Reading Comprehension

Source: Knewton

It is assumed that American hostility against the Chinese began in 1882 with the Chinese Exclusion Act. Signed into law by President Chester Arthur, the act allowed Congress to suspend immigration of both skilled and unskilled Chinese workers for a ten-year period following a widespread economic depression. It should be noted that one of the many damaging consequences of this economic crisis had been the escalation of hostilities against foreign workers. Historians aside, few grasp the intricacies of the changing policies or the corresponding social developments that combined to produce a subtle and deep-seated discrimination against the Chinese that would sustain itself well into the 20th century. In order to understand both these intricacies and the fluctuations that characterized U.S. treatment of the Chinese, it is important to examine what initially motivated the government to accept this particular immigrant group.

Government attitudes toward the Chinese derived from a variety of considerations. Since immigrant laborers were mostly young, illiterate, and healthy, they provided a massive source of tax income without burdening government infrastructure (education and healthcare, for example). This fact was not lost on United States politicians. Knowing that their constituents required cheap labor to staff construction projects (particularly in the Western regions of the United States), these politicians readily welcomed Chinese immigrants into the country during the period following the Civil War and the dissolution of the Southern slave-plantation system. Repealing the century-old formal exclusion of Chinese immigration, the Burlinghame Treaty of 1868 established friendly relations between China and the United States. By granting China "Most Favored Nation" status, the treaty recognized China's control over its own territory, allowed Chinese consuls to preside over ports in the US, protected Chinese Americans from persecution directed towards their religious persuasion, and allowed them specific privileges-with the exception of naturalization. Mandates such as these encouraged immigration, a practice which was fueled in China by war, starvation, and political corruption.

By 1880, the Chinese immigrant population in the US was well over 70,000. Based on the agreement of 1868, promising employment opportunities seemed available on paper but often evaporated when workers, lured by three-year contracts and charismatic recruiters, became mired in the challenges associated with actually procuring these positions. These expectant laborers faced unbearable transport conditions and were often subjected to unfair wages (which, in fact, were often denied to them by way of shadily outlined food-and-housing schemes). Able neither to return to China nor to naturalize properly, such immigrants were forced to live in an environment of harsh discrimination, where they often perished from disease and starvation. Following the waning of the Gold Rush craze and the intensification of competition for mining jobs, the Chinese found themselves to be the objects of considerable resentment from their white peers. This widespread feeling culminated in the passage of the Exclusion Act.

Q1
The primary purpose of the passage is to

A: illuminate the social factors that culminated in the Burlinghame Treaty of 1868
B: demonstrate the relationship between political shifts and their corresponding social developments
C: demonstrate how political attitudes toward the dissolution of the Southern plantation system affected Chinese immigration policies
D: show how denying 19th century Chinese immigrants the opportunity to naturalize caused the rise of certain industries, particularly in the West
E: illuminate the less considered legislative shifts in Chinese immigration history *


Q2
According to the passage, the author believes that most people who evaluate the legislative shifts that culminated in the Chinese Exclusion Act often fail to consider

A: the fact that Chinese immigrant workers were unable to return to China or naturalize in the States
B: the unfair wages and unbearable transport conditions faced by Chinese immigrant workers
C: the motivations behind initial government acceptance of the Chinese *
D: the terms that defined "Most Favored Nation" status under the stipulations of the act that preceded the Burlinghame Treaty
E: the effect of the Gold Rush and lucrative mining opportunities