BY KEVIN WAITE

作者：凱文·韋特

This year marks the 150th anniversary of one of the largest mass lynchings in American history. The carnage erupted in Los Angeles on October 24, 1871, when a frenzied mob of 500 people stormed into the city’s Chinese quarter. Some victims were shot and stabbed; others were hanged from makeshift gallows. By the end of the night, 19 mangled bodies lay in the streets of Los Angeles.

今年是美國(guó)歷史上最大規(guī)模私刑事件的150周年。大屠殺發(fā)生在1871年10月24日的洛杉磯，當(dāng)時(shí)一群500人的狂熱暴徒?jīng)_進(jìn)了該市的華人聚居區(qū)。一些受害者被槍擊和刺傷;其他人則被臨時(shí)吊死。到當(dāng)晚結(jié)束時(shí)，只剩下19具血肉模糊的尸體躺在洛杉磯的街道上。

Lynching is a term most often associated with violence against African Americans in the post-Civil War South. But racial hatred has never been quarantined to one American region or confined to a single ethnic group. In Los Angeles in 1871, the victims were Chinese immigrants. Their deaths were part of a wave of anti-Asian violence that swept across the 19th-century American West—and reverberates to this day.

私刑這個(gè)詞最常與內(nèi)戰(zhàn)后南方針對(duì)非裔美國(guó)人的暴力聯(lián)系在一起。但種族仇恨從未被局限在美國(guó)的一個(gè)地區(qū)或局限于一個(gè)單一的種族群體。1871年在洛杉磯，種族仇恨的受害者是中國(guó)移民。他們的死亡是19世紀(jì)席卷美國(guó)西部的反亞洲暴力浪潮的一部分，其影響持續(xù)到了現(xiàn)在。



In the early days of Chinese immigration, many new arrivals performed hard manual labor, often for the railroads or as prospectors.

在中國(guó)移民的早期，許多新來(lái)者從事艱苦的體力勞動(dòng)，通常是為了修建鐵路或作為探礦者而來(lái)。

Chinese immigrants became the targets of abuse almost as soon as they set foot on American soil, beginning in 1850 with the California Gold Rush. White prospectors routinely drove Chinese miners from their claims, while state lawmakers slapped them with an onerous foreign miners’ tax. Along with Black Americans and Native Americans, they were barred from testifying against whites in California’s courts. As a result, assaults on Chinese people in California generally went unpunished.

從1850年加州淘金熱開(kāi)始，中國(guó)移民幾乎一踏上美國(guó)土地就成為了虐待的目標(biāo)。白人勘探者經(jīng)常把中國(guó)礦工趕出他們的地盤(pán)，而州議員則向他們征收高額的外國(guó)礦工稅。與美國(guó)黑人和美國(guó)土著一樣，他們被禁止在加州法庭上指證白人。因此，在加州襲擊中國(guó)人通常不會(huì)受到懲罰。

A perceived labor threat lay at the root of this Sinophobia. By 1870, Chinese immigrants accounted for roughly 10 percent of California’s population and a full quarter of the workforce in the state. Wherever Chinese immigrants congregated in large numbers, white workers saw a risk to their livelihoods. The threat posed by Chinese immigration never represented the existential threat to white employment that some agitators claimed. Nevertheless, they mobilized against employers, including railroad corporations and wealthy ranchers, who had Chinese immigrants on their payrolls.

中國(guó)移民的輸入對(duì)當(dāng)?shù)貏趧?dòng)力的威脅是這種“恐華癥”的根源。到1870年，中國(guó)移民約占加州人口的10%，占該州勞動(dòng)力的四分之一。在中國(guó)移民大量聚集的地方，白人工人感覺(jué)到他們的工作機(jī)會(huì)收到了威脅。但事實(shí)上，中國(guó)移民帶來(lái)的威脅從未像一些煽動(dòng)者所說(shuō)的那樣嚴(yán)重，白人就業(yè)面臨的生死存亡論并不成立。盡管如此，他們（白人）還是動(dòng)員起來(lái)反對(duì)包括鐵路公司和富有的牧場(chǎng)主在內(nèi)的雇主，只因?yàn)樗麄兊墓べY單上有中國(guó)移民。


In 1882, more than a decade after the attack, Calle de Los Negros—the heart of Los Angeles's original Chinatown and the site of the massacre—is bustling.

