USA > Washington > History of Washington; the rise and progress of an American state, Vol. IV > Part 23
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Times were now improving. The East was prosperous again, and the company found it possible to sell bonds for building purposes as rapidly as money was required. Work was accordingly resumed on both ends of the line. In Jan- uary 1886 the contract was let for driving the Cascade tunnel, the longest on the line. The one near Bozeman was 3,850 feet in length, that at Mullan 3,610 feet, but this was to be 9,850 feet, or nearly two miles long. Nelson Bennett, the contractor, undertook to push it through in eighteen months, but in order to begin work, he was forced to make a road from the end of the track at Ellensburg, to a point on the eastern side of the mountain where work was to begin, and send over it all the heavy machinery which the undertaking would require. This was done with no small difficulty. Among the materials to be transported were two locomotives and a number of flat cars, besides the heavy drills and other tools that would be required. There was scarcely a trail through the dense forest that covered the foot hills, and sides of the mountains, through and along which all this material must somehow be dragged to a point 2,845 feet above sea level, where the tunnel was to begin. In many places swamps were to be crossed, and in some there were deep gullies and ravines, and finally when the east portal was reached one engine, together with the cars, drills and other apparatus was to be hoisted over the mountain nearly 2,000 feet higher,
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to the western side, so that work might begin at both ends at the same time. But all this was accomplished. In due time the drilling through the mountain wall was begun, and proceeded night and day until it was completed, as it was, eight days in advance of the time fixed in the contract.
While this work was progressing, grading and track laying was pushed from both directions, and when the tracks reached the pass they were carried over the ridge temporarily, by switchbacks, as at the Mullan and Bozeman tunnels, and the first train carried over in this manner reached the Sound, at Tacoma, July 3, 1887. Its arrival was made the occasion of much rejoicing, particularly in Tacoma, whose people felt that their city was now in fact what they had so long claimed it to be, the real terminus of a transcontinental railway. They celebrated the arrival of this first train, and the national anniversary, for three consecutive days. People from all parts of the territory, including not a few from Seattle, joined with them in commemorating an event which had so long been wanted and hoped for, and which was of so much importance to them all.
The relations of Seattle people, and all those in the lower Sound country, with the railroad were still far from satis- factory, and were to remain so for a considerable time, although within a few months after its completion an event occurred that gave them cause to hope for better things. In September 1887, Mr. Villard regained control, and al- though he did not again become president, he occupied a position of equal or even greater authority, as chairman of the board of directors. Seattle had always regarded him as her friend. Her people still believed that his other interest in their neighborhood, outside of the railroad, would impel him to place them on an even footing with Tacoma and
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Portland, and in this they were not mistaken, although it was not until October 10, 1889 that the long hoped for order was issued, equalizing all rates save those on grain.
The territory now entered upon a period of phenomenal development. The influx of settlers had been steady for several years preceding, notwithstanding the unfavorable business conditions that prevailed from 1884 to 1886. The census taken every alternate year by the assessors, had shown a total population of 129,292 in 1885, and 143,699 in 1887; that of 1889 showed a total of 239,544 a gain of 85,875. The vote for state officers, cast at the election in October of the last named year, seemed to indicate that the increase had been even larger than the figures given. An unusually large proportion of these new arrivals settled in the towns, which led Governor Miles C. Moore, the last of the territorial gover- nors, to remark in his final report, that "the growth of some of them, notably Spokane Falls, Seattle and Tacoma, is simply phenomenal, the population of each having apparently doubled within a single year. The most remarkable increase is in the county of King, which in 1887 had a population of 15,972, and in 1889, 40,788, an increase in two years of 24,816. During the same period, Pierce County shows an increase of 15,611, having now a total of 27,795; while Spo- kane County shows an increase of 13,885, having now a total of 25,200."
