PERILS AND REMEDIES.
It is a matter of no small importance that the Christian public of
America should realize that in the Oriental slavery of its Pacific
Coast it faces a flood. One can gaze with indifference upon a little
stream that trickles through a wall, so long as it is thought to be
merely a natural spring of water; but when one is informed that this
is the trickling of water through a dike which dams out the raging
sea, the sensations are changed to a realizing sense of imminent
peril. If some are disposed to criticise this book for leading its
readers into past history and far distant countries, to tell them
harrowing tales, let them know it is intended to take them for a view
behind the dike,--that they may understand the source of the trickling
stream of brothel slaves that, almost unobserved, flows steadily into
our fair land, and know that the stream is the precursor of a flood.
No mere wall of immigration restrictions will ever get control of the
flow so long as men are permitted to hold slaves after they have once
been landed. And for the further reason, that so soon as China and
Japan have drilled a little longer with the fire-arms furnished them
by Western nations, they will force a free entrance to America. The
yellow flood is sure to come, and we must make ready for it. We must
realize what may happen to American women if almond-eyed citizens,
bent on exploiting women for gain, obtain the ballot in advance of
educated American women. We must realize how impossible it is to
throttle this monster, Oriental Brothel-Slavery, unless we take it
in its infancy. For these reasons, we wish to sound the cry long and
loud: "At once to arms! Not a moment to be lost! We cannot build a dam
in the midst of the raging sea. The new dam must be finished before
the old one bursts."
And beside the peril arising directly from the flood of Orientals who
are accustomed to dealing with women as chattels, there will be the
peril from a debased American manhood. Men cannot live in the midst of
such slavery as this, tolerate it, defend it, make gain through it,
patronize it, without losing all respect for woman and regard for her
rights.
And then, the slave business is fast becoming a vested interest of
large dimensions to American men as well as to Chinese. There are
fully as many (probably more) Japanese slaves as Chinese in the United
States, and at the moderate reckoning that they are worth three
thousand dollars each, that represents six million dollars in capital;
and at the present time the Japanese traffic is more threatening
to the United States than the Chinese, with which alone this book
deals.[A]
[Footnote A: When we undertook the task of writing this book we
intended to include in it also a representation of the Japanese
slave-trade, but have been obliged to desist for want of space.]
In these latter days, when everything in the business line tends to
take on the form of trusts and combines, bent on defeating all law and
exploiting the common people for gain, it casts a shadow of gloom over
one's spirits to think of capitalists entering so largely upon the
active culture and development of vice for pecuniary profit. This can
no longer be looked upon as an evil due to the frailty of human nature
and the strength of the sex appetite; it is rather the expression of a
greed for gold, and should be actively combated as such. The owners
of property, especially those who have a monopoly in the matter of
housing vice because of municipal measures for its segregation, are
most potent offenders against decency, and should be punished as such,
instead of their being admitted, as too often they are, not only to
good society, but to membership on the church roll.
No individual can afford to be indifferent and ignorant as to the
existence of social vice in the community. The only escape from moral
blight and confusion is by active conflict with the forces of evil.
The wrong training of youths who grow up in the presence of tolerated
evils, cannot be overcome in a single generation, nor in a single
century. There is a confusion of the moral sense in the presence of
evil to which one has become accustomed, that is truly terrible.
When it was first learned in England that such an official had been
appointed at Singapore and Hong Kong as the inspector of brothels, the
matter could scarcely gain credence. Mr. Benjamin Scott, Chamberlain
of the City of London, in his valuable book, "A State Iniquity,"
in mentioning this exclaims: "Her Majesty's Inspector of Brothels!
