The Korean Experience in America, 1903-1924

Author(s): Lee Houchins and Chang-su Houchins

Source: The Pacific Historical Review, Vol. 43, No. 4, (Nov., 1974), pp. 548-575

Published by: University of California Press

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3638432

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The Korean Experience in America, 1903-1924

Lee Houchins and Chang-su Houchins

Lee Houchins is a member of the history department in Georgetown University and Chang-su Houchins is a member of the anthropology department in the Smithsonian Institution.

he experience of Korean immigrants in the United States and Hawaii during the years 1903 to 1924 is unique in several respects. Their numbers, when compared with other East Asian immigrant groups, were relatively small.¹ Most, whether students or agricultural laborers, were Christians. More than half emigrated to Hawaii as plantation laborers at a time when the political structure of their home country was on the verge of collapse in the face of steadily increasing pressure from a rapidly modernizing Japan. Like most Asian emigrants, they were motivated by the hope of greatly improving their economic situation. Their emigration was encouraged, however, by a government which innocently hoped that, by doing so, it would somehow acquire a measure of prestige--and support from the United States.

Within less than a decade, the Korean immigrants in America found themselves almost completely cutoff from their homeland and in danger of losing their ethnic identity to the Japanese, who had succeeded in annexing Korea. Their identity was preserved, however, by means of their increasingly politicized community organizations and their generally deep involvement in the Korean

i Between 1889 and 1910, for example, total immigrant entries by group approximated 148,000 Japanese; 22,400 Chinese; and 8,300 Koreans. "Asiatic Immigration to the United States by Race or People, 1899 to 1944," Working File: Immigrants by Race, Immigration and Naturalization Service, U.S. Dept. of Justice Papers, Statistics Branch Offices, Washington, D.C.

548

The Korean Experience in America 549

independence movement abroad. For these reasons, this paper will emphasize the political history of Koreans in America as well as the basic patterns of the immigration process itself.

The first Koreans to reach the United States were students or political refugees. They arrived in the years after the signing of the Shufeldt treaty that opened Korea to the West in 1882. The United States and the Korean kingdom exchanged ministers in the following year, and, when the Korean mission returned in 1884, one of its members remained behind to pursue his studies in Massachusetts.²After the abortive, anti-conservative and pro-Japanese coup of December 1884, three political refugees found asylum in the United States. One of these, So Chae-p'il (Philip Jaisohn), emerged as a leading activist in the Korean independence movement of 1919 and a prominent member of the Korean community in the United States.³ In an attempt to demonstrate clearly its independence from traditional Chinese domination of its foreign affairs, the Korean government sent resident ministers to Japan, Britain, France, and the United States, where a legation was opened in 1887. This move facilitated the travel of a substantial number of Korean students, sixty-four in all,⁴ most of whom were encouraged by Christian missionaries in Korea to study Western life and thought at American colleges and universities. Included in this group were An Ch'ang-ho, Kim Kyu-sik, Рак Yong-man, and Yi Sung-man (Syngman Rhee). There followed, until early 1905, small numbers of diplomats and gingseng merchants.

Large-scale Korean emigration to the United States and its territories began in 1903 as the direct result of initiatives on the part of American sugar planters in Hawaii and the very good offices of the American minister at Seoul, Horace D. Allen, and American missionaries. The importation of Koreans for work in Hawaiian sugar plantations was first proposed in November 1896. J. F. Hackfeld, president of a Bremen-based firm heavily involved in underwriting the Hawaiian Sugar Planters Association (HSPA), made the suggestion to the executive council of the Republic of Hawaii. Hackfeld's

This was Yu Kil-chun, whose formal, national dress is on display in the ethno
logical collections of the Peabody Museum, Salem, Mass.

-- The other two were Рак Y5ng-hyo and S6 Kwang-b6m, both of whom had visited
the United States as members of the first Korean mission, 1883-1884.

-- Kim W6n-Yong, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa [Fifty year History of Koreans in
America] (Reedley, Calif., 1959), 29-30.

550 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

proposal was rejected, in accordance with the then current anti-Oriental policy of the executive council.⁵

Returning from home leave in March 1902, Horace Allen was intercepted in San Francisco by an HSPA representative. Allen then met with HSPA officials in Honolulu to discuss the feasibility of the importation of Korean plantation workers. In Seoul, Allen sought out David W. Deshler, a fellow Ohioan and junior partner in the American Trading Company operations at Inchon (then Chemulp'o), and asked him to act as the HSPA agent in Korea for the emigration scheme. Allen also introduced Deshler to E. Faxon Bishop, an HSPA representative who had been dispatched to Japan with $25,000 to recruit labor and promote shipping.⁸ Deshler had interests in a steamship company operating between Inchon and Kobe and, therefore, stood to profit from transporting emigrants as well as from the fee paid by the HSPA for each Korean laborer to reach its plantations in Hawaii. Horace Allen's motivations are somewhat more difficult to identify. Though he was obviously convinced that Korean laborers would adapt to working conditions on the Hawaiian sugar plantations, and though he may have sincerely felt that such an opportunity would better the lot of individual Koreans,⁷ his dominant motivation appears to have been political self-interest.⁸ In any case, Allen's well-established role as adviser to the Korean emperor, Kojong, was crucial to his success.

Allen had little trouble persuading the Korean administration of the positive economic value of mass emigration. The social situa-

Wayne Patterson, "Koreans to Hawaii: Failure in 1897 and Success in 1902" (Pa
per presented to the Columbia University Seminar on Korea, May 17, 1974), cited
with permission. See also Hilary Conroy, The Japanese Frontier in Hawaii, 1868-
1898 (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1953), esp. chap. 12.

-- Patterson, "Koreans to Hawaii," 17-18, 21-22; Fred Harvey Harrington, God,
Mammon and the Japanese: Dr. Horace D. Allen and Korean-American Relations,
1884-1905 (Madison, 1944), 186. Ко Sung-je identifies Deshler as an HSPA employee
and says that HSPA chairman, Charles R. Bishop, met with Deshler at Inchon in
1902, Han'guk Iminsa Yon'gu [Studies in the History of Korean Immigration] (Seoul,
1973), 209.

т Allen to John Hay and to Sanford B. Dole, Dec. 10, 1902, Diplomatic Dispatches, Korea, 1883-1905, Department of State Papers, Record Group 59, microcopy M-134, reel 13, National Archives.

8 By supporting the emigration scheme enthusiastically, Allen was able to contribute materially to Deshler's personal fortunes. Deshler, in turn, strongly supported Allen's bid for the post of minister in the Seoul legation by organizing the interest and patronage of influential Ohio Republicans, including his stepfather, George K. Nash, a close friend of President-elect William McKinley. Harrington, God, Mammon and the Japanese, 186, 294; Patterson, "Koreans to Hawaii," 19-21.

The Korean Experience in America 551

tion in Korea in late 1902 was desperate.⁹ A cholera epidemic raged through the summer, exacerbating the effects of a second year of drought, flood, and locust plague. Severe famine prevailed in the three southern provinces and Hwanghae, northwest of Seoul.¹⁰Large numbers of urban Koreans found themselves in equally distressing circumstances. Yet Allen also appealed to the Korean emperor's sense of prestige: unlike the Chinese, who had been excluded since 1882, Korean laborers would be welcomed in Hawaii or the Philippines.