During these prosperous years the competition between the rapidly growing towns, particularly Seattle and Tacoma, grew more and more intense and interesting. Tacoma boasted of its new hotel, the best on the coast north of San Francisco in that day; the headquarters' building of the railroad company; its wheat warehouses, from which steadily and rapidly increasing shipments were made year
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by year to the markets of the old world; and of its tea ships, which in their season brought cargoes of tea direct to its wharves from China and Japan. Seattle was equally proud of its lines of steamers to San Francisco and coast points; the new railroad lines that were extending eastward toward the mountains, and northward to a connection with the Canadian Pacific, and of its splendid lakes that were some day to be connected with the ocean by canal, giving the ships of the world a safe harbor in fresh water. Both towns had large lumber mills, and coal shipments from both were al- ready large and rapidly growing. Both were lighted by electricity. Seattle had two lines of cable railroad, while Tacoma as yet had none. Both were, or soon would be experimenting with electric cars. Tacoma had one flour mill, that was shipping its product to the Orient, while Seattle seemed about to have extensive iron works established near it, and its people confidently expected that the deposits of iron ores, which had long been known to exist in the neighborhood of the Snoqualmie Pass and on the Skagit River, not to mention the deposits of bog ore found in many places, would soon be developed, and made the basis of ex- tensive manufactures of iron and steel. Smelting works had already been started by San Francisco capitalists at Irondale near Port Townsend, where bog ores, mixed with other ores from Texada Island in the Gulf of Georgia, had been experimented with successfully so far as the quality of product was concerned.
Port Townsend and the cities on Bellingham Bay-not yet united into one under the name of Bellingham-were partaking of the general prosperity. People in the former were living in confident anticipation that it would yet be made the terminus of a railroad. From the latter P. B.
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Cornwall and his associates were building one railroad toward the Northeast, while another would at no very distant day connect them with Vancouver, and still another, known as the Fairhaven and Southern, was supposed to be what it ultimately became, a part of the Great Northern, whose world conquering builder was rapidly extending it toward the coast.
The prospect of competition with this new line at no very distant day, together with the efforts of the Union Pacific- which now controlled and had made connection with the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company's lines-to extend to the Sound, and so command a share in its vast lumber and coal trade, stirred the Northern Pacific authorities to renewed activity. Branches were built from Tacoma through Olym- pia, and from Centralia to Gray's Harbor, and from Chehalis, on the original line from the Columbia to the Sound, to Shoalwater Bay, and new life was infused into the settle- ments in those regions. The Seattle, Lake Shore and Eastern had built twenty-four miles eastwardly from Seattle, on its Snoqualmie division, and twenty miles toward the north, while forty-five miles of track on its eastern division had been laid from Spokane westwardly. Everett and Ana- cortes had not yet been established, but soon would be.
According to the report of Governor Moore, in 1889 the Northern Pacific was operating 807 miles of road in the territory, and the Oregon Railway and Navigation Com- pany 389 miles. A network of short lines known as the Hunt System was growing up in Walla Walla County, and already comprised eighty-four miles of track. The extension of the Northern Pacific to Gray's Harbor and Seattle, to- gether with the Columbia and Puget Sound tracks, and a short line known as the Vancouver, Klikitat and Yakima
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road, on the Columbia, and the narrow gauge lines, made a total of 1,475 miles of tracks in the territory, when it became a state.
Vancouver, the ancient seat of Dr. John McLoughlin when he ruled there in medieval state, and with baronial authority, was still without direct railroad connection, and yet it was partaking in some degree in the general prosperity. It was still military headquarters, as it had been in Harney's time, and from the river bank where McLoughlin and Douglass, in their time, had been wont to watch the Indian flotillas sweeping up and down the lordly stream, its people could now see the stately ships or mighty steamers come and go to and from all parts of the civilized world. The old order of things had passed away; a new age, a new people and a new order of things, much better than the old, though as yet only imperfectly appreciated, had come, that was to make all the past seem fruitless by comparison.
CHAPTER LVII. THE ANTI-CHINESE MOVEMENT.
