Front Cover of "China Man or White Man, Which?"
This is the front cover of a reply to Father Buchard from Rev. O. Gibson. It was delivered on March 14th, 1873 in Platt's Hall, San Francisco. Rev. O. Gibson was requested to prepare an answer to the lecture delivered by Father Buchard, a Jesuit Priest, on "Chinaman or White man, which?" Father Buchard claimed that the Chinese Americans where taking all their (Americans') wealth, because they didn't have to pay taxes, and they sent all their earnings back to their country. He claimed that the Chinese were replacing white people, making the the white people chase the bad life, the lives of prostitutes, gamblers, and so forth. He was completely against Chinese Immigration.
The reply to the note was that Gibson didn't want to apologize to the Chinese or praise the white men, he wanted to defend the founding principle and the traditional policies of the American government. Though Gibson wasn't on any side, he did defend the Chinese for one thing, and that was taxes. He pointed out that every Chinese man paid their share of $2 poll tax many times a year, which adds up $10,000, more than how much the white man paid. The white man paid $ 9,000 overall tax. He also mentioned points against the Chinese Immigration, for example all the rice they consumed. He mentioned how the Chinese Immigrants consumed a great deal of rice, which caused America to lose $1,000,000 in gold coins every year. In the end of his reply to Father Buchard, he said America belongs neither to white men or Chinese men, it belongs to the Red Indians(""Chinaman or white man, which?").