Allen requested an audience with the emperor in late October,¹¹and on November 16, 1902, an edict established the Suminw5n (Department of Immigration) within the Imperial Household Department.¹² The enlightened Min Yong-hwan was appointed director.¹³Early Suminwon regulations specified that prospective emigrants be of sound health and good standing in their communities. Destination and intended occupation were to be stated, and, most importantly, it was unlawful to issue passports to Koreans emigrating as contract laborers. Passports, valid only for travel to specific destinations, were to be retained by consular officials abroad and sent to the Department of Immigration when the migrants returned to Korea.¹⁴ The regulations were modified in early December to require close police investigation of departing and returning immigrants as well as punishment for those police who failed to screen passports properly.¹⁵

9 The Korean situation in the half decade prior to the outbreak of the Russo-
Japanese war in February 1904 has been described as follows: ". . . the political, eco
nomic, and social conditions of the nation continued to deteriorate under an abso-
lutistic regime dominated by petty, rapacious, and irresponsible court favorites. There
were no large scale convulsions; it was a gradual process of system decay." C. I. Eugene
Kim and Han-kyo Kim, Korea and the Politics of Imperialism, 1876-1910 {Berkeley
and Los Angeles, 1967), 115.

-- Hwangsong Sinmun [Imperial City News] (Seoul), various issues, July 24 to Aug.
29, 1902, facsimile edition in the Korea Section, Orientalia Division, Library of
Congress.

-- Ibid., editorial, Nov. 3, 1902; Allen to Hay, Dec. 10, 1902, Diplomatic Dispatches,
Korea, 1883-1905.

^Hwangsong Sinum, Oct. 23, 1902, gives notice of the request without information about its purpose; Allen and Deshler may have attended several audiences at which emigration was discussed. According to Patterson, Allen falsely represented Deshler as an official of the non-existent Bureau of Immigration of the Territory of Hawaii. Patterson, "Koreans to Hawaii," 24.

13 Hwangsong Sinum, Nov. 18, 1902.

" Ibid., Nov. 21, 1902.

15 Allen to Dole, Dec. 10, 1902, Diplomatic Dispatches, Korea, 1889-1905.

552 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

The Suminwon staff was expanded and branch offices were established in various ports by late November. Official encouragement of emigration "for the purposes of education, observation, and to engage in commerce, industry, and agriculture" was publicly announced.¹⁶ Nonetheless, the Suminwon's administrative responsibilities were restricted largely to issuing passports, and the bulk of the recruiting burden fell upon Deshler. With appropriate credentials from the emperor now in hand, Deshler formed the Tonga Kaebal Hoesa (Korean Development Company) to facilitate his emigration enterprises for the HSPA. Newspaper advertisements emphasized several advantages: Hawaii's mild weather; attractive wages ($16 per month for a sixty-hour work week); free housing, medical care, wood, and water; and free admission to schools where the English language would be taught. Unmarried emigrants as well as those with families would be welcome. Employment opportunities, particularly for farmers, were excellent; furthermore, all would enjoy the protection of American law. The recruitment message was summed up in the slogan "Kaeguk chinch'wi"--The country is open; go forward!¹⁷

The recruiting effort emphasized that those choosing to emigrate did so as free agents, within the letter and spirit of article six of the Shufeldt Treaty, and not as contract laborers. Nevertheless, few Korean emigrants had sufficient funds to achieve the appealing status of "free agent." Deshler's Tonga Kaebal Hoesa (TKH) paid passport fees to the Suminw5n on behalf of prospective emigrants and loaned each departing individual 100 won, in addition to 70 won to be paid as fare for the passage from Kobe to Honolulu. The loans were made through the newly established Deshler Bank in Inchon, whose sole depositor was the HSPA,¹⁸ and were to be repaid ten months after settling on a Hawaiian plantation. TKH offices were established in several port cities as well as in the Chong-dong district of Seoul, near the American legation, but the recruiting effort was not immediately successful. Only through the persuasion of American missionaries, particularly the Reverend George Heber Jones, was the first shipload of emigrants collected. Most

16 Hwangsdng Sinmun, Nov. 18 and 21, 1902. i¹? Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 4. is Patterson, "Koreans to Hawaii," 28.

The Korean Experience in America 553

were from the Inchon port area, and nearly half were members of the congregation at Jones's Yongdong church.¹⁹

The first shipload, carrying 101 emigrants, sailed from Inchon harbor on December 22, 1902, barely five weeks after the establishment of the Suminw5n, and arrived in Honolulu on January 13.²⁰Fifteen additional shiploads in the course of 1903 brought 1,133 more Korean immigrants. In 1904 the flow peaked with thirty-three ship arrivals and 3,434 immigrants. In 1905, the final year of direct Korean immigration to Hawaii, the number of immigrants declined to 2,659. A sense of urgency is suggested by the fact that the average number of emigrants per shipload rose sharply from 73 in 1903 to 104 in 1904 and to 166 in the first half of 1905.²¹ The last large group of Korean immigrants to Hawaii arrived in a single shipload on May 18, 1905.²²

There are, of course, a number of reasons why mass Korean immigration to the United States and its territories was brought to an end in 1905: basic Korean conservatism, particularly regarding absence from ancestors' graves; the opposition of individual Korean politicians and individual American missionaries; and, perhaps, the recall of Horace Allen. The principal reason was, however, the accelerating establishment of Japanese hegemony on the Korean peninsula. "Complete freedom of action in Korea" was one of the major Japanese aims in the 1904-1905 war with Russia. In February 1904, the Korean court was forced to make damaging concessions which allowed the Japanese to interfere in Korean administration and to prevent Korean attempts to seek assistance from other powers. Provisions of the February protocol were expanded in late May, with the effect that the Japanese began to establish a de facto protectorate in Korea.²³ As a means of assuming supervisory

i" Ко, Han'guk Iminsa Ydn'gu, 208-210.

-- Only 93 received medical clearance during an intermediate stop at Kobe, accord
ing to No Chae-убп, Chae-Mi Hanin Sa Ryak [Brief History of Korean Residents in
America] (Los Angeles, 1951), 4-5.

-- Citing Нубп Sun, P'owa Yuram Ki [Memoirs of My Hawaiian Sojourn] (Seoul
[?], 1909), 5, Ко SHng-je gives the size of the first group departing Inchon as 97. Kim
W6n-yong's figures (121 departing, 101 arriving Honolulu) are somewhat higher.

-- No, Chae-Mi Hanin Sa Ryak, 29. According to Ко, Han'guk Iminsa Ydn'gu, 210-
211, a small number continued to arrive until November 1905.

-- Shumpei Okamoto, The Japanese Oligarchy and the Russo-Japanese War (New
York and London, 1970), 112-120.

554 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

and veto powers over Korean affairs, the Japanese demanded and secured Korean acceptance of foreign advisers on financial and foreign affairs, both of whom would follow the instructions of their respective ministries in the Japanese government. The foreign affairs adviser appointed in August 1904 was Durham White Stevens, an American employee of the Japanese foreign office and a protege of Theodore Roosevelt. Shortly afterwards, the Korean police came under the complete supervision of the Japanese military gendarmerie.²⁴ The Japanese perceived further Korean immigration as a threat to their newly established political control over Korea.²⁵Emigration was effectively suspended and the Suminw5n dissolved on November 17, 1905, with the signing of the secretly negotiated treaty that formalized the Japanese protectorate in Korea. The Suminwon's director, Min Yong-hwan, committed suicide, leaving an empassioned plea for independence addressed to the people of Korea.²⁶

Of the 7,226 immigrants to Hawaii during the years 1903-1905, 6,048 were male adults, 637 women, and 541 children. Less than sixty percent remained in Hawaii; roughly a thousand immigrants returned to Korea, while two thousand moved on to the continental United States.²⁷ Unfortunately, we do not have a detailed sociological profile of the immigrants to Hawaii. According to Bernice B. H. Kim, almost all the adult males were between the ages of twenty and thirty. Most were common manual laborers from Korean port cities and towns; the remainder included former soldiers in the Korean army, household servants, policemen, woodcutters, and miners. Few came from rural districts, and less than fourteen percent were farmers.²⁸ There may have been a few students and

Kim and Kim, Korea and the Politics of Imperialism, 123-124.