O PPOSITION to the Chinese began early in the territory. The legislature on January 23, 1864 passed an act imposing a per capita tax of $24 a year on each Chinaman, to be paid in quarterly payments of $6 each. This tax was reduced to $16 per year in 1866. The sheriffs were charged with the duty of collect- ing it, and they were authorized to exact payment by seizing and selling the goods of delinquents when necessary.
But rigorous as this tax was it did not prevent Chinese laborers from coming to the territory in considerable numbers and the census of 1885 showed that there were 3,276 of them engaged in various occupations within its borders. There was at that time no very serious opposition to them. Work was abundant and everybody was employed who cared for employment. A few agitators and mischief-makers were protesting, but they secured little attention and few followers, until the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railroad, threw many men out of employment, a considerable por- tion of whom drifted across the line to Seattle, Tacoma and other towns along the Sound.
From that time forward the agitators and mischief-makers found it easier to get the attention of the multitude than they had done. The idle always have time to listen, and are easily persuaded that somebody other than themselves is responsible for their idleness. Their passions are easily inflamed; it is particularly easy to arouse in them a hatred for, and encourage an opposition to an alien race. The opposition to the Chinese in California was well known all along the coast. Every sand-lot orator in San Francisco was as notorious in the cities of Washington and Oregon as in those of California, and some of their associates and co- workers had drifted to the Sound cities, and were aspiring
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to imitate their example. Strangely enough there were persons of responsibility and respectability who readily joined with these in stirring up a needless trouble. There were few residents of the territory, if any, who were anxious to have the Chinese remain. Some of the coal mining com- panies, a few of the mills, and a few private individuals had employed them, when it had been difficult to secure white labor, but now that that difficulty was past, most of them were glad to secure white laborers again. A few had Chinese house servants who had proved so satisfactory that they wished to retain them, but these were not many. The China- men therefore were left with few to defend them, except those who were not willing to see them driven out by violence.
The agitation which began in Seattle and Tacoma in the summer of 1885, had gradually spread to other towns and villages in the western part of the territory, and to the coal mines in King County, in a few of which Chinamen were working, when on September 4th, the people at Rock Springs, Wyoming, drove the Chinamen out of the coal mines at that place, killing eleven of them. News of this outrage was applauded by the agitators, and those who were accustomed to listen to them. It spread quickly to the smaller towns, and was received with peculiar interest at the coal mines and the hop fields where some growers, who had been unable to procure the usual number of Indians to gather their crop, were bringing in Chinamen for the purpose. Among the latter were the Wold Brothers, who had large yards in the Squak Valley. On the afternoon of September 5th a party of thirty-five Chinamen, arrived at their yards, and two nights later their camp was attacked by five white men and two Indians, who fired into the tents where the Chinamen
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were sleeping, and killed three of them and wounded three others. The rest fled to the woods and escaped.
The perpetrators of this cowardly attack were easily traced, and within a few days were arrested and taken to the jail at Seattle. In due time they were indicted for murder, but such was the state of public feeling at the time that they were not convicted. They were also indicted for riot, and on this charge one of the number was convicted and a trifling penalty imposed, but an appeal was taken and the case was not decided until long afterwards.
On the night of September IIth, only four days after the attack on the hop-pickers in the Squak Valley, the quarters occupied by the Chinese coal miners at Coal Creek were raided by ten or fifteen masked men, and burned. Some of the inmates were roughly used. Guns and pistols were fired to frighten the Chinamen, but none of them were killed. They were however, told that they must forthwith leave the country.
These outrages were openly applauded by the lawless ele- ment, as that at Rock Springs had been. The perpetrators of them were praised as men of spirit, by the street orators in both Tacoma and Seattle, who were every day finding it easier to get attention. Street meetings were held more frequently than ever. Parades were organized in which tableaux, showing women in chains, and children supposed to be starving as a result of competition with cheap labor were exhibited, while numbers of banners or transparencies with denunciatory inscriptions were displayed, all of which amused or excited the idle, and alarmed the timid, disturbed and unsettled business and made conditions, which were bad enough at the beginning, even worse than they otherwise would have been.
