Huanchun Xu on "A Chinese View of the Statue of Liberty"
Huanchun Xu, a student in F&C summer 2017, wrote this essay in response to reading a letter to The New York Sun titled "A Chinese View of the Statue of Liberty" by Saum Song Bo. Saum Song Bo had seen advertisements targeted towards Chinese Americans calling for donations to build the pedestal for the new Statue of Liberty. He found the advertisements particularly insulting considering just three years earlier the United States had passed the Chinese Exclusion Act which barred all but the most elite Chinese from immigrating to America and had prohibited any Chinese person from becoming a United States citizen. Huanchun's essay was also adapted as an editorial for her school newspaper, The Bell.
"That Statue represents Liberty holding a torch which lights the passage of those of all nations who come into this country. But are the Chinese allowed to come? As for the Chinese who are here, are they allowed to enjoy liberty as men of all other nationalities enjoy it? Are they allowed to go about everywhere free from the insults, abuse, assaults, wrongs and injuries from which men of other nationalities are free?"
Within the five texts we were assigned to read for Monday, the one that moved me the most was "A Chinese View of the Statue of Liberty" which was written by Saum Song Bo. After I read the text, I did not know how to describe my mood, like heavy and down, as if I want to say something but do not know what I want to say. Discrimination is a serious problem in America, not only for the Chinese, but also for Africans, Hispanics and so on. As someone with a Chinese background, this text gives me a sense of understanding of how Chinese people lived in America in 1885. How hard was it for them to face all the “insults, abuse, assaults, wrongs and injuries from which men of other nationalities are free?”1 This question shows all the embarrassing situations which Chinese people lived through at that time. This question reminds me about a video I watched on social media yesterday. The video is about a Chinese youth and his girlfriend who were eating in a McDonald's, which is at 14th street in Manhattan. Suddenly, a white woman came in front of them, pointed to them and said some bad words like “ foreign dog’ to those two Chinese people without any reason. This is the reality, this is what we as immigrants are facing now, whatever we do, it is always wrong for no reason for some people. I was quite emotional, because I can do nothing about it to help my countryman to change their situation; I do not have enough power to help them.
Although this text hurt to read, it let me realize the dire situation from the past to now; it motivates me to do something for my countrymen like me who fall in love with this country and would like to be one of the representatives here.
Something else that surprised me in the reading was realizing people’s human nature, which is only using their morality for self-benefit. One of the important grievances for America to declare its independence from England was “No representation, No taxation”, how come Americans have forgotten all the things that happened in the past and make the same mistake as their “haters” did for them during the colonial period? Chinese people lived in America in 1885, they were asked to “contribute toward building in this land a pedestal for a statue of Liberty”, but Song Bo described that in 1885 “this country is the land of liberty for men of all nations except the Chinese”2. Americans felt that they needed the Chinese people’s help, they encouraged the Chinese to help the pedestal fund of the Statue of Liberty. However, liberty did not mean much for the Chinese people of 1885 because they did not get the freedom from the country which is labeled as “the land of liberty”. Although this text hurt to read, it let me realize the dire situation from the past to now; it motivates me to do something for my countrymen like me who fall in love with this country and would like to be one of the representatives here. Even though I am only one person and the power I have is insignificant, I believe that, if I can do something about discrimination, people will see it, and they will follow and may try to help people out of the embarrassing discrimination. I want to do this not only for the Chinese people, but also for all the people who face the discrimination problem.
1. Saum Song Bo, "A Chinese View of the Statue of Liberty" Chinese American Voices From the Gold Rush to the Present, edited by Judy Yung, Gordon Chang, Him Mark Lai, University of California Press, 2006, 55-56, 56.
2. Ibid., 55.
