what legislation might_be de d to meet the condition Mr. McNab was unable to suggest, but s opinion was that it would have to be effected through Congress. Still another view was entertained by a wirepuller who had been doing poli- cal chores through the region just be- vond Chinatown for some years past. “Them lads,” says he, “is full regulars. You'll see them bloods goin' round here resently eatin’ ginger an’' smokin' of the est China-made cigars wots in the box. The patriotism in their get-ups don’t weigh half_as much as does the question of profit. Do you 'spose that guy Parke is goin’ to coionize all them v s _for mere sport? Not much, he ain’t—he’s smooth. He'll have this bunch of votes in his fist, an’ he'll go to Kelly or Buck or Crimmins an' say, ‘See here wot I've got “‘Wot'll yer take for 'em? Buck'll ask. ‘Wot'll you gimme?’ will say Parke, ‘Dollar fer each vote.’ ‘Fer each name on the ticket?’ an’ It'll be a go, an’ ther native sons will be in it way up to ther necks.” Whether any of the above is dop rect his hypdthesis or not, certaf the possession of a thousand votes wi] repose a power in their holder sufficient at least to make him respectable, i{f he desires to be so. Those votes would have been the balance of power In a dozen offices in San Francisco at the last elec- tion, and it cannot be doubted that in a city where the counts are as close as in San Francisco the man who can influence the casting of such a number of ballots will hu;: t“ 3 ?lfi;lmlg uflfI the fate of many aspiran political office. JOHN H. BENNETH