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The agitation was accomplishing the purpose for which it had declaredly been started, in what should have been a satisfactory way, if those who were directing and stimulating it had had no other purpose in view. Many of the Chinamen were voluntarily leaving their employment and the country, as fast as they could get the money they had earned, and secure passage to British Columbia or California. The coal mine owners and mill owners were discharging some, and arranging to discharge others, as rapidly as they could fill their places. The employers of Chinese ser- vants in some cases were getting rid of them. The Chinese merchants, contractors and owners of laundries alone, or almost alone, seemed to be making no preparation to leave.
But the agitation was kept going just as vigorously as if nothing had yet been accomplished. "An anti-Chinese Congress" as it was designated by those who arranged it, was summoned to meet in Seattle September 28th, and self- appointed members came from all directions to attend its deliberations. All the labor organizations were represented. The mayor of Tacoma presided. Most of the more active agitators attended and made speeches. A long series of high-sounding resolutions was adopted, their final declara- tion being that all Chinese must leave Western Washington by or before November 15th. Following this so-called "Con- gress," a mass meeting was held at Tacoma, in which the resolutions it had adopted and the edict it had proclaimed were approved, and a committee of fifteen was appointed to see that the edict was enforced. This committee promptly served notice on all the Chinese residents of the place that they must leave within thirty days. A similar committee was appointed in Seattle only a few days later.
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By this time the Chinese consul at San Francisco had be- come alarmed for the safety of his countrymen in the Sound country, and had written Governor Squire to ask whether the local authorities could and would give them protection under the law and the treaty, in case the agitators should attempt to put their threats into execution. The governor had applied to the sheriffs for information as to the exact condition of affairs, and asked whether they were confident of their ability to preserve order. Nearly all replied confi- dently. John H. McGraw, afterwards governor of the state, but who was at that time sheriff of King County, was "firmly convinced" that he would be able "to protect the lives and property of all persons in the county, without the interven- tion of the military arm of the government." Nineteen- twentieths of the able bodied men could be depended upon, as he thought, as a posse comitatus, in case the lawless and viciously inclined should make any open attack. Sheriff Byrd thought there had been no disposition shown to harm the Chinamen in Tacoma, but he was not satisfied that the town would escape trouble should they refuse to go by the Ist of November. A large number of men were taking an active part in the expulsion movement, and should they meet with resistance from the Chinese, trouble would be sure to follow.
But he was sure that a sufficient number of "good substan- tial citizens among the business men of Tacoma" would stand willing and ready to assist him in preserving peace, and he would immediately make a thorough canvass of the city to ascertain how many reliable men he could command in case of emergency. At Whatcom there were but few Chinese, and Sheriff DeLorimer replied that they would soon be gone, and they would go in peace.
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Having received these assurances the governor wrote the consul that in his opinion the sheriffs in the principal centers would be so strongly supported by the law-abiding citizens, that they would be able to repress all disorders. "Of course it is possible," he said, "that an outrage might be committed before the authorities could prevent it, and in the excited state of public feeling, I have privately advised Chinese resi- dents who have waited upon me, that I thought the best policy for them to pursue is to quietly withdraw, if they can do so, until the present period of excitement has passed away."
The governor had also communicated with the authorities at Washington, and for some days following he kept them thoroughly advised. The consul at San Francisco had also written to the Chinese minister in Washington, and he in turn had applied to the national administration to guarantee the protection of his countrymen. Warned by what had happened at Rock Springs, President Cleveland and his cabinet were anxious to prevent, if possible, a similar out- break on the Sound, and yet were unwilling to assert the national authority, so long as the territorial and county officials felt confident that they would be able to control the situation. They however, stood ready to send troops from Fort Vancouver to any one of the Sound cities, as soon as advised that it would be necessary, or even urgently desirable.
