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VIII. Major Dates and Events for Asian Americans in the United States
and Washington State

Year

Event
1849 Gold discovered in California. First wave of Chinese immigration to the US.
1853 Territorial law passed banning Chinese from voting in Washington.
1863 Territorial law banning Chinese from testifying in court cases involving whites in Washington.
1864 Territorial law enacting poll tax for Chinese in Washington.
1868 Meiji Restoration begins in Japan.
1870 234 Chinese in Washington state according to the US Census, comprising 1.0% of the population.
1870 First Congressional debate over the rights of Chinese in the US.
1870 Chinese miners in eastern Washington outnumbered white miners nearly two to one.
1871 Beginning of construction of the Northern Pacific Railroad from Kalama to Tacoma, Washington, using nearly 2000 Chinese laborers.
1880 3186 Chinese in Washington state according to the US Census, comprising 4.2% of the population. Total in US: 105,465.
1882 Chinese Exclusion Act signed into law.
1883 Northern Pacific Railroad transcontinental line completed from Lake Superior, using nearly 17,000 Chinese over the entire span of the project.
1884 Beginning of large-scale contract immigration by Japanese to Hawaii.
1885 Anti-Chinese riots in Rock Springs, Wyoming. 28 Chinese killed by a white mob.
1885 Three Chinese killed outside of Issaquah.
1885 Anti-Chinese demonstrations in Tacoma. 700 Chinese residents expelled.
1886 Anti-Chinese demonstrations in Seattle. 350 Chinese residents forcibly expelled.
1889 Washington becomes a state
1892 Chinese Exclusion Act extended another ten years
1898 Spanish-American War. US acquires the Philippines from Spain, making the the islands a protectorate.
1899-1902 Filipino Rebellion against US occupation. Nearly 60,000 US troops sent to suppress hostilities.
1905 Chin Gee Hee returns to China to construct that nation's first railway.
1906 US Attorney General orders federal courts to stop issuing naturalization papers to Japanese.
1907-08 "Gentlemen's Agreement" limits US Japanese immigration to parents, wives, and children of males already here.
1909 Nippon Kan, an ersatz Japanese community center and hotel, built in Seattle.
1910 Chong Wa Benevolent Association established in Seattle.
1913 Alien Land Act passed in California, prohibiting Asians from owning land.
1915 Passage of state law barring Asian immigrants from taking "for sale or profit any salmon or other food or shellfish."
1917 All Asian immigrants except for Japanese and Filipinos banned by order of Congress.
1921 Alien land restrictions passed in Washington state. 1922 In Ozawa v. US the Supreme Court rules that Takao Ozawa is ineligible for citizenship because of his "Mongolian" ancestry.
1923 In Bhagat Singh Thind v. US, the Supreme Court rules that racial exclusion is based on the "understanding of the common man."
1923 Additional alien land restrictions passed in Washington state against Asians.
1924 National Origins Act passes US Congress, the most restrictive immigration legislation in US history.
1927 Anti-Filipino riot in Yakima Valley.
1928 Anti-Filipino riot in Wenatchee Valley.
1930 Nearly 3000 Filipinos working in Alaskan canneries.
1930 Formation of the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL).
1933 Cannery Workers' and Farm Laborers' Union formed in Seattle. Virgil Duyungan, a Filipino cannery worker, is the first president.
1934 Tydings-McDuffie Act makes the Philippines a commonwealth and promises full independence ten years later. Filipino immigration to the US limited to 50 per year.
1937 Washington state legislature attempts to pass an anti-miscegenation law prohibiting "...any person of the Caucasian or white race to intermarry with any person of the Ethiopian or black race, the Malayan or brown race, or Mongolian or yellow race."
1937 Alien land restrictions in Washington state extended to Filipinos.
1939 Pio DeCano successfully challenges 1937 amendment to the Washington Alien Land Law.
1940 14,565 Japanese and Japanese Americans living in Washington state, comprising 11.5% of the population, according to the US Census.
1941 Japan attacks US Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
1942 Franklin D. Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066, calling for the evacuation of all Japanese and Japanese Americans living on the Pacific Coast inland to internment camps.
1942 Yakima Valley Filipinos successfully secure leasing rights on the Yakima Indian Reservation.
1942 In December, riots break out at the Manzanar Relocation Camp in California over food shortage and the arrest of a union organizer.
1943 Congress repeals the Chinese Exclusion Act, but allows only 105 immigrants annually.
1945 War Relocation Authority notes that 120,313 Japanese and Japanese Americans lived in the internment camps from 1942-1945.
1946 Chinese wives of American citizens allowed to emigrate.
1948 Japanese American Claims Act passed, allowing limited redress for those dispossessed of their property during internment.
1949 Communists victorious on Chinese mainland, establish the Peoples' Republic of China. Nationalists flee to Taiwan, and establish Republic of China.
1950 9,694 Japanese and Japanese Americans living in Washington state comprise 6.8% of the population, according to the US Census.
1952 Immigration and Nationality Act (McCarran-Walter Act) eliminates race as a bar to immigration and naturalization. Token quotas still remain.
1960 Wing Luke elected to Seattle City Council.
1965 Immigration and Naturalization Act gives equal quota to all countries and favors immigration of professional classes. Took effect in mid-1968.
1975 US involvement in the Vietnam War ends. Cambodia falls to the Khmer Rouge.
1982 Vincent Chin, a 27-year old Chinese American, was killed by a Detroit autoworker who mistakes him as Japanese.
1988 Passage of reparations legislation by US Congress for Japanese Americans interned during WW II.
1992 Chinese for Affirmative Action file suit against the University of California, claiming that UC uses quotas to limit Asian American enrollment.
1996 Gary Locke elected governor of Washington state, the first Asian on the US mainland.
1996 Proposition 209, which restricts social services for immigrants, passes by nearly 60% in California.
     

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