Chinese Exclusion

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The article written by Calavita, The Paradoxes of Race, Class, Identity, and ‘Passing’, discusses the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which was the first national effort to control immigration and barred the entry of Chinese laborers in America. Immigration inspectors were tasked with deciding which Chinese immigrants got to enter the country, based on class, but were given vague descriptions of what type of person was allowed entry. As a result of the discrepancies in the act, immigration inspectors suffered from a lack of routine. Inspectors struggled with defining what a merchant was from what a laborer was, as well as how to go about proving that these persons were who they said they were. Due to the ambiguousness, inspectors were urged …show more content…

American students do not learn as much about the racism against other races that live in our country, such as that of the Chinese Exclusion Act. It is my thought that the United States doesn’t teach it because they are ashamed of their deliberate actions of racism that they used to further their governmental interests. As Calavita mentions in her book, Invitation to Law & Society: An Introduction to the Study of Real Law, the Chinese Exclusion Act wasn’t truly about race, but that race was used as an excuse to bar their entry as people. In fact, she breaches the topic that it was more about classism, and that is why certain immigrants of upper class status were allowed in while others, the lowly laborers, were not. This is similar to the laws that were passed in recent decades on the war on drugs. In the film, The House I Live In, that was shown in class, the war on drugs was discussed and it showed first hand accounts of how the war on drugs directly affected impoverished black Americans based on their race and social class. I agree with Calavita in both her book and journal article that race and social class are intertwined and that the law uses both to enforce the laws they

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