In it, she dissects the details of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which, for more than 60 years, barred all Chinese immigrants except students, teachers, diplomats and merchants. That’s a story New York University history professor Heather Lee is cooking up in an upcoming book on Chinese restaurants. So then how did Chinese restaurants continue their steady growth to become one of the most ubiquitous restaurant styles in the country?

And this goal was achieved with passage of the Asian Exclusion act of 1924, clamping down on immigration of all people from Asia. Chin notes that the anti-Chinese movement succeeded in its bigger goal to expand immigration restrictions to Japanese, Filipinos and South Asians. The rationale? That “the Chinese of the city of Chicago are invading said neighborhood” and “if they are permitted to settle in said neighborhood it will materially affect and depreciate the value of the property.”īut just because much of the legislation stalled, it didn’t mean the larger movement was stopped. Still, in 1911, the City Council was able to pass the ordinance to refuse construction and remodeling permits to people of Chinese descent around 23rd and Wabash.

In Chicago’s case, most of these laws were eventually struck down by the City Hall lawyers who warned the aldermen they couldn’t single out individual types of restaurants for special rules. Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan communicated with the legislators that this didn’t make any sense and would make problems for us internationally.” But, in all of those cases, at the end of the day, cooler heads prevailed. “These laws passed legislatures in places like Pittsburg, Montana and Massachusetts. So how close did these laws come to 86-ing Chinese restaurants all together? It was accomplished only after they smoked and drank in the chop suey restaurants and permitted themselves to be hypnotized by the dreamy seductive music that is always on tap.” Vanity and a desire for showy clothes led to their downfall, it is declared. “More than 300 Chicago white girls have sacrificed themselves to the influence of chop suey joints during the last year, according to police statistics. This all came together to produce the kind of fear illustrated in this excerpt from a 1910 Tribune editorial. And in the middle of this, emerged a chop suey craze.” “They were places of racial mixing, freer from the regulation of a traditional society at a time of cultural change, when women were starting to vote and were headed toward national suffrage. “You could think of them as kind of underground rave or underground dance parties,” Chin says, reaching for a more modern analogy. Many offered music, kept late hours, attracted a Bohemian clientele and were connected to saloons or gambling houses. It should be noted that many (but certainly not all) of Chicago’s early Chinese restaurants sprang up in Chinatowns that abutted the city’s red light districts (first around Harrison Street and then Cermak Road). Daniel Harkin (one of the 1906 citizenship ordinance’s supporters) was informed that the proposed legislation would effectively bar Chinese from the restaurant trade, he responded the city “could get along without any chop suey places,” according to Tribune reports at the time.

A 1906 measure to restrict restaurant licenses to only those with American citizenship - something people from China were not allowed to obtain.

A 1906 rule requiring special licensing fees and additional taxes for chop suey restaurants.

while also banning any live music from the establishments.

A 1906 proposal to restrict men under 21 and women under 18 from entering chop suey joints after 10 p.m.

A 1911 ordinance to refuse construction permits to any “Chinamen” in the vicinity of Wabash Avenue and 23rd Street.

Sky chop suey on kedzie egg foo