History  

Standing Up for the "Heathen Chinee"

by Timothy Sandefur

For the delegates who gathered at California's constitutional convention, the Chinaman was the issue.

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Charles V. Stuart had been talking for ten minutes when the gavel fell. His speech was passionate, even desperate; he was not an accomplished orator. One pictures his hands shaking and his voice stuttering as he faced the hostile audience at the California Constitutional Convention. The chairman, usually lenient to speakers who went over the time limit, immediately interrupted Stuart.

General Volney Howard of Los Angeles spoke up with gloating. "I hope the gentleman will be allowed to proceed. He is the pluckiest man in the Convention. I give him my ten minutes."

"Thank you, General," said Stuart, without a pause. "As I was saying. . . ."

Howard could afford to be magnanimous — and smug. Nobody was listening to Stuart's plea on behalf of California's Chinese immigrants, and the convention had long ago made up its collective mind: the constitution they were drafting would include provisions barring the Chinese from working for any California corporation, and commanding the legislature to act to forbid Chinese immigration.

A quarter-century of anti-Chinese racism had built up to this moment. In the seats of the capitol building in Sacramento sat the 156 other convention delegates — Republicans, Democrats, Workingmen, or, like Stuart, Nonpartisans. But of all of them, only Sonoma County's Charles Stuart would speak on behalf of the state's most persecuted minority.

Stuart was born May 9, 1819, into a prosperous and conspicuous Pennsylvania family. His grandfather, Charles Stewart, had settled near present-day Williamsport in 1762, at the age of 19. In 1783, he bought 714 acres in Nippenose (or Nippenoos) Township — a name which may have meant "warm place," in a Native American language, or may have referred to the cold weather, when Jack Frost would nip at one's nose — and raised a family of six. The eldest son, Samuel, became a notorious local sheriff and member of the state legislature. The third son, also named Charles, born in 1775, became a farmer, and raised eleven children, taking particular care over their education. By the time this Charles' third son, Charles V., was born, the family owned what one contemporary called a "magnificent estate," as well as several slaves. The home was described by a contemporary as an "old-fashioned brick house . . . in a conspicuous position overlooking the river near the east end of the Jersey Shore bridge," and his family was prominent enough to "move in the first circles of society."

Charles V. Stuart (it is not clear when the spelling of the family name was changed, or by whom), later recalled that "[m]y early years was spent on my Father's farm doing the labor usually done by Boys + going to school till my 14th year when I was placed at the Owego Academy at Owego N.Y." The academy, in what is now Tioga, N.Y., was situated within the area known as the "Burned-Over District," after the number of religious revivals and reform movements that began in that area in the 1830s. What are now the Mormon and Seventh-day Adventist churches began in or around the area, along with several other reform movements, and in particular, the abolitionist movement. By 1837, four years after Stuart began studying at Owego, New York had 274 anti-slavery societies.

It is impossible to tell what influence abolitionism had on Stuart. His teacher at Owego, Charles Rittenhouse Coburn, was a reformer and educator who went on to become the state's Superintendent of Schools. He is said to have written a book on moral philosophy, but if so, it has been lost. But Stuart's religious and literary education were significant; later in life he would punctuate his speeches not only with biblical references, but with references to the works of Victor Hugo, as well.

After leaving Owego, Charles moved to Ithaca, N.Y., where he became a merchant. Evidently he applied himself strongly, and in 1839, believing his health was suffering from hard work, he went on a year-long vacation, touring the country from Maine to Texas, and from New Orleans to the Great Lakes, before finally returning to Ithaca. Four years later, he married Ellen Mary Tourtellot, the daughter of a respected soldier. At some point, Stuart seems to have served in the army, probably fighting local Indians, and earning the title of Colonel. Over the next four years, he and Ellen had two daughters and a son.

Then came the Gold Rush. The wild country of California was suddenly inundated by a flood of immigrants, from America's East Coast, as well as from across the Pacific. Chinese workers poured in to work the gold fields, as they had to build the Transcontinental Railroad and to work in the state's agricultural fields. Racial and cultural conflict quickly followed. The cultural differences of the Chinese — and more importantly, their competition for jobs — made them a target for the vilest racism in the state's history.

