How The White Establishment Waged A 'War' On Chinese Restaurants In The U.S.
Though Chinese restaurants are now an American staple, during the late 1800s and early 1900s, some Americans staged a multi-pronged effort to shut them down.
In most American cities these days, it seems like there's a Chinese restaurant on every other street corner.
But in the late 1800s, that ubiquity was exactly what certain white establishment figures feared, according to new study co-written by Gabriel "Jack" Chin, a law professor at the University of California, Davis.
Chin examined how white union workers and lawmakers waged a nationwide "war" on Chinese restaurants in America from 1890 to 1920. "It shows this tradition of an expectation on the part of some white Americans that public policy should be organized for the benefit of their employment," says Chin, who adds that he sees parallels with anti-immigrant