Curiosity is aroused to inquire what were the attributes, duties, rank
and status of this official. From the evidence taken by the Commission
[at Hong Kong], we gather that he kept a register of 'Queen's Women,'
and saw that their names were duly inscribed on the door-posts of the
Government establishments, as lawyers' names are inscribed on nests of
Chambers in the Temple, and those of merchants and traders are written
on offices in the City. He comptrolled the receipt of the fees paid by
the women into the Colonial Treasury.... But, what was the fashion of
his uniform? Did he attend the receptions of His Excellency and
the Port Admiral? Was he allowed precedence of chaplains, or how
otherwise? and was he expected to dine with the Bishop? Was he
decorated on the abolition of his office, and allowed a good service
pension? or is he still in the service of 'our religious and gracious
Queen?'" That officer still remains in the service of the Government,
both at Singapore and at Hong Kong. By the ruse of denominating all
the tasks connected with the Government management of immoral houses
at Singapore "protection," the Chief Inspector of brothels in this
place holds a more honored place in the community than at Hong Kong.
As to Mr. Scott's ironical questions in regard to that officer's
rank, we cannot answer, nor whether he is invited to the Governor's
receptions; but Mr. Scott would have been astounded, indeed, had
he, like ourselves, first met the Chief Inspector of brothels at a
reception given to ministers of the Gospel and missionaries; had he,
like ourselves, been introduced to the official by a minister of the
Gospel than whom none stands higher in British India, and that in
terms of eulogy of the Inspector's activity in Christian work. How
can we explain such a state of affairs? Just as we would explain the
religiousness of early days of America and England associated with the
monstrous cruelty of the slave traffic. There is often in connection
with great human wrong great moral confusion, and without judging the
individuals living under such conditions, we can say emphatically,
those conditions are most undesirable, and attended by moral peril,
especially to the young. It is a truly lamentable thing when prolonged
familiarity with vicious conditions leads to such lack of discernment
as to a man's true character, even among the best portion of a
community. We do not wish such a state of things as this in America.
California does not lack in excellent laws (as they read, in the
Statute Book), for the suppression of prostitution. There are laws
against procuring; against trading in Oriental women for evil
purposes; against buying or selling a female, with or without her
consent, for prostitution; against a husband forcing or influencing a
wife to lead an evil life; against a husband even consenting to his
wife practicing prostitution; against keeping a house of ill-fame; and
against knowingly renting a house for a place of prostitution. But all
these laws, almost the world over, as well as in California, are weak
at one point, namely, that they provide for imprisonment _or_ fine,
whereas they should provide for imprisonment _and_ fine. This is not
because the penalty would then be heavier, of necessity, but in order
that the law may not be prostituted into license. The alternative of
a fine instead of imprisonment defeats the object the public-spirited
citizens have in demanding a law for the discouragement of vice, and
places before the police officials a temptation to corruption. A mild
sentence, which invariably puts the procurer or brothel-keeper in
prison, is worth more than a heavy sentence by way of fine, which can
be met by further oppression of his slaves. Besides, the heavier the
sentence threatened, if there be an alternative fine, the more potent
implement it furnishes for blackmail in the hands of corrupt police
officials. Penalties by means of fines invariably tend to degenerate
into a monthly squeeze to the police, in payment for toleration, and
thus tend to make the police official a defender of social vice,
rather than an exterminator.
It has always been considered, among experienced workers, a most
difficult thing to attack prostitution itself by means of penalties,
for the reason that the punishment is invariably visited with greatest
severity upon the head of the female partner in shame, who is often
the mere victim, while the male partner goes free. But surely
those men who make a business of cultivating vice and vicious
practices,--who use every sort of device to corrupt the youth and
develop the trade in women, can be reached by just and wholesome laws.
We cannot make men moral by act of parliament, but we can restrict
their depredations.
It has long been our feeling that every form and kind of spurious
marriage, such as bigamy, polygamy, illegal divorce and remarriage,
seduction, adultery, and bastardy, besides constituting sometimes
cause for civil action, might with good results be lifted into
offenses against the State. National development depends not upon
the individual but upon the _family unit_, and that family unit is
non-existent outside the monogamous relation, or, at least, is so
frail as to easily crumble. Nothing could be more vicious in moral
education to the youth than the average suit for civil damages, in
which the whole decision of the case is made to depend upon whether
some young girl can or cannot be ruined in reputation by lawyers
of the defense and by their client, concerning whom there is not a
question as to their lack of a decent reputation. When the State rises
to defend itself against counterfeit marriage, just as it defends
itself against counterfeit coin, then the whole horizon of the life of
a profligate woman will not be brought before the public gaze every
time she comes into court, but will be kept in deserved obscurity, and
the woman will be tried for a _single_ offense, just as the man is
tried, and not for all the offenses and indiscretions of a life-time.