1882年，襲擊發(fā)生十多年后，洛杉磯唐人街的中心和大屠殺發(fā)生地洛斯內(nèi)格羅大街(Calle de Los negros)一片繁華。

The campaigns against Chinese immigrants were well organized. In the immediate post-Civil War years, so-called anti-coolie clubs arose. The Central Pacific Anti-Coolie Association, among others, advocated for a ban on Chinese immigration. In 1867, a mob of white laborers drove Chinese laborers from their San Francisco worksite, injuring 12 and killing one. The Anti-Coolie Association rallied to the mob’s defense and won the release of all 10 perpetrators.

反對(duì)中國(guó)移民的運(yùn)動(dòng)組織得很好。在內(nèi)戰(zhàn)剛結(jié)束的那幾年，出現(xiàn)了所謂的反苦力俱樂(lè)部。中太平洋反苦力協(xié)會(huì)(Central Pacific Anti-Coolie Association)等機(jī)構(gòu)主張禁止中國(guó)移民。1867年，一群白人勞工將華工趕出舊金山的工地，12人受傷，1人死亡。反苦力協(xié)會(huì)就團(tuán)結(jié)起來(lái)為暴徒辯護(hù)，最終釋放了所有10名作惡者。

This would become a recurring theme: injury and death for Chinese immigrants, exoneration for their assailants. In the Reconstruction-era South, the Ku Klux Klan targeted African Americans; in the West, Klansmen assaulted the Chinese. I’ve uncovered more than a dozen attacks on Chinese workers between 1868 and 1870 attributed to the KKK in California, as well as a smaller number in Utah and Oregon.

這之后成為了一個(gè)反復(fù)出現(xiàn)的主題:中國(guó)移民受傷和死亡，攻擊他們的人被免于擔(dān)責(zé)。在重建時(shí)期的南方，三k黨的目標(biāo)是非裔美國(guó)人; 在西部，三k黨也襲擊了中國(guó)人。我發(fā)現(xiàn)，在1868年至1870年間，加州有十多起針對(duì)中國(guó)工人的襲擊，都是由三k黨所為，猶他州和俄勒岡州也有一小部分針對(duì)中國(guó)工人的攻擊。

Klan activity in California ranged from violent threats to assault to arson. In the spring of 1868, white rioters raided a series of ranches in Northern California, savagely beating the Chinese workers there. When a Methodist minister opened a Sunday school for Chinese immigrants in 1869, vigilantes burned down his church and threatened his life. Klan-affiliated arsonists torched a second church, this one in Sacramento, for the sin of serving the Chinese community. They also burned down a brandy distillery near San Jose that employed Chinese workers.

三k黨在加州的活動(dòng)形式從威脅到襲擊到縱火。1868年春天，白人暴徒襲擊了北加州的一系列農(nóng)場(chǎng)，野蠻地毆打那里的中國(guó)工人。當(dāng)一位衛(wèi)理公會(huì)派牧師在1869年為中國(guó)移民開(kāi)設(shè)了一所主日學(xué)校時(shí)，暴徒燒毀了他的教堂還威脅他的生命。與三k黨有關(guān)聯(lián)的縱火者還焚燒了另一座教堂，那是一座在薩克拉門(mén)托的教堂，理由是他們犯了為華人社區(qū)提供服務(wù)的罪。他們還燒毀了圣何塞附近一家雇傭中國(guó)工人的白蘭地酒廠。

The Ku Klux Klan was just one manifestation of an anti-Chinese fervor that reached into the highest echelons of power within California. In his 1867 inaugural address, Governor Henry Haight warned that an “influx” of Chinese immigrants would “inflict a curse upon posterity for all time.” State lawmakers campaigned against the two major civil rights measures of the era, the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, by claiming that the amendments would grant citizenship and voting rights to Chinese immigrants.