In 1854, the state Supreme Court declared Chinese people ineligible to testify in the state's courts. An 1850 law had declared that "No Black, or Mulatto person, or Indian, shall be allowed to give evidence in favor of, or against a white man," and Chief Justice Hugh C. Murray explained that "the name of Indian, from the time of Columbus to the present day, has been used to designate, not alone the North American Indian, but the whole of the Mongolian race." Thus Chinese could not testify. But, Murray wrote, sensing the absurdity of his reasoning, "we would be impelled to this decision on grounds of public policy" anyway, because if they could testify, "we might soon see them at the polls, in the jury box, upon the bench, and in our legislative halls." The Chinese were "a race of people whom nature has marked as inferior, and who are incapable of progress or intellectual development beyond a certain point." The decision practically legalized violent crime against the Chinese. Mark Twain, who was a reporter in San Francisco in the 1860s, later recalled that his paper refused to publish a news article he wrote about witnessing an attack on a Chinese man in a city street. In California, he wrote, the "Chinaman had no rights that any man was bound to respect [and] no sorrows that any man was bound to pity. . . . [N]obody loved Chinamen, nobody befriended them, nobody spared them suffering when it was convenient to inflict it; everybody, individuals, communities, the majesty of the State itself, joined in hating, abusing, and persecuting these humble strangers."

Like the Chinese, Stuart saw opportunity in California. In February 1849, he and 50 neighbors gathered $500 to set up a mule train to California. Traveling first to Cincinnati, then to Independence, Mo., collecting supplies, the inexperienced group was, in the words of another member of the expedition, "foolish enough to get everything under heaven that we did not want, and nothing that we did. We bought a lot of gold washers, which we faithfully packed . . . picks and shovels also, and everything you could think of. We commenced throwing away our articles the first day, and continued throwing away until we got to the base of the Rocky Mountains." Stuart was chosen as captain of the mule train, because, another member of the train said, he "had been accustomed to Indian fighting."

Calling itself the Ithaca Company, Stuart's mule train left Independence in May, 1849. Traveling to and then along the Arkansas River to the base of the Rocky Mountains, and then to Salt Lake City, they encountered several Indian tribes, one of whom ran off the expedition's pack animals. But the group had no serious conflict with the Indians, and only two cases of cholera, neither fatal. Still, the trip was grueling. One member recalled that "we were obliged to subsist upon what we could shoot, our chief article of food being hawks, which we could cook only by boiling." Stuart himself recalled that the worst part of the trip came between Salt Lake City and the Cajon Pass, near what is now Ontario, California:

This last part of our journey was one of extreme hardship both for men + animals from Provo City (or Fort as it was then) to the Mohave River is one of the most God forsaken portion of this Continent, the Vallys filled with sand + alkalie, the mountain + hills covered with piles of huge volcanic rocks, all the streams, springs + wells, bitter or salt + no living reptile or insect but its bite or sting is poisonous, whole districts only inhabited by the Prarie Dog, the owl + rattle snake occupying the Same hole + living in harmonious accord but feeding upon what, the Lord only Knows. The last Desert we passed in reaching the Mohave River was one hundred + twelve miles without water only such as we carried in our canteens, on this we lost about 1/4 of our animals, abandoned under the scorching sun for food for the Pi ute.

The group spent a few days recovering in Cucamonga, then traveled to Los Angeles, then through the San Fernando Valley to San Joaquin. Here, the party separated to reach the gold fields on their own. Stuart continued on to San Francisco, arriving on November 20, 1849.

In 1849, San Francisco was a wild town without a seriously functioning government. New arrivals began taking up land by adverse possession — called "squatting" — a source of violent conflict in the state, as thousands of miners declared themselves owners of land that belonged to wealthy absentee landlords. Stuart recalled that squatting was "an entire new bussiness to me," and, after asking local citizens for advice, he spent "a few days labor in fencing Plowing + building," with a business partner named Robert J. Ridley. This labor "soon put us in posession of a handsom little plot of about 10 acres affording us an undisputed + pleasant home" on the grounds of the abandoned Mission Dolores.

