Washington State History
History Lesson #2 – Civil Rights
Chinese Exclusion Act 1880
Background readings:
 Chinese Immigrants
 Exclusion in Washington
Answer the following questions:
1. What is the Chinese Exclusion Act?
2. How did the Chinese Exclusion Act affect the state of Washington?
What is an immigrant?
Read the following two summaries on immigration and use this information to
help you fill out the Immigration Graphic Organizer.
 Chinese Immigrants
 Rail Conflict
Immigration Graphic Organizer
Complete the “Example” using what you have read for this lesson and your own
personal knowledge. You may have to complete additional research on your own.
Then complete the “In your own words, what does the Word Mean?” section.
Answer the following questions:
3. What factors influenced the move of these peoples?
4. What role did the railroad play in immigration? Why would Chinese labor on the
railroad have influenced settlement patterns in the Pacific Northwest?
Issue Analysis
Read the following:
 Run out on the Rails
 Wickersham Letter
 Lum May Statement
After completing the Issue Analysis Sheet respond to the following questions:
5. Who was involved in the expulsion of Chinese people from Tacoma? What
motivations did they have? Were they economic, political, and/or social?
6. What kind of effect did the Chinese Exclusion Act have on the people it targeted?
How has it influenced their descendants’ lives today?
7. How does this topic relate to us today? What is the role of the United States
government in regard to immigration? What issues are the same as they were in
the 1880’s and what issues have changed? Why is this topic important?