“By 2056, most Americans will trace their descent to Africa, Asia, the Hispanic world, the Pacific Islands, Arabia - almost anywhere but white Europe. (Thomas, 2007)”, which indicates the special immigrants culture in America. The USA touts its democracy and liberty and the history of those racial discrimination days fade away. The liberty and democracy was the results of hundred years’ struggle conducting by those immigrants and their descendents. How did they tide over the discrimination days? This paper is going to choose San Francisco as representative city to dig out the buried history about Chinese American.

San Francisco was initially named by Mexican in 1847 and it was a Spanish name. It is interesting when we see the origin of its name that contains a lot of information. Discovered by Spanish, then occupied by Mexican and finally subsumed into the USA, San Francisco enjoyed unique conditions for ethnical diversity. The California Gold Rush made San Francisco known by the world and witnessed the rise of the city. In 1849, an influx of adventurers and speculators boosted the population of San Francisco. And majority of them came to new world and dreamed to get rich quickly. The multiracial characteristic of San Francisco was the main reason for us to have a close study. San Francisco lies on the north of California with Pacific Ocean on its west. The convenient position contributes a lot to its rise. According to census in 2000, the population of San Francisco was 776733 and Asian American accounted 30.8% which was a high proportion (Table DP-1; Profile of General Demographic Characteristics: 2010) . My choice of Chinese American as the particular subject is inspired by the high ratio and the established Chinatown.

Chinese are considered to be tough and intelligent. They struggled for a better life in America for centuries. At present, the living environment of Chinese American in the city is pretty good while backdating to one hundred years ago, those Chinese American bore a miserable life. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 known as the first immigration restriction towards single ethnic aimed to expel Chinese (Shah, 2001). Shah, N (2001) explained the reasons of the act that was to eliminate competition generated by Chinese immigrants. The anti-Chinese law indirectly reflected their hardworking and talented. The discrimination law took away many obligations from Chinese, however a natural disaster—1906 San Francisco earthquake gave Chinese an opportunity. The documentaries were ruined in the earthquake, which enabled Chinese to entry America by fake identity. Those fake identities legitimized their immigration and made it possible for them to conduct business and create wealth. It was a special immigration history. The demand for labor for reconstruction of the city raised this immigration favor. In 1915, the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition was a new opportunity for Chinese. They made a living by toiling. During the process of rebuilding, the government planner tried to remove Chinatown, and the proposal was against by Chinese power in San Francisco. At that time, Chinese American had a say to their rights. Chinatown was always thought to be the most “crowded” urban area in the city. The population density was unbelievable high which was several times than the average of San Francisco in 1970s and nearly all citizen in this district came from Guangdong province. Majority of them in Chinatown were working-class. Even in middle 20^th century, the life standard of Chinese American in San Francisco was lower than average level. The elite were rarely Chinese people, and they were still viewed as cheap labor. But Chinese people never yield to the harsh world. And perhaps this spirit dates back to the thousands of years’ struggle to survive.

When we look back to the world history from 1850 to 1950, the whole world suffered a complete revolution. World War I and World War II happened during these period, which reconstructing the world economy. The financial center transferred from Europe to America. And that was why American became the destination for immigrants all over the world. The new world was appealing to opportunity seekers. Compared with America’s rise, Chinese empire was collapsed and nearly lost its state sovereignty. The advanced foreign machines and weapons were incentives for Chinese to go out. Immigration was also a way to escape from the double exploitation imposed by foreign aggressors and domestic emperor. The new world was unknown to them. It may be a heave or a hell. The immigrants were brave decision maker because they had no experiences to draw on. I really appreciate those Chinese. Therefore in this paper, I want to get more close to their life and try to trace the feelings of them. Also, the city full of desire is appealing to me. The combination of Chinese American and San Francisco vivid depicts the life of immigrants in front of my life.

