A New Constitution
At the peak of anti-Chinese sentiment and the rise of the Workingmen's Party, Californians adopted a new state constitution. Voters in June 1878 elected delegates to a constitutional convention; a third of the delegates were members of the Workingmen's Party. The document the delegates produced was far longer and more complex than the original constitution drafted at the Monterey convention in 1849. It was approved by the voters of California on May 7, 1879.
The new constitution included provisions for regulating the railroad and other corporations. It also modified the tax structure to benefit farmers and established a state board of equalization.
The anti-Chinese provisions of the constitution were long, elaborate, and emotional. The ban on the public employment of Chinese was absolute: "No Chinese shall be employed on any state, county, municipal, or other public work, except in punishment for crime." The constitution also instructed the legislature to "delegate all necessary power to the incorporated cities and towns of this state for the removal of Chinese without the limits of such cities and towns, or for their location within prescribed portions of those limits." Thus California cities were empowered to exclude Chinese residents or to require them to live in Chinese ghettos. The presence of Chinese immigrants, ineligible by race to become American citizens, was declared "to be dangerous to the well-being of the state, and the legislature shall discourage their immigration by all means within its power."
Anti-Chinese sentiment in California found its ultimate expression in the Chinese Exclusion Act, approved by the United States Congress in 1882. The act prohibited Chinese immigration for ten years. In 1892 the law was extended for another ten years, and in 1902 it became permanent. The law was repealed during World War II, when China and the United States were allied in the struggle against Japan.
The exclusion law contributed to an economic and demographic decline of the Chinese immigrant population. Boycotts of Chinese-produced goods by white consumers reduced significantly the economic opportunities for the immigrants. Most Chinese workers were relegated to the ranks of common laborers or farm workers. Few Chinese women lived in California at the time of exclusion, and thus the immigrant population faced extraordinary difficulties replenishing itself through natural increase. The Chinese population in the United States declined from 107,000 in 1890 to just 75,000 in 1930.
The exclusion law not only made it nearly impossible for additional Chinese to enter California, it also caused great hardships for those who were already here.