The penalty for such wrong doing may not be placed at even so high a
figure in the Statute Book as it now stands, while accounted a civil
injury, but the dignity of the trial would give serious lessons
in virtue to the youth. No nation can long exist that does not
incessantly discourage the practice of every sort of offense against
the sanctity of the marriage relation.
But after all, there will be no success in attempting to cope with
Oriental prostitution by means of laws against prostitution and
kindred vices, for the reason that the evil is a far graver one than
this. Innocent children are reared for vice, and at a certain age
thrust into the life through no choice of theirs; and not infrequently
perfectly respectable women of mature years are kidnaped for the vile
service. The effect upon the moral character of a man who resorts to
a _slave_ class of victims to his evil propensities, must be to make
that man a menace to society wherever he goes, through deeds of
violence which he is willing to commit, and accustomed to commit, of
the worst imaginable sort.
And an attack upon the slave _traffic_ alone will never prove
adequate. The history of our country's dealing with negro slavery
is instructive on this point. There were laws in abundance for the
suppression of the _traffic_ between Africa and America; it was
forbidden to bring slaves into the country, and devices were invented
looking to an eventual liberation of all the slaves in certain
regions; but what did all these amount to, so long as slavery could
exist? There had to be one sweeping, general emancipation of slaves
wherever they were found, under whatever circumstances, and when the
state of slavery was abolished, the trade in slaves died a natural
death. The words of Mr. Francis concerning conditions at Hong Kong
bear directly on this point: "Until the system of prostitution which
prevails in this Colony ... is declared to be _slavery_, and treated
and punished as such in Hong Kong, no stop will ever be put to the
kidnaping of women and the buying and selling of female children in
Hong Kong. This buying and selling and kidnaping is only an effect, of
which the existing system of Chinese prostitution is the cause."
In 1880, Mr. Berry, a member of the House of Representatives from
California, made use, in a debate in the House, of the argument that
"if the British authorities had not been able to prevent slavery from
being practiced in Hong Kong, there would be great danger that, if an
unlimited immigration of Chinese were allowed, it would be followed by
the prevalence of slavery in this country."
It is perfectly true that immigration of Chinese, even though it has
been greatly restricted, has been followed by the introduction of
slavery into the United States, yet the premises laid down in this
argument, may not pass unchallenged, for the following reasons: There
was never any serious attempt to put down slavery at Hong Kong,
excepting in the efforts of Sir John Smale and perhaps one or two
others, whose efforts were opposed by others, and in large part
defeated. The records go to show that there was at once a growth of
healthy moral sentiment created among the Chinese, through Sir John
Smale's endeavor, that promised much good for the future had his
course of action been continued. This official planted his feet
squarely upon the doctrine that all buying and selling of human beings
was slavery, and that a human being cannot, in law, "become a slave,
even by his own consent." And moreover this official, with Governor
Hennessey's encouragement, prosecuted his cases without any tender
consideration as to the demands of European libertines, who would be
left with scant opportunities to be self-indulgent unless slaves were
placed at their disposal. The truth is, from the foreign standpoint,
the plea for brothel slavery was based upon the "necessity" of vice,
and from the Chinese standpoint the plea for slavery was based upon
so-called Chinese "custom." The Government was impressed that it must
have consideration for the demands of libertines, and consideration
for Chinese "custom." Neither of these arguments has any worth when
applied to the slave conditions of California, and therefore the most
serious, baffling obstacles to a removal of the evil are out of the
way. Both pretexts, we maintain, were false. There is no necessity for
furnishing vice to libertines; there was no lawful Chinese custom to
be opposed in opposing brothel slavery. But even if these were claimed
to be sufficient arguments across the water, they have no force in
California. There are women, alas! willing to make a trade of their
virtue for _their own gain_, without forcing Chinese women to make a
trade of their virtue for _the gain of masters_. As to Chinese custom:
America is not setting forth inducements for the Chinese to come and
live in our midst, as did Sir Charles Elliott when he promised the
Chinese the privilege of practicing their own social and religious
rites and customs, "pending Her Majesty's pleasure." If Chinese or any
other class of foreigners come to reside in the United States, it
is with the understanding that they must conform to the laws of the
country, whatever modification or radical alteration it obliges them
to make in their native customs, and if they will not do this they
must take the consequences.