-- The Japanese anti-emigration policy was further encouraged by the news of the
tragic circumstances of Korean contract laborers who had emigrated to Mexico in early
1905. According to Patterson, the Japanese minister to Seoul, Hayashi Gonsuke, suc
cessfully demanded an end to emigration in April 1905 ("Koreans to Hawaii," 29), yet
92 emigrants were admitted to Honolulu in July 1905. Ко, Han'guk Iminsa Yon'gu,
210-211.

-- Kim and Kim, Korea and the Politics of Imperialism, 132.

2T Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 3, 6. Ко Sffng-je, whose data are based on Honolulu immigration records and extend into late 1905, has a slightly higher total, 7,296, of whom 715 were women. Both totals are remarkably consistent with data from the Annual Reports of the Commissioner of Immigration for 1903-1905.

28 Bernice Bong Нее Kim, "The Koreans in Hawaii," Social Science, IX (1934), 409.

The Korean Experience in America 555

churchmen, but sixty-five percent were illiterate.²⁹ Clearly, their emigration had almost no impact on the Korean rural economy.

The economic life of most Koreans in America in the early years was not much different from that of other unskilled immigrants. They came as agricultural laborers and so remained until other job opportunities developed. A majority were significantly ill-suited for the rigors of work on the Hawaiian sugar plantations. The daily wage of 69 cents was what recruiters had promised, but little remained after repaying loans. Some immigrants left the plantations for work in railroad construction, fisheries, or the mines. Between 1905 and 1907, some 1,003 Korean laborers fled to the continental United States. Many of them were attracted by the rice farms in California, thinking the work would be more familiar and less strenuous.³⁰ Railroad construction in the western United States presented another opportunity. A vigorous recruiting effort was conducted in February 1905 by a railroad company agent who established an office in a Korean hotel in Honolulu. Advertisements were placed in local Korean language newspapers with a view toward recruiting 5,000 workers, but the number actually engaged was considerably smaller. Most of the Koreans recruited for railway construction jobs entered at San Francisco; others entered at Seattle, the western terminus of the expanding Great Northern railway system.³¹ A relatively large number of railroad workers were established in Salt Lake City by 1906. Some stayed as section hands after constructtion was completed, eventually going into truck farming and other agrarian pursuits in Oregon, central California, Colorado, Utah, Kansas, and Montana.³²

In the face of mounting demands from Californians for Japanese and Korean exclusion legislation, and in the midst of a deepening diplomatic crisis with Japan, the U.S. Congress passed an amendment to the Immigration Act of 1907 which authorized President

Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 7.

-- Ко, Han'guk Iminsa Y6n'gu, 217-218; Bernice Kim, "Koreans in Hawaii," 411.
The 1,003 figure is Ko's; Bernice Kim puts the number at "about a thousand."

-- Miju Hanin Ch'ilsimnyon Sa [Seventy Year History of Koreans in America]
(Seoul, 1973), 59.

-- No, Chae-Mi Hanin Sa Ryak, 26, 57-64. For a brief account of a Korean com
munity established by section hands near Butte, see Dale White, "Koreans in Mon
tana," Asia and the Americas, XLV (1945), 156.

556 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

Theodore Roosevelt to exclude any immigrant not holding a valid passport to the United States. The President's implementing executive order focused more narrowly on Japanese and Korean transmigration from Hawaii to the mainland.³³ Once the provisions of Roosevelt's executive order had taken effect, the inflow of Korean immigrants to the United States and its territories slowed rapidly, reaching a low point--eight entries--in fiscal year 1911.³⁴

The flow from Hawaii to the mainland was, of course, effectively cut off. But the Korean government continued to issue passports, in the apparent hope that Koreans could continue to immigrate, despite the strong anti-immigration policies of the Japanese protectorate in Korea. In late 1907, the American Secretary of State, Elihu Root, ruled that the United States would not recognize Korean passports, only passports issued by the Japanese Foreign Office.³⁵

When the protectorate was formally implemented on November 17, 1905, the incipient decline of American fortunes sharpened in the face of rapidly advancing Japanese commercial operations. The Japanese moved to assure American government and business leaders that Japan intended to adhere to the principles of Open Door Policy in East Asia. Prince Ito Hirobumi, the Japanese resident-general in Korea, sent Durham Stevens to explain Japanese policy and to ameliorate the negative feelings of Americans doing business in Korea.³⁶

Stevens arrived in San Francisco on March 20, 1908, and died

Executive Order, March 14, 1907, Theodore Roosevelt Papers, Library of Con
gress; cf. Charles E. Neu, An Uncertain Friendship: Theodore Roosevelt and Japan,
1906-1909 (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), chaps. 2 and 3, for domestic and diplomatic
background.

-- U.S. Commissioner of Immigration, Annual Report, 1911 (Washington, D.C.,
1912), 26-27; see also "Asiatic Immigration to the United States by Race or People,
1899-1944."

-- Oscar Stans to Root, Nov. 6, 1907; Root to Stans, Nov. 12, 1907, Numerical File,
1906-1910, U.S. Dept. of State Papers.

зв Stevens is a curious and tragic figure. His principal Japanese patron, Hioki Masu, who later served as Japanese minister in Washington, warned him that his position as adviser to the Korean Foreign Ministry would be a difficult one: "When one has to go apparently against the interests of his own countrymen he feels a great burden." Stevens, on the contrary, seemed to delight in the ascription by American businessmen in Korea that he was "more pro-Japanese than the Japanese officials themselves." His assignment in Seoul apparently lasted slightly more than a year. He probably spent the intervening years in Tokyo. Hioki to Allen, Sept. 8, 1905; Stevens to Allen, Oct. 26,1905; and Townsend to Allen, Nov. 30,1905, Horace D. Allen Papers, New York Public Library.

The Korean Experience in America 557

there five days later. His public statement in an arrival interview might have convinced Americans that Korea actually benentted under Japanese administration, but it was sufficiently derogatory to infuriate local Koreans. When published in the San Francisco Chronicle, Stevens's remarks led to a mass joint meeting of the Taedong Pogukhoe (Restoration Association) and Kongnip Hy5-phoe (Mutual Assistance Association) members and local Koreans in the San Francisco Bay area. A committee of four delegates, selected to confront Stevens at the first opportunity,³⁷ accosted him at the Fairmont Hotel. When he refused to retract his statements, he was severely assaulted until other hotel guests intervened. Undoubtedly shaken by the incident, Stevens prepared his departure for Washington, D.C., on March 23.

When Stevens arrived at the Ferry Building the following morning to make his railway connection,³⁸ he was accompanied by the Japanese consul, Koike Chozo. As they alighted from a limousine, Chon Myong-un, a member of the Kongnip Hyophoe, stepped forward with a revolver. Chon failed to shoot Stevens but struck him a vicious blow on the face. In the ensuing scuffle, Chon was wounded and Stevens shot by Chang In-whan, a member of the Taedong Pogukhoe. Stevens died on the night of March 25; both Chon and Chang were arraigned a week later. Because there was insufficient evidence to show that the assassination was the result of a conspiracy of Korean associations, Ch5n was released in June and Chang tried as the sole plaintiff. In the course of the trial, which lasted seven months, the prosecution naturally received substantial assistance from the Japanese consulate, which sought the maximum penalty. The Korean community in the United States and Hawaii directed its efforts toward defense: hiring lawyers, soliciting defense funds, providing interpreters, and collecting evidence.³⁹ In view of the circumstances, the defense was rather successful; Chang was convicted of second degree murder, sentenced to twenty-five years in

Warren Y. Kim places the mass meeting at the "Korean Mission building." Ko
reans in America (Seoul, 1971), 80. He probably means the Korean Southern Metho
dist Mission Church at 2350 California St., San Francisco. See No, Chae-Mi Hanin Sa
Ryak, 62.

-- Yi S6n-gun, Han'guk Sa [History of Korea], VI: Нубпйае-р'убп [Modern Period]
(Seoul, 1963), 965, gives the scene of the shooting as the Oakland railway station.

