The Chinese had immigrated to many places, but perhaps the most well known is California. The Chinese immigration to California was a period of discrimination, conflict, and compromise because the Chinese found hard-to-find gold with smart technologies, got good jobs for low pay, and had better ways to mine for gold. They were more diligent than the other miners, so they were blamed for almost everything that went wrong with the mining machines and mining. The Chinese couldn’t testify in courts and whose murders were not taken seriously by the Americans and courts. They had their tools broken up, had their houses burnt up, and were taunted and stoned. Chinese laborers were forced to leave or be beaten up and imprisoned. However, they became war allies with the U.S. in World War I and World War II.

When the Chinese Exclusion Act was first passed in 1882, it cause a lot of conflict, and the Chinese boycotted all American goods and culture, such as American ways of living, to force the Americans to repeal it, but it didn’t work. In fact, it made Americans more active in making sure the Act was obeyed (Chinese Immigration and Chinese Exclusion Acts). The Americans were angry with the Chinese because the Chinese were finding gold at places where Americans had given up on. All Chinese miners were banned from all of California: San Francisco, Sacramento, and the mining fields (Chinese Exclusion Act). To stay in or enter California, you needed a certificate to prove that you were not Chinese if you had a Chinese-looking face (Chinese Exclusion Act). Because of all of the laws in the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Geary Act, very few foreigners could stay in or enter California (Chinese Exclusion Act). The Geary Act extended the Chinese Exclusion Act after it expired in 1892. It was made permanent in 1902 (Chinese Exclusion Act). If a master of a vessel or ship violated any of the laws, he would have his ship seized and confiscated (Chinese Exclusion Act). The master of the ship or vessel would be fined $1000 if he let a Chinese person in without permission of the government (Chinese Exclusion Act). A Chinese person that was allowed inside California would have to trade some his goods, or he would have be sent back to China without a single speck of gold (Chinese Exclusion Act). If he tried to enter into California with a false, non-Chinese sounding name or tried to impersonate someone that was not Chinese (and was someone allowed to stay) and he was caught, he would be fined $1000 and imprisoned for not more than five years (Chinese Exclusion Act). A Chinese person causing trouble or murdering any European or American man would be fined and thrown in jail for not more than one year (Chinese Exclusion Act). If he obeyed all the laws in the Act, he might compromise and have a treaty with the Americans and not be punished like the other Chinese unless he murdered or caused trouble (Chinese Exclusion Act).

Even though miners were banned, some Chinese became laundrymen, cooks, and cigar makers, but the Americans still cheated them. After the discrimination started, racist American employers started hiding the Chinese laundrymen’s identity and coworkers and customers usually stole bundles of clothing from the Chinese man (Magagini). It caused conflict between the Americans and Chinese.

The Chinese back in China heard stories of “gold mountains” or mountains of gold from newspapers and neighbors (Ketchum 86). On the ship to California, they ate and drank rotten and moldy food, and nearly starved (Ketchum 86). Some people were tricked by Americans into emigrating from China and were chained to and imprisoned on the boat (Ketchum 86). They were beaten if they tried to escape (Ketchum 86). Some desperate Chinese even threw themselves into the Pacific Ocean because they couldn’t stand the torture (Ketchum 86). If they even got to the mines, some couldn’t even mine or prospect for gold (Chinese Exclusion Act). If the ones who were allowed to prospect for gold struck it rich, they were murdered and had their houses burnt (Ketchum 90). They were forced off of good mines that contained lots of easy-to-get gold (Chinese Exclusion Act). The Chinese miners were also stoned, had their tools broken, their claims jumped, and were taunted by American and European children (Ketchum 90). Racist American union leaders also attacked Chinese miners and laborers for almost no reason except that they were believed to be the cause of depressed wages and the lack of jobs (The Chinese in California). If anybody murdered a Chinese man, Americans acted as if it weren’t serious at all (Chinese Exclusion Act). The case would still be put to court, but it was useless. The only defendants would be the Chinese, and because the Chinese were not allowed to testify in court because of the Chinese Exclusion Act, hanging for murdering a Chinese man was impossible (Blake and Daily, 29).