三k黨只是反華熱情蔓延至加州最高權(quán)力階層的表現(xiàn)之一。加州州長(zhǎng)Henry Haight在1867年的就職演說(shuō)中警告說(shuō)，中國(guó)移民的“涌入”將“給子孫后代帶來(lái)無(wú)盡的詛咒”。 州議員也反對(duì)當(dāng)時(shí)的兩項(xiàng)主要民權(quán)措施，即第十四和第十五修正案，他們聲稱這些修正案將賦予中國(guó)移民公民身份和投票權(quán)。

Spurred by Sinophobia, California rejected both measures outright—the only free state to do so. Not until 1959 and 1962, respectively, would the California legislature offer a token ratification of the amendments.

受恐華情緒的驅(qū)使，加州斷然拒絕了這兩項(xiàng)措施——這是唯一一個(gè)這樣做的自由州。直到1959年和1962年，加州立法機(jī)構(gòu)才分別象征性地批準(zhǔn)了這些修正案。

Newspapers amplified anti-Chinese sentiment and normalized hooliganism. The editor of the Los Angeles News, Andrew Jackson King, filled his columns with vitriolic abuse of the small local Chinese population. They were, he wrote, “an alien, an inferior and idolatrous race;” “hideous and repulsive;” “a curse to our country, and a foul blot upon our civilization.” (While he publicly thundered against these immigrants and the threat they posed to white workers, King employed a Chinese cook in his own home.) A spike in assaults on Chinese workers followed from his editorials.

與此同時(shí)，報(bào)紙新聞也放大了反華情緒，使流氓行為正常化?！堵迳即壭侣劇返木庉婣ndrew Jackson King的專(zhuān)欄里就充斥著對(duì)當(dāng)?shù)匾恍〔糠种袊?guó)人的刻薄謾罵。他寫(xiě)道，他們是“一個(gè)外來(lái)的、劣等的、崇拜偶像的種族”，“丑陋可憎的”，是“我們國(guó)家的詛咒，我們文明的污點(diǎn)”。(盡管他公開(kāi)抨擊這些移民以及他們對(duì)白人工人的威脅，但King卻在自己家里雇傭了一名中國(guó)廚師。) 在他發(fā)表社論之后，針對(duì)中國(guó)工人的攻擊激增。

The assault that took place in Los Angeles on October 24, 1871, was the largest and deadliest of the attacks. Roughly 500 rioters—Anglo-Americans and Hispanic residents alike—charged into the city’s Chinese district after a shootout between suspected Chinese gang members and local authorities resulted in the death of a white former saloonkeeper and the wounding of a policeman. As the mob closed in, petrified Chinese residents took shelter in a long adobe building at the heart of Chinatown.

1871年10月24日發(fā)生在洛杉磯的襲擊是最大規(guī)模、最致命的襲擊。大約500名暴亂者沖進(jìn)了該市的華人區(qū)，這些暴亂者包括英美裔和西班牙裔居民，他們襲擊的起因是涉嫌華人黑幫成員與當(dāng)?shù)卣l(fā)生槍?xiě)?zhàn)，導(dǎo)致一名前酒吧白人店主死亡，一名警察受傷。隨著暴徒的逼近，嚇壞了的中國(guó)居民躲在唐人街中心的一座長(zhǎng)長(zhǎng)的土坯房里。

Two hours of indiscriminate killing followed. The mob smashed through the doors of the building and seized Chinese men and boys hiding inside—only one of whom had participated in the earlier gunfight. Rioters mutilated and murdered virtually any Chinese person they could find. When the mob ran out of hanging ropes, they used clotheslines to string up their victims.

隨后是兩小時(shí)的濫殺。暴徒?jīng)_過(guò)大樓的門(mén)，抓住了藏在里面的中國(guó)男人和男孩——而其中只有一人參加了早些時(shí)候的槍?xiě)?zhàn)。暴徒幾乎殘害和殺害了他們能找到的任何中國(guó)人。當(dāng)暴徒用完了吊索時(shí)，他們就用晾衣繩把受害者吊死。

The mob ultimately claimed 19 lives, including a respected doctor and an adolescent boy. All but two of the bodies were moved to the city’s jail yard, where frantic friends and family members searched for their loved ones among the rows of dead. The death toll represented 10 percent of the city’s Chinese population.