-- Overseas Koreans in the U.S., Hawaii, Mexico, China, and Japan contributed
$7,390 to the defense. Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 327.

558 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

San Quentin penitentiary, and paroled for good behavior after ten years. Chang died in 1930 at age fifty-five; Korean community organizations were heavily represented at his funeral.⁴⁰

The Stevens case involved the first outbreak of nationalism among Koreans in America. It also served to confirm Japanese hostility toward student visa applications. This negative policy was maintained on the grounds that students might become involved in anti-Japanese political agitation; furthermore, any implication that Korean students might prefer an American rather than a Japanese education was highly annoying to the Japanese. By early 1909, however, the Japanese government indicated a willingness to issue passports to Korean students who could show evidence of welcome from the United States government as well as sufficient funds. The American consul-general in Seoul finally agreed to issue student visas to Korean students sponsored by American nationals, provided that the latter would vouch for the students' qualifications and financial ability.⁴¹ During the William Howard Taft administration, the United States government adopted a positive, highly encouraging policy regarding Korean students, and immigration officials were directed to give them "every proper consideration."⁴²

During the nine years following the Japanese annexation of Korea in 1910, some 541 students, known to Koreans in America as sindo haksaeng (newly arrived students), were admitted for study at American schools and universities.⁴³ Large numbers made their way to the continental United States via Shanghai on board American flagships without passports or student visas. Most claimed that they were not Japanese subjects, and thus exempt from any requirement to carry a Chosen Sotokufu (the Japanese governor-general in Korea) passport, and, furthermore, that they had left Korea before Japan assumed sovereignty over the peninsula. Classifying this group as "working students," the U.S. commissioner of immigration adopted a surprisingly sympathetic policy toward them.⁴⁴

For a detailed account, including biographical notes on Ch6n and Chang, see
ibid., 318-330.

-- Thomas Sammons to T. J. O'Brien, April 14, 1908, Nov. 2, 1908, Jan. 25, 1909,
and March 24, 1909, Numerical File, 1906-1910, U.S. Department of State Papers.

-- Charles Nagel to P. С Knox, March 22, 1909; Knox to O'Brien, March 29, 1909,
ibid.

-- Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 29.

-- Miju Hanin Chilshimnydn Sa, 75; U.S. Commissioner of Immigration, Annual
Report, 1914 (Washington, D.C., 1915), 319.

The Korean Experience in America 559

Realizing that most sindo haksaeng were essentially political refugees, the leadership of a budding Korean independence movement in America welcomed them as a potentially useful addition to the Korean community. The reaction of Koreans in America to the formal annexation of Korea in the summer of 1910 was directed by the Tae-Han Kungminhoe (Korean National Association). Having anticipated annexation by several months, the Tae-Han Kungminhoe (THK) called on its membership to participate in and contribute financially to a series of patriotic, anti-Japanese programs. Lacking U.S. government interest or support, the THK sent telegrams of protest to both the Korean king and Japanese emperor, a move that produced no apparent result. The THK encouraged the establishment of quasi-military training programs in the hope that military resistance to Japanese rule would become widespread and demanded the participation of young Koreans from the American community. "Military academies" were organized in Hawaii; Clare-mont and Lompoc, California; Superior, Wyoming; Hastings, Nebraska; and Kansas City. Nearly $60,000 was contributed to the THK in support of the military training program, which continued to function until 1916.⁴⁵

When anti-Japanese activities of Korean immigrants in Hawaii and the United States intensified after the 1910 annexation, the seriously concerned Japanese government decided to grant exit permits to young Korean women who were willing to go abroad under marriage contracts--this as a means to calm political passions among overseas Koreans. Only about ten percent of the 1903-1905 Korean immigrants had been women. The unbalanced sex ratio had brought some immigrants back to Korea in search of wives. Most, however, had lacked sufficient capital to return to the United States or Hawaii, even if they had wished to do so. The Japanese decision to issue exit permits to Korean women resulted in more than a thousand marriages in the period 1910-1924. Most (951) of the brides brought to Hawaii in this fashion were from the southern Korean town of Yongnam and its environs, while most of the 115 brides who came to the U.S. mainland via Shanghai were from the northen provinces,⁴⁶ probably Hwanghae and Py5ng'an. The

45 Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 330-346.

a ibid., 27-29. Not all Koreans admitted under these arrangements were young women; the 197 brides who entered at Honolulu in the fiscal years 1918-1921 were accompanied by twenty children and six "parents." The so-called picture bride

560 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

preponderance of brides from the southern provinces reflected the continuing socioeconomic effects of overpopulation and low income. The situation of these young women was so distressed that they would willingly risk marrying an unknown person far away. The picture marriages had a number of important sociological consequences for the Korean immigrant community. They consumed a great deal of accumulated capital because the cost of the marriage arrangements to the typical plantation, farm, or railroad worker was high, usually between $300 and $500; in many cases it was necessary for the prospective groom to borrow from, or simply impose upon, friendly individuals and institutions. The picture groom dealt with marriage brokers in an entrepot city. His temporary residence in Honolulu or the San Francisco Bay area while waiting for his bride to arrive often involved a change of job, and this, coupled with his reluctance to return with his bride to the plantation worker's life, resulted in a steep increase in the urban-izaton rate. In Hawaii, increasing numbers of Koreans left the plantations for the Dole pineapple cannery and the Honolulu docks.⁴⁷The picture marriages resulted in rapid growth in the size of the second generation;⁴⁸ these immigrants, now largely urbanized, enjoyed vastly improved opportunities for education. The picture marriages contributed to the levelling of values between southern, agrarian brides and northern grooms of urban or near-urban origin. An unfortunate, though temporary, consequence of the common disparity in ages between bride and groom was that second-generation Koreans were often left to spend a considerable number of their formative years with their undereducated, non-English speaking, widowed mothers. The same age difference may account for the relatively high divorce rate among Koreans in Hawaii in the 1914-1926 period.⁴⁹

scheme, long used by Chinese and Japanese immigrants, as well as Koreans, should more properly be termed picture marriages; if only one party supplied a photograph it was usually the groom, not the bride, who did so.

4TBernice Kim, "The Koreans in Hawaii," 441. The number of Korean sugar plantation workers declined by 50 percent between 1920 and 1924. William Carlson Smith, Americans in Process: a Study of Our Citizens of Oriental Ancestry (Ann Arbor, 1937), table IX, 67.

-- When the picture marriage inflow began in 1910, there were 107 second-
generation Koreans in Hawaii; by 1920 there were 345 in the lO-to-17 age group alone,
39 percent of whom lived in Honolulu proper. Smith, Americans in Process, table
XVI, 212.

-- At fourteen per thousand, it was the highest of the non-Caucasian ancestral
groups. Ibid., table XVII, 215.