No class of people, taken as a whole, are possessed of a greater
moral sense or can be reached more readily by moral suasion, than
the Chinese. We believe that if a proper condition of public moral
sentiment were maintained, by the enforcement of the laws of the
United States in Chinese communities, no class of people would be more
delighted than the respectable Chinese themselves, who are now left in
a state of terror for their own lives from the highbinders, and who
often dare not bring over their lawful wives from China, to live in
the midst of this reign of terror, at the mercy of slave-traders
and women-stealers. Then Chinese criminals would seek safer shelter
elsewhere, and respectable Chinese family life would take the place,
in our Chinatowns, of a combination of criminal men and slave women.
And Chinese men of weak character, separated far from home influences,
would not be met on every hand by temptations of the most potent sort.
Such is the real worth of the sort of Chinese character that one meets
in other parts of that country from those vitiated by familiar contact
with foreign profligates, that the presence of such could not but be
a benefit to us, and would afford peaceable, thrifty, useful Chinese
settlements in our midst, of which we would feel justly proud.
In order to see that the entrance of Chinese to our country from China
is not made a cover for this dreadful slave trade, there is an urgent
need of coöperation between rescue workers of the California coast
and rescue workers in all the open ports of China. Chinese men are
constantly returning to China to "marry," in duly prescribed form, and
then return with their wives and reënter the United States, merely to
put the women into the brothels. Any man who is willing to run the
risk of detection can thus get a trip home to China to see his lawful
wife and family, and make it a profitable business trip besides,--with
all expenses more than paid by the importation, and sale of a slave.
Chinese women are constantly returning to China to bring "daughters"
to put in the slave pens. No woman (even lawfully married to a
Chinaman), should be allowed to take a ticket at Hong Kong or any of
the open ports of China for the United States, whose case has not been
thoroughly investigated by days of acquaintance with a woman inspector
in a house of detention, if necessary, on the other side. And no
Chinese woman should be allowed to enter on this side of the water,
until she has passed the second time under such surveillance in a
house of detention. And such rescue workers should have the Government
authority signified by a policeman's star.
The evil to be combated should be met with the right remedy. "Fitches
are not threshed with a thresher, neither is a cart wheel turned about
upon the cummin; but the fitches are beaten out with a staff, and the
cummin with a rod." Much of the failure to control brothel slavery
has grown out of the application of the wrong remedy, not out of a
difficulty in controlling the Chinese. These cases of trading in human
flesh have generally been treated in the courts as though coming under
the laws against ordinary prostitution. To illustrate:
Within the past month, three Chinese girls were captured by a rescue
worker. They were cooped up, with a man who had charge of them, in
a tiny closet scarcely sufficient to hold the four, which had been
entered by a panel door which was securely nailed up and bags of rice
piled against it. The rescuer pulled away the bags, pried open the
door of the secret receptacle with her hatchet, and drew out the
girls, dripping with perspiration and panting for breath, in
consequence of the two hours' confinement, while the brothel was being
searched for them. They were conveyed to the mission home, and were
very happy, and expressed their eager wish to remain. A Chinese
woman came to call at the mission home, in the absence of the
superintendent, and, unfortunately, was allowed to get access to an
acquaintance of these girls, and she conveyed to them a promise that
if they would come back, in a very little while they would all be
given their liberty. After that the girls said they wished to go, and
for the following reasons: They could not dwell in safety among their
Chinese people, if in debt to a brothel-keeper, for he would be always
on their track, and if he could not capture them and they would
not return, he would certainly secure their death at the hands of
high-binders. The case came up in court. The girls told there all the
details of their being recently smuggled into this country; that they
were bought by their present owner for $3,030 each; that they were
flogged when their earnings for their owner fell below $300 a month,
and other similar details,--_but_ they also declared their wish to go
back to the brothel and to their owner. To be sure, they had expressed
elsewhere a contrary wish, and the wish to return had been begotten in
their hearts by the threats and inducements conveyed to them by the
woman who came to the home. The judge was one who could not be bought
nor bribed, and who sincerely wished the good of the girls, but they
said they chose a life of prostitution, and to that life they were
returned.
