our
midst under the sanction of hospitality and express treaty obligations,
was made the pretext for an attack upon them. This outrage upon law
and treaty engagements was committed by a lawless mob. None of the
aggressors--happily for the national good fame--appear by the reports
to have been citizens of the United States. They were aliens engaged in
that remote district as mining laborers, who became excited against the
Chinese laborers, as it would seem, because of their refusal to join
them in a strike to secure higher wages. The oppression of Chinese
subjects by their rivals in the competition for labor does not differ in
violence and illegality from that applied to other classes of native or
alien labor. All are equally under the protection of law and equally
entitled to enjoy the benefits of assured public order.

Were there no treaty in existence referring to the rights of Chinese
subjects; did they come hither as all other strangers who voluntarily
resort to this land of freedom, of self-government, and of laws, here
peaceably to win their bread and to live their lives, there can be no
question that they would be entitled still to the same measure of
protection from violence and the same free forum for the redress of
their grievances as any other aliens.

So far as the treaties between the United States and China stipulate for
the treatment of the Chinese subjects actually in the United States as
the citizens or subjects of "the most favored nation" are treated, they
create no new status for them; they simply recognize and confirm a
general and existing rule, applicable to all aliens alike, for none are
favored above others by domestic law, and none by foreign treaties
unless it be the Chinese themselves in some respects. For by the third
article of the treaty of November 17, 1880, between the United States
and China it is provided that--

ART. III. If Chinese laborers, or Chinese of any other class, now either
permanently or temporarily residing in the territory of the United
States, meet with ill treatment at the hands of any other persons, the
Government of the United States will exert all its power to devise
measures for their protection and to secure to them the same rights,
privileges, immunities, and exemptions as may be enjoyed by the citizens
or subjects of the most favored nation, and to which they are entitled
by treaty.

This article may be held to constitute a special privileg