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Ireland’s worst racist in America recalled

By
JAMES O'BRIEN,
IrishCentral.com Staff Writer
Published Sunday, October 10, 2010, 9:28 AM
Updated Sunday, October 10, 2010, 9:32 AM

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Irish emigrant Dennis Kearney incited violence against the Chinese in the 1870s.


He was Ireland’s worst racist in America, a man who incited wholesale violence against Chinese immigrants in California in the 1870s.

Denis Kearney was born in Oakmount, County Cork, Ireland in this month in 1847. He emigrated to America and worked in several jobs in the San Francisco Bay Area.

During the period known as the Long Depression, which started in 1873, he became the most virulent attacker of  Chinese laborers. His slogan was, simply, "the Chinese must go."

In July 1877, rampant anti-Chinese violence broke out in San Francisco, Kearney was elected Secretary of the newly formed Workingman's Party of California, a group of anti-Chinese workers and he led often violent attacks on Chinese workers on the railroads.

Historian Hubert Bancroft, considered the Workingmen's Party to be "ignorant Irish rabble, even though that rabble sometimes paraded the streets as a great political party.”

Kearney himself was subject to suspicion.

As The Argonaut newspaper noted, “When an organization, composed almost entirely of aliens, who are themselves here by the sufferance of a generous hospitality, band themselves together in defiance of the law to drive out a class, who, however objectionable, have the same legal rights as themselves, it is an act of insolent audacity that ought to move the indignation of every honest man.”

Despite such attacks, Kearney remained popular and traveled to the East Coast to try and capitalize on his fame.

Kearney sought the Vice Presidential nomination for the Greenback Party, which was actually quite progressive, but he never won it.

Kearney faded from sight after that, but the laws against Chinese that he helped pass were his legacy most notably the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.

Denis Kearney died in 1907.

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17 Comments

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rhunter67 | Oct 11, 2010, 08:06 PM EDT
...and in the process they came into every ethnic, religious or racial group around them in order to take or maintain control of jobs, money and influence. We hope that there isn't the type of ethnic tension now as in back in the day, but otherwise, it's a successful path.
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rhunter67 | Oct 11, 2010, 08:00 PM EDT
In the US, the Irish are the standard-bearers of immigrant social mobility that is every immigrant's goal. When they got here, they were shat on but kept pluggin' away little by little, year by year. They fought hard to make and defend the inroads they had made in American society, and often, against Italians, Chinese, black, Jewish and the WASP establishment. That's not even to mention the other Irish they killed on the battlefield at Fredericksburg in their new country's name. They ruled the streets for decades, losing power only when they moved on to take over municipal politics while, in the process, banishing the old order of the WASP establishment from big city politics forever. Soon after they would be in every aspect of society and became just other white people who moved to the suburbs. But they laid the groundwork for everybody who landed after them. Like Jack said in the beginning of the Departed, "Ain't nobody going to give it to you, you have to take it." And they did.
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GeorgeDillon | Oct 11, 2010, 03:06 PM EDT
Was Kearney dubbed a a racist because he opposed Mass Immigration? That would make 70% of the people of Ireland racist, since that's the percentage who poll against Mass Immigration. The rich wasps in the US--like the bourgeoisie in Ireland--simper that they're not racists, but they're the greatest racists of all. Anyway, Kearney didn't do too badly, isn't one of the big streets in San Francisco named for him?
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downinthebasement | Oct 11, 2010, 02:56 PM EDT
blood and soil thing? An admission of Irish Naziism? Limp wristed Angles? I guess us Anglo-Saxons are not as manly as the Irish priests... Irish priestly manhood is found on the seat of the pants of many Irish youths...;)
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downinthebasement | Oct 11, 2010, 02:55 PM EDT
Couldn't Father Coughlin be considered Ireland's worst racist?
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kilgara | Oct 11, 2010, 02:41 PM EDT
Rudyard Kipling: " Beware the yellow peril".
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londonirish1965 | Oct 11, 2010, 01:56 PM EDT
We were in America before the Angles came to Britain nevermind America-but of course they know nothing of history.
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londonirish1965 | Oct 11, 2010, 01:54 PM EDT
The Irish have always been into blood and soil-something the limp wristed angles can`t understand.
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Meniskos | Oct 11, 2010, 01:49 PM EDT
Rewriting a Wikipedia article is plagiarism, not journalism. You even used the same photograph. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denis_Kearney . This looks like high school homework.
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Nicomax | Oct 11, 2010, 01:06 PM EDT
Once the Germans, then the Irish, then the Italians, then the Slavs, then the Chinese, then the Puerto Ricans, then the Japanese, then the Mexicans, now the Muslims, and let's include the Jews every now and then.. I almost forgot that Ben Franklin in the 1740's thought there were just too many French in Philadelphia- that's until he went to Paris, and saw what he was missing.
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slainte9 | Oct 11, 2010, 12:26 PM EDT
With all due respect to the genius of Irish Central, Kearney never held public office (except maybe dog catcher). The president who signed the Chinese Exclusion Act into law was Chester Arthur, of Irish (and native American) descent. Wouldn't this make Arthur Ireland's worst racist. Also, how come I've never seen a story about England's worst racist? Did the Irish bring slavery and Jim Crow to America? Irish Central: living proof that the brilliant Irish monks who saved Western Civilization were true to their vows of celibacy.
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Temerity | Oct 10, 2010, 09:32 PM EDT
Nothing has changed Now China is simply decimating our manufacuring section and manufacturers go off shore for cheap Chinese or albeit Asian labour so who is actually looking after the interests of workers here?This is in Aus I am talking.Sorry these are the things best left unsaid. right?which it seems Kearney simply had the gumption to stand up to for the sake his fellow workers and their hard won way of life.
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mhichil | Oct 10, 2010, 03:13 PM EDT
somehow nothing has changed; the economy is depressed and the attacks on immigrants is ripe again in america.. How are those immigrants working for you , Eire?. Remember folks, when you are judging others; everything and everyone else is composed of the same elements as YOU. We are all cut from the same earth and go to the same fire!
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BrendanPKeane | Oct 10, 2010, 02:58 PM EDT
Jasper O'Farrell was one of the great San Francisco planners. He is one of the great Irish rabble that built San Francisco. When commentators reduce a people to "ignorant rabble," as Kearney did the Chinese, and Bancroft does the Irish, lies take hold. Kearney's excuse is 19th century ignorance. Bancroft is a modern, with none.
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BrendanPKeane | Oct 10, 2010, 02:45 PM EDT
I'm an avowed Sinophile. I have no sympathy for Kearney or 19th century xenophobia. This Hubert Bancroft asshole you quote, however, is a modern man, and felt quite entitled to describe the "ignorant Irish rabble." This language is ironically reminiscent of Kearney's description of the Chinese. Labor competition between ethnic groups is complicated, and requires scholarly empathy for real understanding. This Bancroft dickhead is a 21st century bigot using 19th century terminology to describe an entire group of people.
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