The Chinese Six Companies of San Francisco and the smuggling of Chinese immigrants across the U.S.-Mexico border, 1882-1930.

The Six Companies, or Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, of San Francisco played an important role in the immigration of Chinese to the United States and Mexico. (1) This was largely owing to the peculiar nature of this movement. Unlike the more common forms of foreign immigration based on the immigration of individual persons as well as entire families, Chinese immigrants to the United States, in the great majority of cases, were laborers hired by companies requiring their services.

U.S. businessmen who hired Chinese laborers contemplated using their services only on a temporary basis for undertaking certain projects. Neither they nor the rest of their countrymen wished the Chinese to stay in the United States as permanent settlers. Owing to the great cultural divisions between the United States and China, it proved necessary to obtain the services of these laborers through Chinese commercial houses based in San Francisco. The directors and managers of these houses, in turn, belonged to the Six Companies, a collective or umbrella association embracing the entire Chinese community in the United States.

The principal purpose of this paper consists in analyzing the role of the Six Companies in the smuggling of Chinese across the U.S.-Mexico border, from the publication of the first of the so-called exclusion laws in 1882 until the beginning of the Great Depression in 1929, when the Chinese contraband traffic ceased for all intents and purposes. I argue that, in order to better delineate the process of illegal Chinese immigration to the United States for the period under study, it is essential to understand the relationship between the existing forms of social organization among the Chinese immigrants and the role which the organizations played in the various jobs which the immigrants performed, especially as workers hired for specific tasks, such as in mining, agriculture, railway construction, etc. Far from being merely a collective association dedicated to the welfare of its members or to the efficient management of the commercial operations of the companies and businesses of the Chinese overseas communities, the Six Companies, in their role of an "umbrella" organization, constituted, in reality, the keystone in the process of Chinese immigration to the host/receiver countries.

DEVELOPMENT AND ROLE OF THE SIX COMPANIES

The history of the Six Companies dates from the beginnings of Chinese immigration to California, which had become part of the United States in 1848 by the terms of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The arrival of the first Chinese immigrants in search of gold occurred in 1849. (2) By the end of that year, there were 781 persons of Chinese origin in San Francisco and the goldfields. In the course of the following year (1850), this number increased to 4,025 and, by the end of 1851, to approximately 12,000. By 1854, there were more than 40,000 Chinese in the state of California. (3)

By the beginning of the 1850s, the government of California began to pass a series of discriminatory laws against the Chinese. The majority consisted in the levying of special taxes and rules relating to mining and fishing, as well as various activities relating to amusements and recreation (theatres, houses of prostitution, and gaming halls). (4) Although the federal courts later revoked most of these laws owing to their unconstitutional character, the leaders of the various Chinese groups felt that the creation of an organization or agency of their own to protect their civil and legal rights was essential. The particular district organizations were not able to fulfill this function, given that the discrimination against the Chinese was directed not against a few individuals in particular, but against the ethnic group as a whole. (5)

In preserving their identity and protecting themselves as a group, the Chinese immigrants possessed a strong base of support in the character and complexity of their social organization. The Chinese social organizational structure was the product of thousands of years of evolution. One of its principal elements consisted in the tribal, or clan, affiliation of the different immigrant groups. The clans originated in communities that possessed a common lineage, a characteristic which was especially prevalent in the regions of southeastern China. In those countries where the Chinese settled, the clan affiliation extended itself to take in not only the members of one village of origin, but also all those persons who had the same surname. The clan association became an organization that rendered aid to the immigrants in the form of food, shelter, employment, protection, and counsel of one kind or another. (6)

The tong groups, or fraternal organizations, were also established in California. The tongs began as organizations composed of members of different clans and districts, based on mutual aid and protection. Soon, however, as in the case of the Kwong Duck tong of San Francisco, they degenerated into organizations dedicated to the development and control of several illegal activities, such as gambling and prostitution. The need to limit these types of activities carried on by the tongs constituted another motive for the Chinese immigrants to strive to create some type of general organization capable of claiming respect and authority from all the members of the Chinese communities in the United States. (7)