Ridley and Stuart opened a tavern on their new land, which they called the Mansion House. It became a landmark in San Francisco, catering to travelers and local citizens, who were especially fond of the "milk punch." Ridley, an English immigrant who had married the daughter of a prominent Mexican citizen, was an old hand at running taverns, and drank himself to death in 1851, at the age of 32. Stuart continued operating the Mansion House for almost 20 more years, and was prosperous enough to build the first brick house in San Francisco, on the corner of 16th and Capp streets. It is not clear when Ellen and their children joined him — or if they were part of the Ithaca Company — but by the mid-1850s, they were living together in the brick house. A son, Charles Duff Stuart, was born in 1854, and three daughters followed, Antoinette in 1856, Ida in 1859, and Isabel in 1863.

Stuart was enough of a local figure by 1850 to be elected to the city's first Board of Aldermen. In 1854, he ran for the state assembly, but was not elected. His business interests extended beyond the Mansion House: he tried to lease the New Almaden Quicksilver Mine, the first mine in California, and among the wealthiest, since quicksilver (mercury) was an essential ingredient in the process of extracting gold from ore.

But frustrated by "expensive + vexacious law suits" over ownership of the mine, Stuart sold his interest and pursued agriculture instead. Stuart was already experienced in agriculture, not only from his childhood on the farm, but from his San Francisco property, where he had arranged vegetable gardens, including fruit trees imported from New York. In 1850 he and a partner bought 1,000 acres of land in Sonoma County, and a decade later, Stuart became the sole owner of the land. He began planting grapevines, exploiting, he said "the fact that we could produce grape vines without irrigating." By 1863, Stuart was growing 40 acres of vineyards on his Sonoma County property. That number would more than double by 1880.

About 1868, Stuart began constructing a stone house on this land, and in 1870, the family moved into the home that he named Glen Ellen, after his wife. A railroad line was extended to the land, and a small town, also called Glen Ellen, began to grow. Stuart renamed his ranch Glen Oaks to avoid confusion.

Glen Oaks prospered. Stuart was able to send his son, Charles Duff, to the University of California, Berkeley. The ranch house was a large structure made of stone quarried on the property, probably constructed with Chinese labor. The two-story home had hardwood floors, a marble fireplace with a large gilt mirror, and a spacious porch. A barn and other outbuildings were also built of stone covered with plaster. A photograph of the house in 1870 shows several workers among the vines and barrels, with the imposing farmhouse in the background. A pencilled caption reading "Glen Oaks Ranch 1870, home of C.V. Stuart," appears to be in Stuart's handwriting.

No photograph of Charles Stuart is known to exist. An undated picture owned by the Glen Oaks Historical Society, however, depicts a man in a broad-brimmed hat standing at the gate dividing the main house from the barn. Although it is impossible to tell whether this is a picture of Charles V. Stuart, it bears some resemblance to the photograph of Stuart's grandfather, Charles Stewart — with the same prominent cheekbones and recessed chin. But the picture could also be of Charles Duff Stuart — if it is of a Stuart at all.

By the late 1870s, conflict over the Chinese had reached a crisis level. Native-born whites and European immigrants accused the Chinese of being dirty and spreading disease; they refused to assimilate, and used strange potions like opium. They degraded the progress of Christian civilization, the whites complained, and missionary work was hopeless. Most importantly, though, the Chinese competed for work with white laborers, driving down wages. These lower wages, said anti-Chinese writers like Henry George, forced white laborers into poverty and white women into prostitution.

Leading the demand that "The Chinese Must Go!" was the Workingmen's Party, a political party formed out of the disbanded International Workers of the World. The I.W.W. had been founded by Karl Marx in 1864, but its power in San Francisco had quickly failed. The Workingmen now supported a platform combining nativism with opposition to corporate power. Alongside social conservatives who worried about the influence of Chinese culture, the Workingmen successfully called for a constitutional convention to put down "the heathen Chinee."

Why Stuart was chosen for the convention can only be guessed. By 1878, he was a prominent, wealthy citizen, with a reputation as a genuine forty-niner and a shrewd businessman. Sonoma County newspapers reported his life story, but were silent as to his political views, or his opinion of the Chinese. But whether his neighbors knew it or not, Stuart was wise enough to see the danger that anti-Chinese sentiment posed to the farming trade.

The constitutional convention opened on September 28, 1878. The delegates included many prominent Californians, including David S. Terry, former Chief Justice of the State Supreme Court, who had resigned his seat after shooting California Senator David Broderick to death in a duel. (Terry himself would be shot to death in a Fresno tavern by the bodyguard of United States Supreme Court Justice Stephen J. Field.) Terry was only one of many populist delegates who demanded changes in the state's property laws and corporate regulations. Some of the delegates were unashamedly radical. Los Angeles delegate Charles Ringgold frankly denounced the U.S. Constitution as "a political abortion . . . violated in the interest of capital in every section and article. It has outlived its usefulness."