Chinese American own higher salaries than average American and enjoy higher social status although they had experienced the most severe discrimination and violence. Compared with Chinese American’s current situation, Mexican American are still struggled for survive. At set of data imply their dilemma: there are only three or four Mexican American receiving PhD degree in economics, eight of them obtaining politics PhD degree and twenty four of them getting sociology PhD degree until 1973(Ethnic America, 1981). Mexican was stamped untidy, poverty as well as violence. Many of Mexican immigrants are illegal immigrant and majority of them did hard physical labor. In early years, Mexican government even encouraged this kind of immigration as the returned Mexican can bring advanced machines and good living habits back. The process of immigration history of Mexican American can be divided into three steps. American government swayed their policies toward Mexican immigrants. When they needed cheap labor, they would adopted looser immigration policy, which resulted in the influx of Mexican. However, the increasing immigrants led to many serious social problems like rising crime rate. Then concentrating on the situation in domestic Mexico during the reign of Porfirio Diaz between 1876 to 1910, the constantly changing land law gave speculators opportunities to switch land belonged to villagers to their private property (Ethnic America, 1981). During this period, plenty of farmers were forced to be fluid labor, which was also an incentive for those citizen to move to their neighbor country. The gold rush also happened these days. In 1910, a revolution swept Mexico, and nearly 1 million Mexican were killed, therefore, many Mexican American’s ancestors were actually refugees instead of immigrants. The inner pressure and external temptation caused approximately 10% Mexican moving to the USA in early 20^th century. The population of Mexican in California grown fourth. This was the first wave of Mexican immigrants. The second wave occured during The World War II. The war attracted millions of American to join the army and it directly facilitated the government plan of importing Mexican labor. In 1945, there only 50000 contract Mexican workers while this number increased to 400000 in later 1950s (Ethnic America, 1981). The war economy extracted Mexican labor from traditional work to large industry economy. Many Mexican were even allowed to join the army and seventeen of them obtained the badge of honor, which enabled them to experience the mainstream American culture for the first time. The third happened around 1970s. According to Sowell’s (1981) Ethnic America, the reason that caused this was that American government worried about the strick border restriction would offended Mexican government. In San Francisco a city named by Mexican, the Latin immigrants occupied 15% of the total population in 2000 and majority of them are Mexican American (Table DP-1; Profile of General Demographic Characteristics: 2000 ). Those Mexican American live a poor life compared with other immigrants and have a higher birth rate. The lower living standard lead to higher birth rate and vice versa. Why there are differences among immigrants from different countries in America?

We can get some information from above narrative. In later 19 century and early 20 century, China and Mexico experienced the same social inability. The America gave the same temptation for them. Since Chinese and Mexican shared historical generality that both of these two nations suffered revolutions in mainland and also their immigrants were excluded by the official government, when we consider them together, we can draw some comparable conclusions. Chinese immigrants were known for their diligence and intelligent and they strive for entering the upper class, which was a threat for domestic workers. Therefore they were excluded by the authority. The reason for expelling Mexican was that they committed crimes. During the great recession, few of Chinese American received government subsidy while nearly all Mexican lived by subsidy (Sowell,1981). Chinese survived by themselves and rarely relied on subsidy. Chinese American were considered as Asian Jews. The rise of China in new millennium is not a coincidence as Chinese can settle down overseas let alone they realize national revival in mainland. Mexico was the closest neighbor of the USA, while its economy falls behind America for decades. Many immigrants from Mexico did not aim to live there permanently and they just searched for temporary jobs, which deduced their enthusiasm to struggle for better living condition and thus they did not have further plan on receiving education in the USA, which directly lead to the lower population quality of this group. The situation of these two immigrant groups was determined by history and their self expectations.
In the following of this paper, I am going to use several specific cases to compare Chinese American and Mexican American. How they handle with the discriminations, segregations and poverty reflected the characteristics of the nation. In the unsettled times, the efforts of the pioneers of immigrants made the history worth thinking.
后面的写作思路也就围绕着华裔和墨西哥裔美国人的对比。用具体的事例，比如华裔妇女和墨西哥裔妇女的生活状态，华人和墨西哥人在北美政治经济活动中的角色等。主要还是分析民族性格，为什么华人能够取得今天的地位而墨西哥人仍然处于一个很尴尬的角色。


A different mirror[M]. University of St. Thomas, 2007.
Shah, N. (2001). Contagious divides: Epidemics and race in San Francisco's Chinatown (Vol. 7). University of California Pr.
Sowell, T. (1981). Ethnic America: a history. Basic Books.
Table DP-1; Profile of General Demographic Characteristics: 2000