We do not pretend to understand as well as that judge the laws that
were available, on which he rendered his decision, but this we do say:
If California has not a law that will not permit the introduction
of slavery into the state, even though Chinese women _consent_ to
slavery, then it needs such a law at once. _Slavery is too formidable
an evil for free Americans to allow its existence on the consent of
enslaved Chinese women._ Age of consent legislation, as applied to the
question of social vice, is one thing, and consent as applied to the
question of slavery, quite another thing. Sir John Smale, in the
Supreme Court of Hong Kong, quoting from Sir R. Phillimore on
International law (vol. I, p. 316), declared that it was not possible
for a human being legally to "become a slave _even by his own
consent_." Had the matter of consent or non-consent of slaves been
consulted as to negro slavery, we have no reason for believing that
the negro would ever have had his freedom. Though prostitution is
entangled with the conditions of servitude, under which Chinese women
and girls groan in California, yet only about half the slaves are as
yet prostitutes, and slavery looms up so large against the western
sky, as compared with the mere consent or wish of a creature brought
up from babyhood in familiarity with vice, that to consult the option
of such an one in determining the existence or non-existence of
_slavery_ in America, is a thing that ought not to be tolerated for a
moment.
We have shown how every Chinese girl who has escaped from her
servitude to the city of refuge,--the mission home,--is received and
welcomed. How the rescued and rescuer run the race for dear life, and
the pursuers are obliged to turn back at the door. But what a state
of things in this country which we call free! Should not the entire
country be one great city of refuge? Do we not pretend that it is such
to all who are oppressed? Why should not the pursuer be turned back at
the Golden Gate, rather than at the door of an exceptional home in
San Francisco? We are fond of saying that under the stars and stripes
slavery cannot exist. We must make it good, or acknowledge, in dust
and ashes of repentance, that we are hypocrites. Idle words will not
do in place of deeds; we must make good our profession at any cost.
Everyone of these Chinese women should be removed from the brothels,
wherever these exist, consent or no consent, placed in houses of
detention, instructed as to the condition of liberty of the person in
which she _must_ live, and then, if she _prefers_ a slave's life,
he deported to China,--a land in which slavery is permitted. Every
Chinese man who attempts to interfere with this radical treatment of
the situation, should be imprisoned or driven from the country. These
"Watch-dogs," who are perfectly known to the police, both by name and
by face, should be put behind bars and in stripes, for a long time to
come. This is not prostitution, _merely_,--Oh, how tenderly men are
inclined to deal with the male harlot! but for once the libertine
has not a shadow of a shade of defense,--the patrons of _slaves_ are
something worse than fornicators; they are guilty of as many offenses
of criminal outrage as they are guilty of visits to the slave-pens
stocked with Chinese girls, and they deserve a prison sentence for
every such visit.
Girls are afraid to come out of Chinese brothels until they have
earned their freedom. This is because powerful Chinese societies have
been formed that will either kidnap such a girl or kill her. So she
declares in court that she consents freely to be returned to the
brothel, and an extraordinary misconstruction of the doctrine of the
"liberty of the person," leaves the judge with nothing to do but to
deliver the girl over to compulsory voluntariness. Again, Chinese
young men do not wish to marry liberated Chinese girls, but they go,
rather, to the brothel and buy a wife; and for much the same reason.
If a man marries the liberated slave of a brothel keeper, the
high-binders will teach the lesson that he has stolen another man's
property, by watching their chance and assassinating him. Why are not
these societies broken up, root and branch? Cannot? Nonsense; the
officers of the law have not made the attempt with any degree of
earnestness as yet.
