[45] Article in The Outlook, April 23, 1904.


Still more irritating and insulting, if that were possible, was
the treatment of the Chinese exhibitors at the Louisiana Purchase
Exposition at St. Louis in 1904. Our Government
formally invited China to participate, sending a special
commission to Peking to urge acceptance. China accepted in
good faith, and then the Treasury Department in Washington
drew up a series of regulations requiring
``that each exhibitor, upon arrival at any seaport in this country, should
be photographed three times for purposes of identification, and should
file a bond in the penal sum of $5,000, the conditions of which were that
he would proceed directly and by the shortest route to St. Louis, would
not leave the Exposition grounds at any time after his arrival there, and
would depart for China by the first steamer sailing after the close of the
Exposition. Thus a sort of Chinese rogues' gallery was to be established
at each port, and the Fair grounds were to be made a prison pen for
those who had come here as invited guests of the nation, whose
presence and aid were needed to make the display a success. It is only
just to add that, upon a most vigorous protest made against these courteous(?)
regulations by the Chinese Government and a threat to cancel their acceptance
or our invitation, the rules were withdrawn and others more decent
substituted. But the fact that they were prepared and seriously presented
to China shows to what an extent of injustice and discourtesy our mistaken
attitude and action in regard to Chinese immigration has carried
us.''