The Korean Experience in America 561

In late June 1913, at the height of the anti-Japanese labor movement in California, eleven Koreans were severely beaten as they attempted to work in an orchard near Riverside. When an official of the Japanese consulate in Los Angeles visited the victims and offered assistance, the Tae-Han Kungminhoe (THK) interfered. Refusing to accept any offer of help from Japanese officials, the THK's leadership dispatched a telegram to William Jennings Bryan, U.S. Secretary of State, making the following points: All Korean residents of the state of California arrived before 1910, when Korea was annexed by the Japanese; they were Koreans, who opposed Japanese domination of Korea; Japanese government assistance was refused, particularly because the acceptance of such aid would imply that Koreans were Japanese subjects; and all matters regarding Koreans in America should be taken up with the Korean community organization, the Tae-Han Kungminhoe or Korean National Association of North America. Bryan's prompt response, favoring the THK position, was widely published, and the THK gained recognition as a quasi-diplomatic organization representing the Korean immigrant community.⁵⁰

Along with their deepening involvement in political activities, increasing numbers of Korean immigrants sought to improve their economic situatons. Especially after 1910, a substantial portion of Korean males went to the cities where they sought their fortunes as canning factory workers, or as stevedores, cooks, waiters, janitors, and domestic servants. The general economic stability and growth of the 1915-1920 period brought some relief to those immigrants, particularly plantation workers, who had been maintaining themselves at a bare subsistence level.⁵¹ There was a general increase in wages and the availability of new jobs for both skilled and unskilled immigrants, particularly in industrial and semi-industrial areas. By this time, Korean immigrants had accumulated sufficient

so Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 114-117. The Korean National Association of North America was incorporated as a non-profit, social service organization under the laws of the state of California on April 6, 1914. See Ch'oe Hui-song, Ping-Segye Ch'ilsimnydn: Na Ш chasojon [Seventy Years in the Cold World: My Autobiography] (Seoul, 1964), 30, for an account of THK representations with Bureau of Immigration officials at San Francisco on behalf of detained Korean arrivals.

51 The general and sustained poverty among early Korean settlers was partly due to the demanded, and sometimes forced, financial contributions ("duty money") to various Korean political organizations. Typical monthly wage scales for the 1903-1910 period are: plantation workers (Hawaii), $16; farm laborers (California), $36; railroad construction and mining (Utah and Montana), $60; fishery workers (Washington and Alaska), $37. Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 283, 298-299.

562 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

capital to venture into small business operations: laundry, room-inghouse, barber, restaurant, and shoe repair services, as well as retail grocery and used furniture shops. Those who remained in the agricultural sector were now able to operate their own small farms and orchards. The general strike by Japanese plantation workers on Oahu in 1919 gave their Korean counterparts an opportunity to shift from outer-island sugar plantations to stevedoring and cannery work.⁵² Despite marked increases in sugar plantation wages, the balance shifted by 1922, and the majority of Korean workers in Hawaii were engaged elsewhere. The trend continued for another decade and only reversed itself slightly due to the employment of small numbers of second-generation plantation workers.⁵³

Korean immigrants undertook several ambitious economic enterprises between 1910 and 1925. The grandest schemes were large-scale agricultural ventures sponsored by Korean political organizations. The T'aedong Sirop Chusik Hoesa (Great Eastern Industrial Co.) was organized in 1910 by the leadership of the Korean National Association of North America to finance its political activities. One thousand $50 stock certificates were issued to capitalize the purchase of 2,430 acres of farmland in Manchuria. The THK intended to build a model farm village accommodating two hundred families, but the selection of the farm site was unfortunate, and the venture was a complete loss.⁵⁴ A similar venture in California was less disastrous. The Hungsadan (Corps for the Advancement of Individuals) formed the Puk-Mi Sorop Hoesa (North American Farming Industry Company) in 1917. Capitalized at $95,000, the company began rice farming with the hope that a model village for Hiingsadan members would eventually be constructed.⁵⁵ This dream was never realized, and after a decade the company was dissolved.⁵⁶

Smaller scale, nonpolitical business ventures were notably more

Bernice Kim, "Koreans in Hawaii," 441.

-- Ко, Han'guk Ilminsa Yon'gu, 218-219; Smith, Americans in Process, 67-69.

5* Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 286. For a reproduction of one of the stock certificates, dated August 10, 1910, see ibid., 287.

SB Miju Hanin Ch'itsimny5n Sa, 103.

se According to Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 289, the rice farming business began to decline in 1920. No, Chae-Mi Hanin Sa Ryak, 103, gives the organization and dissolution dates as 1912 and 1929, and states that the company was most successful during World War I.

The Korean Experience in America 563

successful. Early immigrants in Hawaii had little opportunity to free themselves from the sugar plantations, but some few did manage to open small businesses. By 1922, there were twenty-two Korean entrepreneurs operating in Hawaiian cities with capital investments between $1,000 and $20,000. In addition to the traditional Asian immigrant hotel, restaurant, and grocery enterprises, Koreans engaged in thirteen different commercial operations, including variety goods and furniture retailing, ready-to-wear clothing manufacturing, and construction contracting.⁵⁷ On the Pacific Coast, economic opportunities were limited by more intense and effective racial prejudice. Entrepreneurial activity within the Los Angeles Korean community was extremely modest and conventional. The largest enterprise by 1939 was the Oriental Food Products Co., which specialized in the wholesale distribution of canned and other processed Oriental foods. But it was in agriculture that the greatest scale and level of success of Korean enterpreneurial skill was achieved.

Korean settlers in California, Oregon, Colorado, Montana, Kansas, and Nebraska began vegetable farming as early as 1911. They followed with successful ventures in orchards, nurseries, and vineyards. In 1916, a group of sixty Koreans in the Manteca, California, area pooled their resources to lease 1,300 acres for experimental sugar beet production. Business thrived, and a small cooperative village was organized nearby. A smaller group of Koreans in Logan, Utah, succeeded with a 292-acre melon farm. By far the most successful of all Korean enterprises before 1924 were the rice and fruit farming operations in the San Joaquin Valley. One California Korean, Kim Chong-nim, celebrated as the "Rice King" in 1917, was able to expand his operations to 2,085 acres in rice. Near Reed-ley, two brothers, Kim Ho and Kim Hy5ng-sun, began a truckfarm-ing business in 1921, eventually working 500 acres. Their business grew to $400,000 annually, as they expanded into nectarine and other fruit production and wholesaling along with canning and large-scale nurseries.⁵⁸

Korean immigrants began building churches and church-related

Hawai-zai Chosenjin Ippan ]6tai [General Situation of the Koreans in Hawaii],
cited by Ко, Han'guk Iminsa Yon'gu, 218-219.

-- Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 299, 302-305. No Chae-убп gives slightly
different totals for participants and acreage involved in cooperative ventures. No,
Chae-Mi Hanin Sa Ryak, 119-128.

564 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

schools in their first years of settlement in Hawaii and the United States and continued to do so in ensuing years. The churches and schools served as community life centers and provided a source of hope for an uncertain future. Korean immigrants viewed the establishment of the Japanese protectorate in 1905 as a clear danger signal, and, when their worst fears were confirmed with outright annexation in 1910, large numbers of them became virtually obsessed with maintaining their identity as Christians and as Koreans. More than half of the early settlers had been active members of missionary church groups when they left Korea;⁵⁹ the remainder willingly participated in church activities as the only organized social activity available.

The first Korean church service was held at Mokolia plantation on July 4, 1903, barely six months after the arrival of the first group of immigrants. The Korean Methodist Church of Hawaii was established in November of the same year; the Korean Episcopal Church in January 1905, and the Korean Christian Church of Hawaii in 1918. The Korean Methodist Church of San Francisco held its first service in October 1905, and in 1906 the Korean Presbyterian Church was established in Los Angeles. By the end of the first decade, there were in the Hawaiian territory alone over thirty-one churches and church-schools, with congregations of 2,800, while on the mainland there were seven church missions with approximately 450 constant members.⁶⁰ Churches of various other denominations were organized in the next two decades. By the mid-1920s, Korean churches were established in Chicago and New York City, as well as in several California cities. The Methodist and Presbyterian congregations were the largest and most active; while there were modest congregations of Episcopalians and Baptists, the number of Buddhists and Catholics remained negligible.⁶¹Over the years, in a definite manifestation of the growing sense of Korean nationalism, the Korean Christian movement became increasingly independent of American church leaders and their organizations.

Nearly every Christian mission in Hawaii provided Sunday school and Korean language classes for children and English language classes on various plantations designed to reduce the illlit-

59 Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 40.

eo Ibid., 41.

ei Warren Y. Kim, Koreans in America (Seoul, 1971), 81-40.

