PROCEEDINGS OF THIRTY-THIRD FRUIT-GROWERS ' CONVENTION. 59 



and Furuseth is a Russian Finn ; therefore, he is in blood a Mongol, and 

 he is standing up telling* us about race antagonisms ! 



The people of the Southern States and the East have been told that 

 it is race antagonism ; that it is the precise analogy of the negro problem 

 in the South. Now, what is the original negro problem ? The race prob- 

 lem relating to the negro is based in the fact that he belongs to a race 

 which in all ages and times and in many nations has thrived in a 

 condition of chattel slavery, and no race that accepts and thrives in a 

 condition of chattel slaveiy has ever commanded the full measure of 

 respect of other nations. 



How is it with the Asiatics? When the bill for the admission of 

 California was before the Congress of the United States, as one of the 

 seven measures in Mr. Clay's omnibus bill, objection was made to it 

 by Jefferson Davis and the Southern Senators because it proposed to 

 admit California as a free State, although part of the territory lay 

 south of the line 36° 30', which, under the Missouri compromise, was to 

 be slave and the territory north free. Mr. Webster, in discussing 

 that, turned to the Southern Senators and said: "Your objection to 

 the admission of this territory is not a. valid objection. Slavery, like 

 all other economic conditions, is the issue of certain physical causes. 

 In its physical features, in its climate, in the plan of its mountain 

 ranges and valleys and river systems, California is Asiatic. It partakes 

 of the physical features and characteristics of Asia. Having the same 

 physical features as Asia, it will be subject to the same economic and 

 natural law, and I call you gentlemen of the South to witness that 

 chattel slavery has never been known in Asia and no Asiatic race has 

 ever submitted to it." 



That told the story. Webster was a wise man, a man who knew the 

 laws of Nature and who could apply them and trace their influence 

 in the economic laws that govern and control the interests of a people. 

 So these Asiatic races have never submitted to chattel slavery. They 

 are not under the ban and bar sinister that is on the negro, because 

 that race has submitted to and has throve in chattel slavery, and that is 

 the reason and cause of the race problem related to the negro in this 

 country and everywhere else, and that does not apply to the Asiatic. 

 They are not slave born. They do not submit to ownership ; they do 

 not submit to chattel slavery. They have their civilization, and there 

 is no such race problem between us and the Asiatics as exists in the 

 South between the Anglo-Saxon and the negro. We know them for 

 the fidelity with which they perform their labor; we know them for 

 their usefulness ; and as far as we know them through their disorders, 

 those disorders are amongst themselves and not amongst us. 



You know the situation in California as well as I know it. You 

 know that the great fruit-producing industry of this State and the 