The Chinese were discriminated against for a very unfair reason. They came to help their families and not to stay and find as much gold as possible to keep and spend on treasures. They weren’t trying to get rich. They were just trying to help their families back in China and because jobs were hard to get in China (The History of Chinese Immigration to the United States). All the Americans thought that that was rubbish and that sending gold back to China was to not a benefit to the Americans and America, which caused a lot of conflict (Blumberg 98).

The Chinese came to America for many reasons. One reason was that their families were suffering and really poor and they really wanted to help them. Another reason was that there was the Opium war in China and they wanted to escape from it. The last reason was that some just wanted to be rich, get gold, build a mansion, show off to their friends, and caught Gold Fever (Chinese Immigration). When they got to America, it caused a lot of conflict.

When they came to mine, they angered the selfish American miners, who would force them off of good mining spots, with their mining skills and mining contraptions, which caused conflict. The Americans eventually turned against them because they weren’t getting much gold and the Chinese were discovering gold everywhere because of their waterwheel and other inventions they created. The Chinese protected themselves from torture by working in small mining groups and working together so no American could have many easy lone targets. They also went to jewelers to have their gold stitched into clothing like belts with gold buckles so they wouldn’t have to pay so much tax on the amount of gold they found in the mining fields. American agents came to their camp, to inspect how much gold they had found, and, they were inspected for how much gold they had with them when they were about to return back home to China to their families (Ketchum 89).

The Chinese miners had better ways to find and obtain gold and money than any other single miner or group of miners by using technology. One good example is the water wheel, which consisted of many buckets interlinked with pulleys to extract water from the Sacramento River (the river containing the gold), which left rich, dry, gold-filled mining land below (Ketchum 89). This proved that they were a lot smarter than the other miners, who spent all day working in mines with their pickaxes and shovels on land that may have run out of gold a long time ago. They traded some of the goods that they had left for other goods or gold dust from other foreigners (Ketchum 87). They also sold prefabricated houses that were shipped in pieces (Ketchum 87) and imported food like dried fruit and fresh ginger (Blumberg 98). Some never even went to the mining fields. They just found Gold Mountain right there in San Francisco. When they saw all the work they could have without having to go to the mining fields, they started working at restaurants and on the railroad (Ketchum 86) and became laundrymen or became cigar makers. Many employers hired them because they agreed to work for very low pay and were very compliant and easy to teach. Because they were very easy to teach, they could learn English very easily and there were teachers in San Francisco who helped them learn English. They saved their money, unlike the other American miners who wasted their money on treasures and weaponry that might never be used, so the Chinese got richer than anybody else and any other group very quickly (Ketchum 88).

The Chinese quickly became allies when World War I and World War II started because they hoped the Americans would repeal the Chinese Exclusion Act and compromise after the Americans realized they were helping in the wars. They hoped Americans would see how they wanted to show that they respected their new homeland (Chinese Exclusion Repeal Act). After World War II, the Americans began to put the repeal of the Act into thought. In 1943, the Americans finally repealed the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Geary Act (Repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act, 1943) and compromised. After the Acts were repealed, the Chinese immigrants and Chinese citizens were allowed to become citizens of the United States and California (The Chinese Exclusion Repeal Act). The Americans and Chinese finally compromised.

The Chinese people have faced conflict when they were blamed for almost everything that went wrong with mining and were tortured before they got to America, and some never got there because of discrimination. The Chinese and the United States compromised when the Chinese became our war allies and when the United States repealed the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Geary Act. Chinese people that worked in mines were discriminated against even though they had done nothing wrong and showed no harm to their assailants, but they have also been able to protect themselves by working together before the Chinese Exclusion Repeal Act was passed. The U.S. repealed the Act when they saw what the Chinese did for them. The Chinese were and still are America’s war allies even when they were being tortured and being treated as objects and slaves. This is an example of conflict and compromise in history.