The Korean Experience in America 565

eracy rate among Korean workers. Korean language books and periodicals were imported for this purpose. The first institution devoted primarily to education was the Hanin Kisuk Hakkyo (Korean Boarding School or "Korean compound"), which was established in Honolulu in 1906 by the Korean Methodist mission.⁶²Various courses were offered for boys aged seven to twelve as preparation for admission to American secondary schools; the Korean language was included in the curriculum. For a brief period, the school was known as the Girls' Seminary, but in 1918 it was expanded as a coeducational institution and its name changed to Hanin Kidok Hagwon (Korean Christian Institute). It was eventually converted to an orphanage in 1928.⁸³ Both Рак Yong-man and Syngman Rhee were closely connected with the Korean boarding school in Honolulu, and, it is said, their celebrated political rivalry began with a dispute over school administration.⁶⁴

Six Korean language schools were in operation on the mainland between 1906 and 1940. All these were located in California--San Francisco, Los Angeles, Sacramento, Dinuba, Reedley, and Delano. After 1931, the number of mission and church-related language schools in rural areas declined as increasing numbers of Korean immigrants and their families moved into the cities. The organization of language schools in large California cities in 1906 demonstrated the resistance of the Korean community to the San Francisco Board of Education's decision to segregate all Chinese, Japanese, and Korean school children in a separate Oriental school.⁰³

But it was the politically oriented organizatons, rather than the churches or language schools, which came to dominate the structure of the Korean community in America. The first attempt to organize Korean immigrants occurred in 1903, when An Ch'ang-ho formed a small fraternal group of San Francisco area students called the Ch'inmokhoe (Friends' Association). With the burst of anti-Japanese feelings among Korean immigrants attending the estab-

"2 Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 243. Cf. Arthur L. Gardner, The Koreans in Hawaii: An Annotated Bibliography (Honolulu, 1970), entry 30.

"3 Kim, ChafrMi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 246, gives 1928 as the closing date of the institute; in his severely abridged English-language version, Koreans in America, 44, the date is given as 1933.

"4 For a partisan account of Rhee's involvement, see Robert T. Oliver, Syngman Rhee, The Man Behind the Myth (New York, 1954), 122-123.

в5 The board's earlier resolution to pursue a segregation policy inspired the formation of the Japanese-Korean Exclusion League in May 1905. Neu, An Uncertain Friendship, 23-25.

566 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

lishment of the Japanese protectorate in Korea in 1905, the Ch'in-mokhoe was reorganized as the Kongnip Hy5phoe (Mutual Assistance Association), giving a definite political cast to an otherwise traditional immigrant community mutual benefit society. By 1908, the membership had grown to 130, distributed among six California local branches.⁶⁶ Under similar political motivation, Korean community leaders in Honolulu saw a need to mobilize the more than twenty Korean clubs and societies in various localities. In 1907 they organized the Hanin Haps5ng Hyophoe (United Korean Society), with headquarters in Honolulu.

The efforts to mobilize proliferating community organizations and, more importantly, to bring the Hawaiian and mainland Korean communities into closer cooperation were greatly accelerated by the Stevens case of 1908. The Tae-Hanin Kungminhoe (Korean National Association of North America) was formed in 1909 for the express purpose of uniting all Korean organizations in the United States and its territories in a concerted effort to protect Koreans and, at the same time, to channel their political energies and sustain their commitment to Korean culture. The THK central headquarters was established in San Francisco, with chapter headquarters in Hawaii, Siberia, and Manchuria. Of the 116 local branches, 78 were in Hawaii, where their role has been described as a "government within a government."⁶⁷ All Koreans in America were required to join the THK and were subject to its membership dues.

The THK movement in Hawaii reached its peak in 1915, by which time the association had invited Syngman Rhee to Hawaii. There ensued protracted factional controversy between Rhee and An Ch'ang-ho and Рак Yong-man, the most prominent Korean political activists in America, which greatly weakened the organization. The central issue of the bitter controversy was the means to be used to achieve the goal of Korean independence; Рак Yong-man favored an activist, militant approach, while Rhee favored a

ее In Oakland, Los Angeles, Redlands, Riverside, Boyd, and Rockspring; an unknown number of chapters were also established in the Far East. Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 88.

67 Gardner, Koreans in Hawaii, 3. The central headquarters was moved to Los Angeles in 1913. Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 111.

The Korean Experience in America 567

slower course, emphasizing education and diplomacy.⁶⁸ With his designation as premier and later as chief executive of the Korean Provisional Government (KPG), established in 1919 at Shanghai, Rhee's prestige greatly increased. For the next two years, as "president" of the provisional government, he devoted himself to a vain attempt to secure support at international conferences. Rhee organized the Tongjihoe (Society for the Like-Minded) in Honolulu in 1921 to reinforce his position vis-a-vis the KPG. But the KPG was already on the verge of collapse because of divergent political strategies and the style of Rhee's leadership.⁶⁹ Rhee returned to Honolulu to demand that Tongjihoe members remain exclusively loyal to him; in 1924 he was elected to a life term as the society's executive-general. Tongjihoe branch organizations were formed in Chicago, Detroit, Butte, New York, and Los Angeles, where a chapter was established in 1929.?

The Hungsadan (Corps for the Advancement of Individuals)⁷¹was formally organized in San Francisco on May 13, 1913, when An Ch'ang-ho mobilized a small group of young Korean students in the San Francisco Bay area. With the motto "virtue, intellect, and health," the Hungsadan's immediate purpose was to improve the lives of individual overseas Koreans, particularly youths, and its long-range goal was to provide elitist leadership which would eventually manage the restoration of Korean sovereignty and subsequent reconstruction.⁷² As means to these ends, the Hungsadan rejected radical revolutionary methods, choosing instead a patient program of individual improvement involving both formal education and self-study.

68 Gardner, Koreans in Hawaii, 3-4. Rhee essentially relied on propaganda directed to the United States. Chong-sik Lee, Politics of Korean Nationalism (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1963), 135.

в9 Lee, Politics of Korean Nationalism, chap. 8, passim; cf. Frank Baldwin, "The March First Movement: Korean Challenge and Japanese Response" (Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, 1969), 105-107, for external reasons for the KPG's "predetermined failure."

-- Tongjihoe membership ranged from 150 to 400; monthly dues were $1.25. For a
full historical account, including organizational structure, operational rules and
regulations, and biographical notes, usually critical, on Rhee, see Kim, Chae-Mi
Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 198-209.

-- Translation from Lee, Politics of Korean Nationalism, 239.

-- Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 176-177.

568 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

In its early years, the Hungsadan concentrated on recruitment. An Ch'ang-ho made it a point to interview every student immigrant on arrival at San Francisco, with a view toward selecting the most impressive as candidates for Hungsadan membership. One such student recalled his 1916 meeting with An:

An came to visit me one day when I was picking oranges on a farm. He told me that, though each individual is free to pursue his studies and other activities, we Koreans should unite to do "anything" for our fallen mother country. If not, we would be like wandering Jews [without a country] .... I became a member, but first had to go through a rather intensive "question-and-answer" process of selection. I passed the examination and took an oath of allegiance at a ceremony conducted by An and previously selected student members.⁷³

When An went to Shanghai in 1919 to join the Korean Provisional Government he continued Hungsadan recruitment. One of his most illustrious recruits was Yi Kwang-su, now considered to be the father of modern Korean literature.⁷⁴ Of his encounter with An, Yi wrote:

An Ch'ang-ho impressed me very deeply. After hearing about the [Hungsadan's] principles ... I was convinced that the independence of our nation could not be attained through a [radical] movement, but only through cultivating the strength of the nation . . . through strengthening individuals and organizing them.⁷⁶

Thus began Yi Kwang-su's transformation from a student radical idealist to a gradualist committed to feasible intermediate goals in the Hungsadan style.⁷⁶ Actually, the Hungsadan never functioned as an active political organization. Most members were, in fact, members of the Korean National Association of North America.