Remarkably, anti-Chinese delegates openly admitted that they despised the immigrants because they were smart and worked hard. As one Chinese worker recalled, the Chinese "were persecuted not for their vices but for their virtues. No one would hire an Irishman, German, Englishman, or Italian when he could get a Chinese, because our countrymen are so much more honest, industrious, steady, sober, and painstaking." The delegates acknowledged this. "The Chinaman is the result of a training in the art of low life," said delegate John Miller.

The result of this life is a sinewy, shriveled human creature, whose muscles are as iron, whose sinews are like thongs, whose serves are like steel wires, with a stomach case lined with brass, a creature who can toil sixteen hours of the twenty-four; who can live and grow fat on the refuse of any American laborer's table. . . . The white man cannot compete in the field of labor with such a being as that. . . . If the white man is to compete with the Chinaman he must adopt a cheaper style of dress, he must inure himself to the cold, he must labor in the night; sleep shall not come to his pillow until the midnight bell tolls the solemn hour. He must arise at the first gray streaks of dawn and at his work. Then what shall be his food? No longer the savory meats, the pure, white bread made by willing hands. No! He must live as the Chinaman lives; work as the beast works; there can be no recreation, no rest, nothing but toil. . . . Our civilization has bred our people to a certain style of life, which to give up is to surrender all that makes life worth living.

Volney Howard agreed. "Our own security requires that we should turn this tide away from California," he told the convention. "If they continue to come in the numbers in which they have been arriving, they will in no time, and at a distant day, drive out the free white laborers by their merciless system of competition, which must inevitably result in their getting the possession and control of the country. . . . It is impossible for the white laborer to compete with him, and as a consequence, he drives off the white man and monopolizes the labor market." Delegates competed for ways to exclude the Chinese from the competition for labor. One delegate favored "absolutely and unequivocally cutting off the power and privileges of any Mongolian of getting any character of employment in the State whatever. That is the only way that we can rid ourselves of the nuisance." Others advocated licensing laws to forbid the Chinese from getting jobs, or laying heavy taxes on all Chinese immigrants, or confiscating the property of corporations that hired Chinese workers, and even forbidding the bodies of dead Chinese workers from being returned to China. (The Chinese believed their bodies must be interred in China, and would save their earnings to pay for repatriation.) At one point, the convention engaged in a particularly cruel joke. After deciding to exclude anyone who was "not capable of becoming a citizen of the United States" — i.e., Chinese immigrants — from owning property, the convention returned to discussing the Bill of Rights. When the delegates came to the clause, "All men are by nature free and independent," the following exchange took place:

[Charles O'Donnell of San Francisco]: I move to amend by inserting after the word "men," in the first line, the words "who are capable of becoming citizens of the United States."
[Thomas McFarland of Sacramento]: I second the amendment. [Laughter.]
The Chairman: The Secretary will read it as amended.
The Secretary read: "All men who are capable of becoming citizens of the United States, are by nature free and independent."

The motion failed, but the fact remained.

Finally, on December 9, 1878, Charles Stuart spoke up. "I have been a patient listener in this Convention," he began, "and have not been on the floor since its first organization — over two months ago. I have heard what was said with a great deal of instruction — sometimes; and sometimes with disgust and disappointment." In a brief speech of four paragraphs, Stuart described his arrival in California, his work as a farmer, and his opposition to any state efforts to defy a federal treaty that permitted Chinese immigration. He was interrupted by O'Donnell. "You say you have employed hundreds of men; have you not employed hundreds of Chinamen?"

"I have, sir, thousands of them, and hundreds and thousands of white men, too," Stuart answered.

"I thought so," snapped O'Donnell.