In addition to the clans and tongs, other organizations called hui kuan or huiguan were also established in the Chinese communities in the United States. The membership of each of these organizations comprised those immigrants who spoke the same dialect, were from the same district in China, or were from the same tribe or ethnic group. (8) In 1851, in San Francisco, the two first huiguan, or district associations, were founded. Some merchants from the districts of Nanhai, Panyu, and Shunde, near the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, established the Sanyi huiguan, the Sam Yup Association or Canton Company. The second association established that year, the Siyi huiguan, or Sze Yup Association, was integrated by immigrants from four districts of the Tan (Tam) River valley--Xinhui, Xinning (Taishan), Kaiping, and Enping--located slightly west of the Pearl River Delta. (9)

The following year (1852), Yuan Sheng (Norman Assing), Cai Libi, and Liu Zuman of Xiangshan established a third company, the Yanghe huiguan, or Yeong Wo Association. This huiguan included immigrants from the surrounding districts of Dongguan, Zengcheng, and Xin'an (the modern day district of Bao'an).

In 1853, immigrants from this third district--Xin'an--the majority of whom spoke the hakka dialect, unlike the majority of the Cantonese who belonged to the Yeong Wo Company, withdrew from it to form a fourth association, the huiguan Xin'an, or Sun On Company. (The name of this organization has changed many times and today is known as the huigan Renhe or Yan Wo Association.) That same year (1853), owing to an internal dispute within the Sze Yup Association, the members of the Xinning group--which constituted the most numerous group of this association--separated and formed another company, the Ning Yung (or Ning Yeung). Another internal dispute within the Sze Yup Association in 1862 resulted in the creation of the Hehe huiguan or Hop Wo Association. The latter was made up of a coalition of the Kaiping and Enping clans, together with some dissident members of the Xinning group. Later, several Xinhui merchants, who represented only one of the founding groups of the Sze Yup Association, reorganized it under the name Kong Chow. (10)

In the following years, new companies were formed and others disappeared, according to various circumstances. In 1878, for example, owing to a grievance among members within the Hop Wo Association against the dominance of the Yee clan over the group, the dissident members formed a new association, the Zhaoqing huiguan, or Sue Hing Association, which included members from the Kaiping and Enping clans. By 1879, the Hop Wo Company had fragmented into four distinct groups: Yu Fengcai Tang (Yee Fung Toy Tong), Tan Yiyi Tang (Tomo Yee Yee Tong), Huiguan En-kai (Yen Hoy Association), and the Sue Hing Association. In 1883, through the intervention of consul general Huang Zunxian, these groups united with the Hop Wo Association. However, the Sue Hing Association soon separated again. In 1898, the Tan (Tom) and Guan (Quan) clans, together with other clans, also separated to reestablish the Yen Hoy Association.

Some years afterwards, in 1901, another thirteen groups belonging to the Enping clan, headed by the Tang (Tong) clan, also separated and joined the Sue Hing Association. By 1909, the Yen Hoy and Sue Hing associations, owing to the relatively small size of their respective memberships, united under the name of the latter (Sue Hing).

The periodic unions and splinters among the various companies have continued to the present day. Nevertheless, the name Six Companies has been retained to refer to the overall organization. (11)

In the beginning, it was thought that the president elected to preside over each association ought to be a scholar or man of letters. It was believed that such a leader would not be interested in becoming involved in factional politics and would also be capable of acting as an intermediary between the Chinese imperial government and its subjects in the United States. In practice, however, presidents were selected from among the businessmen and merchants of each huiguan. Initially, the presidents were elected for an indefinite period. Later, owing to the problem of corruption and the rivalry between the different clans and groups, it was agreed to limit the president's period of service to one year. In addition, a system was established in which the presidents were elected alternately from members …