California enacts the Alien Land Law - May 3rd, 1913

On this day in 1913, the California Senate passed a law restricting the property ownership rights of Asian immigrants.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio.
Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class, a
show that shines a light on the ups and downs
of everyday history. I'm Gabe Bluesier, and in this episode
we're talking about the hateful origins and tragic outcomes of

(00:21):
California's Alien Land Law. The day was May third, nineteen thirteen.
The California Senate passed a law restricting the property ownership
rights of Asian immigrants. The bill, known as the California

(00:46):
Alien Land Law, was co authored by Attorney Francis J.
Haney and California State Attorney General Ulysses S Webb. Written
at the behest of Republican Governor Hirum Johnson, it effectively
bought guard Asian immigrants from owning farmland in California. The
law was implicitly directed at Japanese immigrants or es, but

(01:09):
in practice it affected Chinese, Korean, and South Asian immigrant
farmers as well. Despite the objections of California State Secretary
William Jennings Bryan not to mention the nation of Japan,
the bill passed thirty five to two in the state
Senate and seventy two to three in the State Assembly,

(01:29):
then two weeks later Governor Johnson signed it into law.
California's alien land law was an expression of the anti
Asian sentiment that had been festering in America since at
least the mid nineteenth century. This animus among white populations
in the Western States, in particular, was initially directed at

(01:51):
Chinese immigrants, culminating in the Chinese Exclusion Act of eighteen
eighty two. Then at the turn of the twentieth century,
j Japanese immigrants became the new favorite target. The shift
in focus was largely due to the annexation of Hawaii
in eighteen ninety eight. Much of the island's Japanese population

(02:12):
immigrated to the US mainland in nineteen hundred. The majority
of families settled in California, but they didn't stay long
in the unwelcoming cities where they landed. Instead, many of
the essay moved to the rural areas where they wouldn't
be accused of corrupting white communities or stealing their jobs.

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They turned to agriculture as both a way of life
and a means of income, and while most started as
laborers on white owned farms, many were later able to
establish their own Those successes helped foster a sense of
belonging among a group of people who at the time
had no hope of becoming naturalized US citizens. Owning farmland

(02:56):
allowed them to support their families, prove their productivity, and
take an active role in American society. But in the
eyes of xenophobic white landowners, it just made them a threat.
By nineteen eleven, anti Japanese politicians and agriculturists had begun
to lobby for restrictions on Japanese landownership in California. Their

(03:19):
efforts bore fruit on May third, nineteen thirteen, when California
became the first state to enact a so called alien
land law. The law effectively prohibited Asian immigrants from owning
agricultural property or leasing it for longer than three years,
but the authors of the legislation were careful to avoid

(03:40):
using the words Asian or Japanese, as that would have
clearly violated the equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Instead,
they used a more neutral sounding term aliens ineligible to
citizenship wording aside, The understood goal of the law was
to discourage Japanese and other Asian peoples from settling in California.

(04:05):
State Attorney General Webb even admitted as much himself, saying, quote,
the fundamental basis of all legislation upon this subject, state
and federal has been, and is race undesirability. It seeks
to limit their presence by curtailing their privileges which they

(04:25):
may enjoy here, for they will not come in large
numbers and long abide with us if they may not
acquire land. To be clear, the law did not take
away farmland from those who already owned it, nor did
it prohibit Asian immigrants from owning residential or commercial property

(04:46):
in California. However, it did block the path to agricultural
ownership for future non white immigrants, ensuring that the economic
power of Japanese immigrant farmers couldn't be made permanent. That said,
some Japanese landowners found ways to circumvent the Alien Land Act.

(05:07):
Some placed their land in trusts for their American born children,
while others transferred ownership to corporations run by Asian immigrants. Unfortunately,
the California legislature eventually found out about those loopholes, and
in the early nineteen twenties, they tightened restrictions to close them.

(05:27):
This meant that Japanese American children now had no way
to inherit the businesses that their immigrant parents had built.
As a result, many were forced to relinquish their family
farms to the state and move elsewhere after their parents passing.
By that time, California had also adopted many other anti

(05:48):
Asian policies, including school segregation, unequal law enforcement, a ban
on marriage with white people, and the denial of voting rights.
But California was far from the own state to engage
in such blatant discrimination. More than a dozen others followed
California's lead by passing their own versions of the Alien

(06:09):
Land Law, and while many of those laws were challenged
in the U. S. Supreme Court in the nineteen twenties,
every one of them was upheld. The court's ruling helped
normalize discrimination against Asian communities, stoking the fires of xenophobia
and paving the way for the mass incarceration of Japanese
Americans during World War II. But after the war, California

(06:34):
seemed to recognize the role it had played in making
internment legally, politically and socially permissible. The state legislature reversed
its previous policies and even voted to pay reparations to
people whose land had been seized after the death of
their parents. The U. S. Supreme Court also changed its tune,

(06:54):
and by nineteen fifty two, most of the alien land
laws in other states were struck down as well well. Well,
of course, that doesn't mean that discriminatory land laws are
gone completely or that anti Asian sentiment doesn't still exist
in America today. Both of those societal ills are sadly
still with us, but neither is as entrenched as it

(07:17):
once was. Remembering past struggles like this helps us see
how far we've come as a country and reminds us
that it's up to each new generation to keep the
progress going. I'm Gabe blues Yay, and hopefully you now
know a little more about history today than you did yesterday.

(07:39):
If you'd like to keep up with the show, you
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this Day at iHeartMedia dot com. Thanks to Kasby Bias
for producing the show, and thanks to you for listening.

(08:00):
See you back here again. Tomorrow for another day in
history class,