"That is what I am coming to now," Stuart continued. "There is not a man in California in my profession, that of farming, but what employs, directly, or indirectly, the Chinaman. The Chinaman becomes your cook, the Chinaman becomes your servant, he becomes your hewer of wood and drawer of water, even in the city of San Francisco." Stuart recalled the celebrations in San Francisco when California was admitted to the Union, over a quarter-century earlier. Stuart had watched the parade from the Mansion House. "the Chinamen, few as they were, were admitted to a post of honor, and they followed the officers of the State and city in the parade," Stuart recalled. But since then, racial hatred over competition for jobs had poisoned the state. The problem was not that the Chinese were racially inferior, but that white men did not want to compete: "White men we have plenty of here," he said, "We have thousands and tens of thousands of white men traveling this State and the United States, voluntary idlers — not involuntary. We have a class of so-called white laborers that have never worked, never intend to work, and never will work."

Banning Chinese immigration was unconstitutional, Stuart argued; it was a federal matter, and states could not interfere. He spoke nervously, trying to remember all his points: "I am somewhat unaccustomed to this kind of business," he said. "Consequently I am going to leave that to others who are better posted than myself — after a while." But then he came to his larger point, and the shorthand reporter captured his words as well as the audience's reaction:

Chinese immigration is injurious to the country, is it? Chinese immigration to the country has made it what it is. [Derisive laughter.] Labor has made it what it is. . . . It has been labor that has cleared up farms, that has planted fruit trees, that has built cities, that has done everything except the mining, and even then, the tailings we always used to rent to Chinamen in early days. Everything has been done by this labor.

Stuart was not immune from racism, though. Like most of his contemporaries, Stuart believed that whites lived in a secure position of superiority. But that did not justify racist laws. White labor was good, if you could get it, Stuart said, but whites were unwilling to arise at the first gray streaks of dawn:

I believe one white man is worth two Chinamen; that one Chinaman is worth two negroes, and that one negro is worth two [white] tramps [laughter and hisses] — that is, for labor. It is a well known fact that in all nature, both animate and inanimate, both animal and every other kind, that the weak fall under the march of the strong. That is a well settled fact in all governmental philosophy — that the weak fall under the strong. The black man has faded away, and the Chinaman takes his place as a laborer. He is for a day, and gone. The idea of the Chinaman, or the Chinese Empire, overthrowing the Anglo-Saxon race is preposterous.

Stuart begged his fellow farmers to come to the defense of Chinese labor. But nobody would. One farmer who followed attacked it. "Can a country possibly prosper under the doctrine of Mr. Stuart?" he asked. "If the Chinese were out of the country, [other] men would have a chance of working. . . . I trust that there are very few farmers that hold the views of Mr. Stuart. I hope so, for the honor of that glorious profession of farming, which I have always gloried in. When I left it for a time, I could not keep away from it, and there I am still. [Applause.] The Chairman: Order! Order!"

Stuart jumped up again: "Mr. Chairman: a year ago last Summer about twenty or thirty white men came up near my place. I went down with others to employ them. I wanted fifteen, I think; another wanted ten or twelve, and so on; and we took them all. After a little they inquired: 'How much will you give?' 'A dollar a day and board.' They wanted a dollar and a half. . . . They did not want work. They would sooner go to San Francisco afoot; sooner go back to their beer." The house grew increasingly agitated at Stuart. Charles Beerstecher of San Francisco rose to attack: "I would ask the gentleman if he considers one dollar a day and board fair wages?"

Mr. Stuart: It is fair wages. You can get them East for twelve and fifteen dollars a month — that is half a dollar a day.
Mr. Beersstecher: I don't wonder that they do not work for you.
Mr. White: Wages in the Pajaro Valley are two dollars a day, and always have been, so far as I know.
[Applause and confusion.]
The Chairman: The house will keep order.
Mr. Inman: I would like to know if this is a political meeting?
The Chairman: The Sergeant-at-Arms will keep order in the lobby.

James O'Sullivan of San Francisco rose for his turn: "I venture to say that the gentleman is an employer of the Chinese," he said.

"Yes," replied Stuart. "Yes: I knew it the first words that fell from his lips," replied O'Sullivan, "that he had such a hatred of his white fellow man — "

"No," interrupted Stuart, "I employ white men too."

"Order!" shouted the Chairman. The delegates swarmed like hornets, rising to ever greater fury over the Chinese. They were starving white families, they were monsters who were obliterating Western civilization. And, again, they worked hard for little pay. "If the white man works for a dollar a day," Beerstecher complained, "the Chinaman can work for fifty cents; if the white man can work for fifty cents, the Chinaman will work for ten cents. We cannot compete with them. This is what has driven the boys of San Francisco into hoodlumism and the girls into houses of prostitution." Stuart sat quietly as the fury continued for the rest of the day, and the next — and for the rest of the week. Only once did he try to speak, but he was ruled out of order. The Convention ignored him.