The public dynamics of Korean immigrant politics are recorded in Korean community publications. More than thirty Korean language periodicals appeared in Hawaii and the continental United States between 1903 and 1924.⁷⁷ Most were conspicuously short-

73Ch'oe, Pingrsegye Ch'ilsimnyOn, 37.

74 Cf. Peter H. Lee, Korean Literature: Topics and Themes (Tucson, 1965), 102, 112.

76 Yi Kwang-su, Nae Kobaek [My Confessions] (Seoul, 1948), 188-139, as cited and translated in Lee, Politics of Korean Nationalism, 239-240.

те Ibid., 239.

77Taehan Min'guk Kukhoe Tosogwan [National Assembly Library, Republic of Korea], Han'guk Sinmun Chapchi Ch'ong Mongnok, 1883-1945 [Catalogue of Korean

The Korean Experience in America 569

lived, suggesting that many ambitious publishers were richer in good intentions than in financial resources. A large number of weeklies and monthlies lasted for less than a year; others survived for several years. Periodicals associated with political associations reflect the turbulent histories of such organizations: frequent reorganization, and title changes, widely fluctuating availability of funds, and abrupt shifts of editorial policy. Still, precisely this type of publication enjoyed the greatest longevity.

Three well-known periodicals served the Korean community for periods ranging from a decade to more than seventy years. The oldest Korean publication is the Sin-Han Minbo [New Korea], the organ of the Korean National Association of North America, currently published in Los Angeles as a weekly. The first issue appeared in San Francisco in 1905 as the Kongnip Sinmun [Korean News], a publication of An Ch'ang-ho's Kongnip Hyophoe. The Kongnip Sinmun was absorbed in 1910 by the THK's Sin-Han Minbo. The second oldest publication is the T'aep'yongyang Chubo [Korean Pacific Weekly], which was first published in 1913 as a monthly magazine in Honolulu under Syngman Rhee's editorship. Another publication worthy of notice was the Sin Han'guk po [United Korean News], published by the Hawaiian committee of the THK under Рак Yong-man's leadership between 1909 and 1913. Previously published as a daily beginning in 1907, it continued weekly publication under various titles and changing format until December 1968.⁷⁸

Nearly all of the Korean community publications were political. Both news content and editorial policy were designed to instill in the immigrant reader a sense of Korean nationalism. The most frequently reported topics and editorial themes centered on the Korean independence movement in Korea proper and overseas, the spirit of aeguk chongsin (patriotism), and the dream of kwangbok (restoration of Korean independence). In addition to the publications of various Korean student associations, there were several distinctive, special-purpose Korean language periodicals. The Tan-san Sibo [Korean Report], for example, was published in 1925

Periodicals, 1883-1945] (Seoul, 1966), 1S3-176. See also Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnydn Sa, 259-279, which contains a comprehensive list of overseas Korean publications, including monographs.

T8Cf. Gardner, Koreans in Hawaii, entries 47, 101, 178, 181, and 187-189.

570 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

by a Korean communist group in Honolulu;⁷⁹ while the Korean Socialist-Labor party organization in Los Angeles published Tongmu [Comrades] in 1921.⁸⁰ The overseas Korean periodicals that survived probably did so because the subsidizing political organizations required subscriptions as a condition of membership.

Korean political activists in both America and China were struck by the relevance to their situation of President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points speech of January 8, 1918. As is well known, article five of Wilson's address stressed the principle of self-determination, especially the more specific idea that colonial claims should be adjusted to reflect the interests of the colonized population, not just those of the colonial governments. Charles R. Crane, travelling as Wilson's unofficial emissary, arrived in Shanghai in late November and was regarded by local Koreans as a possible means of communication with the President. Encouraged by a preliminary individual encounter with Crane, the Korean Shanghai group hurriedly formed the Sin-Han Ch'ongny5n Tan (New Korea Youth Party) as an organizational base for their petition. The petition was delivered to one of Crane's entourage, and an additional copy was placed in the hands of Thomas Millard, the editor of the influential Millard's Review. Encouraged by these events, the leadership of the Sin-Han Ch'6ngy5n Tan (SHCT) summoned Kim Kyu-sik, American educated and fluent in English, from Tientsin to send him to the Paris Peace Conference. Difficulties in booking passage were overcome when Kim was allowed to travel in company with the Chinese delegation, which left Shanghai in late January 1919.⁸¹

The response of the Korean community in America was not well coordinated. Nontheless, it had important consequences. The New Korean Association, recently organized by the University of Nebraska student, Chong Han-gyong (Henry Chung), met in New York in late November 1918 to write a lengthy petition for American assistance in the achievement of Korean self-determination. The petition was circulated to President Wilson, the House and Senate foreign relations committees, and the U.S. delegation to the Paris Peace Conference. This appeal by Koreans in America was reported a fortnight later by the Japan Advertiser in Tokyo, where

Taehan Min'guk Kukhoe Tos5gwan, Han'guk Sinmun Chapchi Ch'ong Mong-
nok, 169.

-- Kim, Chae-Mi Hanin Osimnyon Sa, 262.

-- Baldwin, "The March 1st Movement," 39-44.

The Korean Experience in America 571

the newspaper was seen by a Korean student. As Frank Baldwin has argued, awareness that Koreans in America had taken positive action, coupled with news of the Shanghai group's plans to send Kim Kyu-sik to Paris, led directly to a flurry of demonstrations by Korean students in Tokyo, culminating in their proclamation of a Korean declaration of independence on February 8, 1919. This, in turn, stimulated the political consciousness of key sectors of Korean society, with the result that the March First Independence Movement was launched.⁸²

The immediate opportunity for the mobilization of mass demonstrations by Koreans for independence came with the death of the Korean emperor, Kojong, a death popularly attributed to the Japanese. The emperor's funeral was originally scheduled for March 1, but Korean nationalist leaders, working in close collaboration with Korean Presbyterian and Methodist clergy, moved with alacrity in organizing nationwide demonstrations centering on a mass meeting for independence in Seoul.

Meanwhile, there was a concerted effort on the part of An Ch'ang-ho's Korean National Association (the THK) to mobilize Koreans in America in an effective independence movement. By December 1918, the THK plan involved sending Ch5ng Han-gy5ng (Henry Chung) to Paris to present Korea's case; Syngman Rhee, head of the THK's Hawaiian branch, along with Min Ch'an-ho, would attend the League of Small Nations activities in New York; and Kim Hon-sik, who signed the New Korea Association's appeal the previous December, would direct Korean propaganda activity throughout the United States. The more exciting aspects of this program, as reported in Tokyo and Korea by the Japanese press services, served to inspire Koreans in Tokyo and Korea; the Shanghai group was equally well informed.⁸³

Responding to THK notification, Syngman Rhee arrived at the San Francisco THK headquarters in mid-January 1919. Rhee announced to a large gathering at a Korean church that he would cooperate with his old rival, An Ch'ang-ho; that the Honolulu branch of the THK approved of the THK central committee's plans; that he and the THK Honolulu branch would cooperate with the THK central committee; that he had brought $1,000 to

ibid., 45-46.

-- Ibid., 125 and 291n. There is no mention of these episodes in Oliver's partisan,
and often unreliable, Syngman Rhee.

572 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

cover his expenses for attendance at the Conference of Small Nations in New York; and that he wished the question of his representation at the Paris Peace Conference left open. When Rhee met with An in Los Angeles, they disagreed over fund raising for the independence movement; An argued that the THK had already raised $10,000 in the United States and that he should go to Hawaii to raise an equal amount and, failing that, Rhee should help redress the imbalance. Rhee refused on both counts.⁸⁴

In the meanwhile, So Chae-p'il (Philip Jaisohn), the George Washington University graduate now permanently settled in medical practice in Philadelphia, proposed that additional funds be raised from the Korean community to subsidize an English language magazine which would publicize the Korean effort at the Paris conference. It was agreed that such a magazine would provide a basis for cooperation among contending Korean groups in America.⁸⁵ This was the genesis of Korea Review, the first issue of which appeared in May 1919.