For years, the "Protectors" at Singapore and at Hong Kong have
summoned the slaves into their offices and informed them that they
were free, and asked them if they freely consented to going into a
life of shame, before putting them there? But to what purpose? Let the
Police Magistrate, H.E. Wodehouse, reply, as he did concerning a
case of suicide: "When registering her name she said she had no
pocket-mother, that her parents were both dead, and that she became a
prostitute of her own free will. The inspector said that that was the
description of themselves that nearly all prostitutes gave, and that
it was very rarely that it was true." Remember that, reader, when
the columns of your morning paper inform you that all the girls of
Chinatown have been interrogated, and that they all said they were
there of their own free will? It is "very rarely that it is true."
Referring to this case, which we describe on page 118, the Marquess
of Ripon wrote to Hong Kong that the brothel-keeper who attempted to
extort money from the young man before delivering up his captive to
him for marriage, should have been prosecuted, and adds: "A single
successful prosecution in a case of this kind would, in all
probability, do more to show that the inmates of brothels are free to
leave such places when they wish, than could ever be effected by the
present system, under which efforts are indeed made to explain their
positions to the inmates of brothels." This is a very clear statement
of exactly what is needed in California. The public should refuse to
be satisfied with visits of the police officials to the girls, to
ascertain the girls' state of mind as to a sense of liberty, and
demand to know the official's state of mind,--whether he is ready to
_prove_ the freedom of the slave by hounding the slave dealers out of
the community.
There was recently a war of secret societies in Oakland's Chinatown.
One of the "tongs" quarreled with another, and three or four Chinese
men were shot on the streets of Oakland,--one fatally, named Lee Bock
Dong, in his own house. Lee Bock Dong had a slave girl who saw the
shooting, so she was taken into custody by police officers. But the
Chinese got her out of jail by means of the usual writ of habeas
corpus, and she was sent to Sacramento to another person, who had
disputed her ownership with Lee Bock Dong. It seems, Lee Bock Dong had
been holding the slave girl for a debt owed to him by her real owner
in Sacramento, of $2,000. The Oakland _Enquirer, of_ Feb. 20th, 1907,
informed its readers a few days after the affray as follows: "This
girl's possession was one of the points in dispute between the two
tongs, and it was this that was settled at yesterday's conference." It
is interesting to note that other newspapers gave the information
that police officials attended the conference of these tongs, to help
settle the dispute. The report continues: "Lee Bock Dong's widow
demands the return of the girl as security for the money, or the
payment of the $2,000. This the Bing Gongs (one of the tongs) finally
agreed to, and it was for them to determine the course they would
pursue. The police say that this step is only preliminary to a
settlement of the whole affair ... that peace will be declared, the
complaint against the alleged murderers withdrawn, and the case
dismissed ... it is now expected that within a few days the extra
police force, which has been maintained in Chinatown ever since the
night of the shooting affray, will be withdrawn and peace reign once
more." This article is headed: "Warring Tongs Hold a Conference, and
it is Agreed Chinese Maiden is to be Returned, or Equivalent in Cash."
The _Enquirer_ of March 9th reported that the "Chinese tong men have
been dismissed."
"Equivalent in cash" for a Chinese maiden! Can it be possible that
this is the United States of America, and the twentieth century! One
actual murder, and two murderous assaults on the public streets, all
dismissed by an understanding entered into with the police that they
could now withdraw their extra force, since the Chinese girl had been
passed over as security for a debt, until the "equivalent in cash"
is paid! Have we spent hundreds of millions of dollars, and shed the
blood of thousands of young men, and widowed and orphaned tens of
of thousands besides, in a civil war to put down African slavery,
introduced from the Atlantic Coast, merely to turn about and welcome
Chinese slavery from the Pacific Coast?
"Behold this is a people robbed and spoiled; they are all of them
snared in holes, and they are hid in prison houses: they are for a
prey, and none delivereth; for a spoil, and none saith, Restore.
"Who among you will give ear to this? Who will hearken and hear for
the time to come?"