That’s because restrictions against Chinese immigrants represented the first major flex in the modern era of the federal government’s power to control its borders. Chinese laborers were the first group to be barred from the entire country based on national origin, and lawsuits involving this group were often major tests of constitutional liberties — most notably the Supreme Court case of Wong Kim Ark in 1898, which established the right to birthright citizenship.
Time and time again, the treatment of this minority group served as a test of America’s ability to live up to its own ideals of equality. As Massachusetts Sen. George Frisbie Hoar noted when he spoke out against the exclusionary legislation of the 1880s: “We go boasting of our democracy, and our superiority, and our strength. The flag bears the stars of hope to all nations. A hundred thousand Chinese land in California and everything is changed.... The self-evident truth becomes a self-evident lie.”
