Speech #580059980

Under the treaty of 1868 it was agreed that Chinamen might come freely into the United States as Americans could go into China. Under the treaty of 1880I will get to the point I want to make in a momentthe United States agreed with China that Chinamen might be excluded. Now. those two were absolutely inconsistent. and I can not see any good reason for contending that. so far as they were inconsistent. a later law of the land repeals the prior law of the land. So under the treaty of 1880 we had not the power of prohibiting immigration. but we had the power of suspending the immigration of Chinese into the United States. Then came the act. a very peculiar act. of 1888.