Speech #500101649

The Senator from Connecticut said further: I do not understand that the Republican party. which has a glorious record of having stood all these long years for the natural rights of man. having planted itself on the Declaration of independence. and the principles there enumerated as upon an immovable rock. and said that they should become the guiding spirit of this Republic. has ever committed itself to any proposition that no man shall come to this country to labor unless he is white. This is what the Republican party at its convention said: "Since the authority to regulate immigration and intercourse between the United States and foreign nations rests with the Congress of the United States and the treatymaking power. the Republican party. regarding the unrestricted immigration of the Chinese as a matter of grave concernment. under the exercise of both these powers. would limit and restrict that immigration by the enactment of such just. humane. and reasonable laws and treaties as will produce that result." That was the breaking down of the tissue. that was the giving way of the structure upon which the Burlingame treaty was formed. But they have thoroughly melted now. and. like they do on almost all occasions when they find there is anything to be made by it. they have run right in and taken the front row. they have outheroded Herod. There is nobody to be found now in the United States who is such a pronounced. inveterate. unconquerable. irreclaimable opponent of the importation of Chinese labor here as the distinguished leaders of the Republican party in the United States.