Japan and the California Problem

When, during the middle years of the last century, thousands of stalwart pioneers moved westward to California in quest of gold, they had no idea whatsoever of the part of destiny they were playing. When, synchronously with that movement, Commodore Perry crossed the Pacific and forced open the doors of Japan with the prime object of securing safe anchorage, water, and provisions for the daring American schooners then busily engaged in trade with China, he never dreamed of the tremendous result which he was thereby bringing about.

What those men were doing unconsciously was nothing short of preparing the way for contact and ultimate harmonious progress of two great branches of mankind and civilization which originally sprang from a common root, but which in the course of thousands of years of independent development have come to possess strikingly different characteristics.

Culture is aggressive and masculine; it craves conquest and vaunts victory. Once let loose in the open field of the Pacific, the East and West are now involved in a mighty tournament, the outcome of which is yet beyond mortal imagination. The most we can hope for is the speedy realization of Kipling's vision:

But there is neither East nor West,

Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,

When two strong men stand face to face,

Though they come from the ends of the earth.

The Oriental problems in California, originating as they did in the conflict of local, economic, and political interests, have in recent years come to assume more and more the character of cultural and racial questions. The forms and motives of the movement for the exclusion of the Orientals are vastly diverse, often counteracting and contradictory, but deep in the bottom of the whirl there lies the fundamental question of race and civilization. To say the least, the present unrest in California with reference to the Japanese problem is the intensified, miniature form of the general struggle in which East and West are now being involved. Says Governor Stephens of California in his letter to Secretary of State Colby:

California stands as an outpost on the western edge of Occidental civilization. Her people are the sons or the followers of the Argonauts who wended their way westward ... and here, without themselves recognizing it at the time, they took the farthest westward step that the white men can take. From our shores roll the waters of the Pacific. From our coast the mind's eye takes its gaze and sees on the other shores of that great ocean the teeming millions of the Orient, with its institutions running their roots into the most venerable antiquity, its own inherited philosophy and standards of life, its own peculiar races and colors.

This being the case, the magnitude of the Japanese problem in California can hardly be exaggerated. Enveloped in a state under the guise of local conflict, the problem is, nevertheless, a gigantic one, involving vital questions of world destiny. Shall the races of Asia and Europe, brought together by the progress of science, be once more strictly separated? Cannot different races, while remaining biologically distinct, form together the strong factors of a unified nation? Should white races organize in defense of themselves against "the rising tide of color" and invoke race war of an unprecedented scale and consequence? Is it not possible to arrive at some principle by which the contact of white and yellow races may be rendered a source of human happiness instead of being a cause for all the evil consequences imaginable? These are some of the questions which are contained in the Asiatic problem in California.

Already a considerable quantity of literature has appeared which sounds an extremely pessimistic forecast of the future of Eurasiatic relationship. Some writers erroneously divide mankind into so many races by the color of the skin, as if each were a pure, homogeneous race, and they indulge in the risky speculation of "inevitable" race war between the white race, which hitherto held supremacy, and the yellow race, which is now attaining a position of serious rivalry. Others urge the imperative need of organizing the white nations into a supernational state in order to enable them to weather the threatened attacks from the yellow races. All these arguments are based on the presumption that the Asiatic races wherever they go-in Australia, Canada, or America-create conflict with the Aryan race. The fallacy of such arguments lies in envisaging the large problem of East and West from its partial expression. The anti-Asiatic movement in the new world is certainly a significant problem, but it is only an incidental and local phenomenon of the great process under way of cultural unification. That the California problem is not all that is involved in the relationship of Asia and America can readily be seen by the incessant increase, in spite of it, of close co?peration between them. In science, in art, in religion, in ideals, in industry, and commerce, and, last but not least, in sentiment, the peoples of these continents find themselves ever more closely bound together, learning to appreciate the inestimable value thereby created, and fast widening the scope of their group consciousness so as to embrace all mankind, thus concretely vindicating the futility of the idle speculation of race war based on the mere difference of skin pigmentation.

If the error of race-war theory arises from absorption in parts, overlooking their relations with the whole-from magnifying out of proportion the local racial conflict to the extent of eclipsing the value and significance of vastly more important relations-it behooves us to avoid such grievous mistakes and to view the situation in a broader perspective. Indeed, the key to the understanding and the solution of the difficulty of the Pacific Coast is in viewing it in the light of friendship and co?peration between America and Japan. Then, and only then, does it become clear how important it is to approach the problem with prudence and foresight, and to endeavor to solve it in a spirit of fairness and justice. It then becomes plain, in the face of the vastly important tasks involved in wisely conducting the relationship of Orient and Occident, how foolish and cowardly it is to assume a negative attitude of fear and withdrawal from the natural circumstance which time has brought about. Whether one likes it or not, the world is already made one, and any human attempt to divide it into air-tight compartments is hopeless. We are bound to have yet closer contacts among all races and nations. The way to a satisfactory solution of the California problem clearly lies in a closer and more intimate association-in a word, better mutual understanding between Orientals and Occidentals.

Let us then honestly seek to comprehend the heart of the difficulty and frankly discuss the question, untrammeled by any bias, prepossessions, or fear; with eyes steadily fixed on the larger aspects of the problem; eager to arrive at some constructive principles of solution satisfactory to all concerned.

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