Erika Lee argued that the American implementation of exclusion policies towards Chinese played a significant role in transforming the United States from a nation of immigrants to a `gatekeeping nation'. Her book is divided into four parts: Part one deals with the events leading up to the eventual Exclusion Act of 1882 by addressing the public paranoia of invading Chinese `hordes' as well as the attitudes of Immigration Officials towards Chinese; Part two discusses the restrictive nature of the exclusion policies that specifically targeted Chinese as well as how Chinese circumvented these oppressive laws with the aids of lawyers, judges, non-Chinese (that is, European) friends and various others; Part three examines the inefficiency of the exclusion policies as the policies failed to sufficiently curb amount of Chinese entering the United States but rather resulted in corrupt Immigration Officials as well as smugglers creating a `black market' for immigration and thus labelling Chinese as one of the first `illegal' immigrants in the process; Part four analyses the immediate consequences of the Exclusion Act of 1882 by explaining that the exclusion policies resulted in Chinese illegally entering the United States which caused Government Officials to raid Chinese residence and places of business at anytime as well as construing that the vigilant surveillance of Chinese by Government Officials, indeed the general public, created an ambience of fear for Chinese communities. Furthermore, Erika Lee's extensive use of both primary and secondary sources made this book especially compelling. Lee cited hundreds of primary and secondary sources which she integrated beautifully in her book.
Overall, I believe her argument to be just and well formulated. However, it is hard to believe that the Chinese alone caused the US to become a "gatekeeping" nation. American Nativism extended far beyond the Chinese during this time. At the time of the Exclusion Act of 1882, for example, Americans already had a distaste for the new stock immigrants coming into the US. The Immigration Restriction League, as a another example, sought virulently to exclude most (if not all) immigrants like the Italians, Slavs, and numerous others. Indeed, it could be argued that the Chinese were just the first victims of American Nativism and American treatment for Chinese merely reflected future treatments towards other immigrants groups. As a result, the Exclusion Act of 1882 was just the first set of Acts arising from a predetermined goal at ultimately excluding all immigrants. The Chinese were just the first set of victims.
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