It dragged on for months. Delegates agreed on provisions forbidding either state bureaucracies or private corporations from employing the Chinese; prohibiting the Chinese from fishing in Californian waters; prohibiting them from buying, holding, or leasing real estate, and voiding all contracts to rent property to the Chinese; and banning "Asiatic coolieism." Finally, on Feb. 1, 1879, the convention brought these provisions up for final approval. Stuart rose once more. "I oppose this article, and I hope every section of it will be stricken out," he began. "Such savage monstrosity has never been penned by man. Is it for Christian men, in this enlightened age, and only for California, to commit this unnatural act of attempting the destruction, by starvation or otherwise, of over one hundred thousand men? Is there anything to be conceived more horrible or more savage?"

Stuart begged the delegates to reconsider their extreme proposals. "Let us now reflect, and use our better judgment and purer reasons, before we pass this terrible article. Such a barbarous, inhuman, or unnatural proposition has never been conceived or entered the brain of either Pagan or Christian man since the foundation of the world. Talk of the Draconian laws written in blood!" These proposals would punish the very virtues of Chinese immigrants:

You can trace down the stream of time through all savage life, with its wars, its cruelties, and its slavery, and fail to find its equal or parallel for injustice, treachery, or ingratitude. These men, after being invited to our shores, after building our railroads, clearing our farms, reclaiming over one million acres of our swamp and overflowed land, planting our vineyards and our orchards, reaping the crops of the small and the needy farmers, gathering our fruits and berries, digging and sacking our potatoes, supplying our markets with the smaller kinds of fish from the sea, manufacturing our woolen and other goods, cleaning up the tailings of our hydraulic mines, scraping the bedrock of our exhausted mining claims, and relieving most of the householders in this State of the household drudgery which would be imposed upon our wives and daughters, thus contributing to our happiness and true prosperity. Sir, after all this, which has added many millions annually to the State and nation's wealth, you would commit treason against our Government by putting this unjust and inhuman article in our organic law. I beg of gentlemen on this floor to pause, to consider well, and not to be carried away through blind prejudice, through political ambition, or through race hatred; but act like civilized, just, and Christian men; not to do an act that would shock all humane men throughout the world, both Christian and Pagan. Sir, this is what I plead for, and will ever plead for; and will sympathize with the weak and downtrodden of the world, and hope to ever remain on the side of humanity and justice as long as life shall last. I may well say that:

"Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn."

Stuart told the convention that he had been attacked in the newspapers and received death threats for his previous speech defending the Chinese. But, he said, "they emanate from sources too low, too filthy, too cowardly, for me to notice. I will now say that no threats, no fears, no intimidation, no coercion, shall ever deter me for a moment from defending the right or doing my conscientious duty." He returned to his subject, and his plea became ever more desperate:

It is complained that the Chinese are penurious in their diet, and that they live on nothing but rice. The truth is, however, that they live here at a greater cost, and have a greater variety of food . . . than do most of their Caucasian enemies. . . . Of pork, poultry, fish, and vegetables, they use large quantities, and good, for which they pay high prices. . . . And the general condition of health among them is far better in the country than among their Caucasian enemies. . . . Every night, after their work is done, and frequently before they eat their meal, each and all go through the ablutions from head to foot, and on Sunday their bathing and washing occupy nearly half the day. What a lesson! What an example to their boasting Caucasian persecutors! It would be well for them and the country if they would copy or practice some of their heathen rites — such as cleanliness, economy, and industry. . . . I am told that many [members of the Convention] agree with me. If so, why not speak . . . ?

[T]he gentleman from Alameda[,] Mr. Webster . . . in his fierce denunciation of the Chinese, I asked him whether Italians and others did not compete with them? He answered 'The Italians compete with them only because they have been brought up from childhood to labor and economy.' What a concession! Economy and labor! Oh, consistency, thou art a jewel. Mr. Reynolds of San Francisco, the ablest St. Paul of their tribe of persecutors, differs from all the rest in his persecution of them. He says he does so on account of their intelligence, industry, and thrift; not on account of their ignorance and filth. I think, sir, I see a ray of light beaming through the dark minds of these benighted persecutors, and hope, like their great leader, they will become converted and sin no more in this way. . . .