In reply to inquiries from the secretary of the interior, which were prompted no doubt by the solicitation of the Chinese minister, the governor again communicated with the sheriffs and the municipal authorities, particularly in Pierce and King Counties, notifying them of the anxiety felt in Washington and San Francisco about the situation in their
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neighborhoods, and asking for more definite information that would enable him to keep the president, and others in authority, thoroughly advised as to the progress of events. To this the sheriff of Pierce County replied that the Knights of Labor in the city of Tacoma, had offered themselves and their services as deputy sheriffs, and he was swearing them in as rapidly as they could be called to his office. He had also sworn in fifty deputies in the Puyallup Valley, and "two hundred good substantial citizens of Tacoma had already offered their services," and he would swear them in at once. He had no doubt he would be able to procure all the assis- tance necessary, and he assured the governor "that peace will and can be preserved by the civil authorities of our county." On the same day General Sprague, chairman of the Chamber of Commerce in Tacoma, wrote that while many were willing to utter incendiary language to frighten the Chinese away, they would not countenance unlawful acts. "The sheriff," he said, "is both efficient and vigilant, and before the Ist of November, he will have a force of about three hundred reliable deputies sworn in, and be ready for any emergency." This letter was accompanied by another, signed by a large number of the most prominent business men of the town, in which they "beg respectfully to say, that in our opinion there will be no occasion whatever for the presence of troops, or the employment of an organized force under the sheriff, and that the sheriff will be able to pre- serve the peace and enforce the laws." In this he would be supported by the citizens generally. "We hold ourselves responsible for these assurances," this letter concluded.
On October 27th, the governor visited Tacoma and ad- dressed a mass meeting of its people, and on the following day received a letter from a prominent resident of that city,
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assuring him that "there is not a man in Tacoma who does not fully recognize the difficulty of the position in which you are placed by the prevailing agitation, and the patient good sense with which you have up to the present, met and sur- mounted that difficulty. The reaction of sentiment in your favor is quite marked. Your visit has set matters right, and there will be no further misunderstanding. Our Chinese are still going, and there will probably be very few left here at the end of this week." On the 29th, the gov- ernor was invited to attend an anti-Chinese meeting in Tacoma, but being unable to be present he sent a letter saying, that while he sympathized with the American workingmen in their efforts to have the Chinese peace- fully go, "the condition distinctly is peace; maintain law and order, and the victory will be yours."
It was evident enough from all this and from other infor- mation received by the governor, that the people of Tacoma were determined that the Chinese should go. Many of them seem to have hoped that they would be allowed to go peaceably, but the disturbing element was thoroughly re- solved that they should go, and resolved to accelerate their going, in case there was the slighest indication that all would not leave before the time fixed by the declaration of the "anti-Chinese Congress." It soon became apparent that the sheriff and his deputies were quite in accord with this sentiment.
The plans of the disturbing element had been carefully laid, and while the sheriff was assuring the governor of his ability to preserve the peace, and the law-abiding portion of the community was hopeful, if not confident, that he would do so, the agitators and their followers were prepared for action. On the morning of November 3d, they asembled to
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the number of several hundred, and marched to the Chinese quarter, which was located on the waterfront near the North- ern Pacific freight yards. They had a number of wagons with them, and as soon as the houses of the Chinamen were reached, their goods were thrown into them, while their owners were assembled in their neighborhood to be marched out of town. The day was cold and rainy. The Chinamen were greatly excited, but none of them offered any resistance. An equal number of children could hardly have been managed more easily. Several of them were old and decrepit; a few were sick, but these were forced out of such shelter as they had, and placed on the wagons with their goods. The stores and places of business of such as were engaged in trade, were not disturbed at the time, but as soon as all the houses had been vacated, the evicted celestials, escorted by their tormen- tors, took up their line of march through the town, and out along Centre Street to Lake View, where the wagons were unceremoniously unloaded, and the owners of such goods as they contained were left on the bleak prairie, to make themselves as comfortable as they might until the following day, and it was reported that two of the sick died meantime from exposure.
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