暴徒最終奪去了19條生命，包括一名受人尊敬的醫(yī)生和一名少年。除了兩具尸體外，所有尸體都被轉(zhuǎn)移到了該市的監(jiān)獄院子，在那里，瘋狂的朋友和家人在一排排的尸體中尋找他們的親人。此次事件的死亡人數(shù)占該市中國(guó)人口的10%。

Although eight rioters were convicted of manslaughter, they all walked free a year later on a technicality.

盡管8名暴徒當(dāng)時(shí)被判過(guò)失殺人罪，但一年后他們都因訴訟程序性細(xì)節(jié)而被釋放。



Although legal discriminatory measures were taken against the Chinese, including the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 depicted above, Chinese immigrants took steps to settle into their new country.

盡管美國(guó)白人對(duì)華人采取了包括上文所述的《1882年排華法案》在內(nèi)的歧視性的法律措施，但華人移民還是采取了一些步驟，在他們的新國(guó)家安頓了下來(lái)。

This October, Los Angeles will commemorate the 150th anniversary of the massacre amid a national uptick in anti-Asian violence. Leaders in the Chinese American community are planning a weeklong series of events to reflect on the tragedy and its resonance today. That programming accompanies a campaign to erect a permanent memorial to the 19 victims. Together, these commemorations will be a somber remembrance of the atrocity and the enduring challenges that Chinese Americans face.

今年10月，洛杉磯將在全國(guó)反亞洲暴力上升之際紀(jì)念大屠殺150周年。美國(guó)華人社區(qū)的領(lǐng)導(dǎo)人正計(jì)劃舉行為期一周的一系列活動(dòng)，以反思這場(chǎng)悲劇及其引起的共鳴。該活動(dòng)與為19名遇難者建立永久紀(jì)念碑的活動(dòng)同時(shí)進(jìn)行。這些紀(jì)念活動(dòng)將是對(duì)那次暴行和華裔美國(guó)人所面臨的持久挑戰(zhàn)的沉痛回憶。
原創(chuàng)翻譯：龍騰網(wǎng) http://www.top-shui.cn 轉(zhuǎn)載請(qǐng)注明出處


But they will also be a celebration of survival. Within a year of the massacre, Chinese immigrants moved back into some of the same quarters that had been ravaged by the mob. They rebuilt much of what had been lost and resisted repeated calls for their removal. Their very presence sent an indelible message: The mob had failed, and they would remain.

但它們也將是一場(chǎng)生存的慶典。在大屠殺發(fā)生后的一年內(nèi)，中國(guó)移民搬回了曾經(jīng)被暴徒蹂躪過(guò)的一些地方。他們重建了大部分失去的東西，并抵制了多次要求他們搬遷的呼聲。他們的出現(xiàn)傳達(dá)了一個(gè)不可磨滅的信息:暴民失敗了，他們會(huì)留下來(lái)。

That’s a key message for Gay Yuen, president of the Friends of the Chinese American Museum in Los Angeles, as she prepares for this year’s anniversary commemorations. “Chinese American history is U.S. history; it’s California history; it’s Los Angeles history,” she told me. “We are Americans and we helped build this country. We’re not others and we’re not foreigners.”

這對(duì)位于洛杉磯的中美之友博物館的館長(zhǎng)Gay Yuen來(lái)說(shuō)是一個(gè)關(guān)鍵信息，她正在為今年的周年紀(jì)念活動(dòng)做準(zhǔn)備?！叭A裔美國(guó)人的歷史就是美國(guó)的歷史;這是加州歷史;這是洛杉磯的歷史，”她告訴我?！拔覀兪敲绹?guó)人，我們幫助建設(shè)了這個(gè)國(guó)家。我們不是其他人，我們也不是外國(guó)人。”


Discrimination did not deter Chinese immigrants from coming to the United States, including these students, who arrived in Seattle in 1925.

歧視并沒(méi)有阻止中國(guó)移民來(lái)到美國(guó)，圖為1925年來(lái)到西雅圖的學(xué)生。