Rhee, however, went off on an increasingly independent path. Exploiting the apparent lack of political unity among Koreans in the United States, especially in the East, Rhee wrote to his followers in Hawaii, urging them not to cooperate with the THK. His subsequent request to the State Department for a travel permit was forwarded to Paris, where Secretary of State Robert Lansing rejected it with the prediction that the conference would not entertain Korean claims against Japan, largely because the Korean issue was not related to the resolution of the World War I conflict. The State Department publicly announced the substance of this decision, adding that the two Koreans (Rhee and Chong) who had applied for travel permits were Japanese subjects.⁸⁶

The efforts of Kim Kyu-sik, who had reached Paris in mid-March, were largely in vain. He did manage to engage the interest of a personal aide to Colonel Edward House, as well as Stanley Hornbeck, the chief of the Bureau of Far Eastern Affairs, but the Lansing position on the irrelevance of the Korean question had taken a firm hold among the senior American delegates. Acting on a request from Rhee, Kim tried without success to reopen the question of passport issuance to Korean delegates from the United

si Ibid., 127.

85 Ibid., 127-218; New York Times, March 9, 1919.

88 Baldwin, "The March 1st Movement," 128-129,170.

The Korean Experience in America 573

States.⁸⁷ By now it was clear that Korean independence movement leaders in the United States would have no opportunity for direct participation at the Paris conference. And by now, also, news of the March 1st independence demonstration in Korea--and their brutal suppression by the Japanese military and police--had reached Korean organizations in America. Rhee and Ch5ng abandoned their attempts to reach Paris and turned to collaboration with So Chae-p'il in the organization of a public meeting and other efforts to attract the attention and support of the American public.

The Korean independence movement's propaganda offensive in the United States began with a series of communications to President Wilson and Acting Secretary of State Frank Lyon Polk.⁸⁸The first of these was a letter of April 17, 1919, to Wilson from Earl К. Раек (Раек Il-gyu), acting president of the Korean National Association, which forwarded a translation of the March 1st Korean declaration of independence. Paek's covering letter stressed that "thousands of Koreans have been educated abroad in recent years . . . [and] these men are trained in the best thought of the western world."

In mid-June, Rhee addressed similar letters to Polk and Wilson, informing them that, on April 23, "Korea became a completely organized, self-governed democratic state." The new state had adopted a "Constitution or Manifesto," and, he added, he was honored by being elected as the president of the Republic of Korea. Rhee simultaneously announced the establishment of a Washington "headquarters" for the Republic of Korea. Though Rhee made no mention of Japan or the notion of self-determination, he referred to the Shufeldt Treaty of 1882 and the commitment of "protection" given by the United States and implied in article one.⁸⁹Polk ignored this entire flurry of correspondence. The cautious Polk, in fact, marked one of Rhee's letters with a bold "File, Do not acknowledge. FLP."

One of the most articulate political statements of the Korean community propaganda campaign to reach the State Department in this period was an undated, three-and-a-half page manifesto submitted by Young L. Park, representative of the United Asiatic So-

Rhee to Polk, Rhee to Wilson, April 23, 1919, U.S. Dept. of State Papers, Decimal
File, 1910-1929, Korea (Chosen), Internal Affairs, microcopy M-426, reel 2.

-- These letters are in ibid.

88 Rhee to Wilson, June 16, 1919, ibid.

574 PACIFIC HISTORICAL REVIEW

ciety of Detroit. Park's statement emphasized the notion of self-determination, presented a comprehensive historical review of the Japan-Korea relationship, and announced the convening of the "first Korean Congress on foreign soil" to be held at Liberty Hall, Philadelphia.⁹⁰

Rhee's agents in Washington persisted in forwarding his numerous and varied requests to Wilson and the State Department, none of which appears to have elicited a written response. Late in June, Rhee cabled Wilson to protest Japanese authority over Korea at the conference.⁹¹ On the same day, he sent a lengthy letter protesting Japanese oppression, asserting that the Korean emperor was poisoned by the Japanese, and arguing that the Japanese prohibition of Korean education abroad was a violation of article eleven of the Shufeldt Treaty. As something of an afterthought, Rhee appended a copy of his mid-June letter to the emperor of Japan which proposed that Japan and Korea enter a "new era of perpetual peace and good will."

By now, the THK leadership realized that there was little hope for an opportunity to participate actively in the postwar settlement, nor to establish effective KPG representation in Washington. S5 Chae-p'il's propaganda approach to the American public and the U.S. Congress was successful enough for him to continue the effort for several years. The Korean Commission, which had represented the KPG in Washington since late 1919, was supported by S5 Chae-p'il's Korean Information Bureau, whose resources included the influential Korea Review.⁹² Despite considerable discussion, congressional support for de facto recognition of the KPG died on the floor of the Senate and in the House Foreign Relations Committee.

Abandoning his attempt to gain a voice for Korea at the Paris Peace Conference, Rhee shifted to an effort to assume direct control over the KPG. The KPG was already weakening when he arrived at the organization's headquarters in Shanghai late in 1920. He failed to rally his provisional government and soon came under personal attack for, among other things, his handling of finances. As Chong-sik Lee has pointed out, Rhee's personality was simply not suited to the kind of compromise necessary to overcome the

Rhee to Wilson, June 14, 1919, ibid.

-- Rhee to Wilson, June 27, 1919, ibid.

-- Lee, Politics of Korean Nationalism, 142-146.

The Korean Experience in America 575

intense factionalism of the KPG's leadership, and the provisional government collapsed within three years.⁹³

Koreans in America made a last effort to present their aspirations when they appeared at the Washington Disarmament Conference, which convened on November 12, 1921, to discuss naval arms limitation and Pacific and Far East problems.⁹⁴ This move also failed.

Like the March First Movement in Korea, the Korean independence movement in America was initially inspired by Wilsonian idealism. Yet it was the residual realism of Wilson and his advisers that frustrated the movement. Confused by this inconsistency, the Korean political leadership in America sought to identify scapegoats within its own ranks. Factional conflict within the Korean community was intensified by the collapse of the KPG at Shanghai in 1923. As politically oriented as it was, the Korean community, and particularly the leadership of its community organizations, fell into disarray, and it was not until the eve of Pearl Harbor that the THK of North America was able to undertake the painful process of reunification.⁹⁵

The modestly successful effort to gain American congressional and popular support faded in the face of mounting pressures from interest groups promoting an Oriental exclusion policy. With the implementation of the Immigration Act of 1924, Korean immigration dwindled rapidly to an entry rate of twenty per year. The deepening of the Great Depression and simultaneous heightening of Japanese military activity in northeast Asia further reduced the Korean entry rate to a mere trickle. A net outflow of returnees over Korean immigrants was established as early as 1926, a trend which would not reverse itself until 1948.⁹⁶ The Korean immigrant community in America was no longer capable of substantial population expansion. Without the unifying force of the Korean independence movement, it devoted itself to economic growth, problems of cultural identity, and, particularly, education.

"3 Ibid., 152-154.

-- For the text oё the Korean Commission's statement to the conference, see Cong.
Rec, 66 Cong., 2 sess. (Dec. 14, 1921), 344-345. See Lee, Politics of Korean Nationalism,
171-173, for an extensive treatment of this episode.

-- Rhee eventually emerged as the principal beneficiary of reunification when he
was installed as president of the Republic of Korea.

-- "Asiatic Immigration to the United States by Race or People, 1899 to 1944";
miscellaneous undated records in the U.S. Dept. of Justice files, Immigration and Nat
uralization Service, Statistics Branch Offices, Washington, D.C.

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The Korean Experience in America, 1903-1924