Stuart saw his time running out, and urged the delegates to recognize that Chinese immigrants were hardworking and honorable immigrants:

Who are they who desecrate the Sabbath? Who form our rioters and our hoodlums? Who fill our alms houses? Who are plotting to overthrow our common schools? Who stuff our ballot boxes? Who are conspiring to overthrow and destroy our Government, and to utterly stamp out liberty, that despotism over conscience, mind, and muscle, may rise upon the ruins . . . ? Who burn our railroad depots? Who threaten the lives of our best citizens? Who are plotting to despoil our wealthy men? Who claim two thirds of our public offices? Not Chinamen. Then who are they? You may search history through all time, and examine the nations of the East through their rise and fall, and you will find China where it now is and has been for over five thousand years. Yet you will fail to find an instance where she has overrun or crowded out a single nation, however near —"
[At this point in the speaker's remarks, time was called and the gavel fell.]
Mr. Howard, of Los Angeles: I hope the gentleman will be allowed to proceed. He is the pluckiest man in the Convention. I give him my ten minutes.
Mr. Stuart: Thank you, General. As I was saying, on the contrary, her laborers, traders, and merchants have all been encouraged to settle [throughout the world]. . . . Sir, when I was a candidate . . . [t]hey charged that I had said a Chinaman was better than an Irishman or a Dutchman. I said no such thing; but did say that they had as much right here as either and should be protected the same; and I say so still.

He ended with a final plea for equal rights:

Give to the children of these people (and some of them native born) the privilege of our common schools in return for the school taxes they pay; cease persecuting them by personal assault, to which the law is blind; stop this disgraceful special legislation against them; stop this relentless, heartless, and inhuman persecution of foreigners . . . and then, and only then, will we do our duty. What right has the State to exact of these men poll and other school taxes, and then legislate against them, prohibiting their children the privilege of her common schools? Why pass and continue to pass arbitrary and oppressive laws against them? Why does the State fail to protect them from murder, arson, and outrage? I charge the city of San Francisco with cowardice in not protecting them in the exercise of their rights of 'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,' which all men are guaranteed under our flag; while they have collected millions of dollars in taxes, licenses, and otherwise, yet they furnish them no protection in return. They pass cruel ordinances against them; they harass and annoy them through every device the law can invent, and why are similar outrages heaped upon them in nearly every county, town, village, or hamlet in this state? Tell me; tell me; oh, tell me, why they are not protected like others in their honest toil? Or is this to be the final sum of all villainy? In case the outrages on these people do not cease in this state, and it refuses longer to protect them, then I call upon our Government to give them the ballot, that they may protect themselves. If it does not, then I demand the repeal of all naturalization laws, and to modify all immigration laws, with other nations, under the treaty making power.

There was probably a sneering silence in the crowd when Stuart sat. Only one delegate rose to reply; the anti-Chinese provisions were certain to pass. "I regret that I must differ," cracked the delegate. "It is a question between people of our own race, who build homes and build up the country, and the heathen, who band together like brutes, and I must choose the former."

The provisions all passed. The new constitution was submitted to the voters and approved by a statewide vote of 77,959 to 67,134. Shortly thereafter, federal courts struck down most of the anti-Chinese provisions as unconstitutional.

The next year, Charles Stuart died at his home in Sonoma County. His wife, Ellen, continued to manage the vineyards for years afterwards, with her son, Charles Duff Stuart. It succeeded for several decades, and Charles Duff became a writer, publishing a novel, "Casa Grande," in 1906. In it he told a story of the early days of California; his hero, John Miller, is a successful farmer in Sonoma County, a quiet, hardworking man of firm convictions who confronts a family of squatters on his property. But the novel contains no Chinese characters.

Today, Glen Oaks Ranch still stands, at the end of a row of unkempt eucalyptus trees. The vineyards were long ago sold off, and today tourists know the nearby town only as the hometown of writer Jack London. The ranch house, and a few pages of a handwritten autobiography, and the record of his speeches before the constitutional convention are all that remain of Charles V. Stuart, a brave man ahead of his time.

© Copyright 2008, Liberty Foundation

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