Has the United States ever enslaved Chinese people to help them build railroads in history?

The earliest Chinese people came to the United States en masse was when gold mines were discovered in California in 1848. At that time, people from Taishan, Xinhui, Kaiping and Enping in Guangdong Province went to California to hunt for gold. They were all sitting in the airless cargo hold of foreign ships. They ate, drank, pooped, urinated and slept in it for dozens of days, transporting them like piglets.

Go to the United States, go to the rivers in the canyons of California, use a sieve to pan for gold, and make a living.

After California officially joined the United States, it began a series of anti-Chinese labor movements in history. In 1850, Canada passed the Foreign Miners License Act, charging a license fee of 20 yuan per person per month, coupled with the officials' commission and exploitation, and even fake receipts, as well as the tax collector's pursuit. After being hunted and beaten, most of the Chinese workers fled from the canyon area to San Francisco. Some were desperate to return home, and some were unwilling to return home because they could not see the Jiangdong elders, so they stayed in San Francisco and did all kinds of menial and hard work. The most common one is laundry. Because there is no cost to do laundry, and because California is undergoing development and there are more men than women, this industry is in great need; at the same time, white people are not willing to do this kind of hard work and low profits.

At that time, beating Chinese workers had become a pastime for white people when they were against Chinese workers. If you grab a Chinese worker's pigtails and kowtow his head on the street, you will definitely attract passers-by to watch and cheer, just like Wang Hu beating Ah Q in Weichuang. The police

not only did not interfere with this unprovoked beating, but when they saw the Chinese worker's nosebleed, they thought he had been fighting with someone else and arrested him

.

From 1850 to 1860, Chinese workers were killed at will, and many died tragically in foreign lands. The Qing government at that time did not

but protect overseas Chinese. Overseas Chinese might be beheaded when they returned home according to the earliest Qing laws.

In 1864, the United States built a transcontinental railway, starting from both the east and west coasts at the same time. In order to take advantage of cheap labor, white people thought of Chinese workers who "can build the Great Wall". They began to systematically recruit more than 10,000 Chinese workers in Guangdong, and they still transported piglets to the United States. Build roads for them.

These Chinese workers can endure any hardship and do any work. They camped on the site, cooked meals, worked around the clock

and offered to compete with the Irish workers who were paving the road from east to west. The highest record of Chinese workers is 10.6 kilometers per day, far exceeding that of Irish workers. But when the east and west sides held a grand opening ceremony for the railway line, the Chinese workers were kept far away and were not allowed to participate. At that time, the Chinese workers were very angry and hid the last sleeper used for the connection. When the connecting ceremony was going on and the sleepers could not be found, people saw a Chinese worker coming out with the sleepers on his shoulders. The contributions of Chinese workers have not been properly compensated. It was not until more than ten years ago, on the 100th anniversary of the Transrailway in the United States, that a sign was erected at the connection site to commend the contributions of Chinese workers.

With the completion of the Cross-Railway, the status of Chinese laborers improved slightly, but then it triggered a new anti-Chinese movement.

The total number of Chinese workers in the United States at that time was 63,000. After the completion of the Cross-railway, not only were all unemployed, but they were also massacred and deported. This anti-Chinese trend also involves local economic conflicts. After the completion of the Cross-Railway, many enterprises in the west were controlled by the railway kings who represented the eastern plutocrats. The local people were dissatisfied and angry with the Chinese workers who built the road. Especially after the road construction work was over, the unemployed Chinese workers wearing short Tang suits and long braids did whatever they could to survive, regardless of wages or hard work, which aroused the jealousy of local workers. They believed that Chinese workers had taken away their employment opportunities, so they flocked to areas where Chinese workers gathered, killed them and burned down their houses. In 1886, the city of Seattle, Washington State enacted special legislation to force Chinese to leave the country within a time limit. Since then, in the western states of the United States, "Chinese exclusion" has become a slogan for democracy, democracy, and the two parties to win votes.

In this case, the surviving overseas Chinese were still alive and dead. The laws at that time stipulated that Chinese could not be naturalized as U.S. citizens, were not allowed to own real estate, each person had to pay a head tax of 10 yuan, and their hair could not exceed 1 inch. Their remains could not be exported from the country. Laundries must be equipped with delivery carriages, and they were only allowed in The Brick House opened... There were numerous laws specifically controlling the Chinese.

After the Great Fire of San Francisco in 1906, the law allowed Chinese people born in the United States to enjoy citizenship rights.

Although this law looks democratic, it is actually a joke. Because there are very few women among the Chinese workers in the United States, male Chinese workers have no conditions to get married, and they cannot go back after leaving the United States. Some people worked hard to save some money and returned to Siyi, Guangdong to marry and support themselves in old age, while some stayed single all their lives and ended up in a foreign land.

Overseas Chinese who came to the United States as immediate family members also suffered bitter humiliation. After they arrived in San Francisco, they were first detained on a small island for investigation. This kind of investigation lasted for as little as two weeks and as long as half a year. They were repeatedly questioned, beaten and kicked. Everything you say is recorded. Many people died of illness in detention centers, and many committed suicide out of fear of guilt for falsifying the relationship between father and son.

It was not until the Second World War that the status of overseas Chinese gradually improved as China and the United States became allies and the United States canceled several anti-Chinese policies.