Anti-Asian Sentiment in Early 20th Century America

In the wake of the Civil War and the major improvements in the lives of African Americans during Reconstruction that followed, America saw its inequitable treatment of minorities shift from African Americans to Asian immigrants. To clarify, African Americans were still subject to much racial terrorism and many civil rights abuses, but they had recently gained major legislative victories with the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and the 14th Amendment in 1868 that had helped to ensure their legal citizenship and equal rights in America. During this same time period, Asian immigration to America had begun to increase. Due to the nativist feelings that still pervaded in post-Civil War America and concerns about the labor market brought about by†¦show more content†¦Its primary legislative objective was to ensure that the Civil Rights Act of 1866 would remain intact and efficient. The Civil Rights Act had ensured that all people born in the United States would be guaranteed â€Å"f ull and equal benefit of all laws.† However, the 14th amendment took this idea much further and stratified the act. Citizenship was reaffirmed for all people born or naturalized in the country, regardless of race; states were given much more limited power in addressing and amending these same laws of equality for all citizens; â€Å"life, liberty, and property† were guaranteed to all as a right with the â€Å"due process of law† as the basis; and no one could be denied â€Å"equal protection of the laws.† The major implication of the amendment with regard to Asian immigration is that African Americans were now (supposedly) guaranteed all of the aforementioned rights of the 14th amendment, but the Asian immigrants that would arrive over the next few decades would not necessarily be able to have the same freedoms since they were not born or naturalized in the U.S. Indirectly, the 14th amendment would make it easier for the United States to employ its dis criminatory practices against immigrants simply because it failed to account for them and only recognized citizens as privileged to the rights the amendment guaranteed. 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