Speech #580059907

To so hold gives firmer ground for those to stand upon who may claim that we are not without exclusion laws after the denunciation of the 1894 treaty goes into effect. Otherwise it must be that the only treaty we will have after that time is the Burlingame treaty. and the validity of our exclusion laws must in that event be measured by the provisions of the Burlingame treaty. Since that treaty declares in the most emphatic language for the open door to Chinese of every condition. no law that interfered in the least with the freedom of immigration could have a leg to stand upon.