White Employees and Employers of B.C.

Many employees found the limited Asian immigration as a threat to their livelihood due to the fact that these immigrants would work longer and harder for lower wages. Employers wanted an increase in Asian immigration due to the greater efficiency of business and the idealology of profiteering could be carried out.

Asiatic Exclusion League

In reaction to the growing Chinese population, the Asian Exclusion League, first formed in San Francisco, established a branch in Vancouver on August 5, 1907. Its membership was comprised of Americans living in the city, members of the Knights of Labour, unemployed labourers, and prominent business, religious, and military leaders.

Speakers of the Riot

On September 7, 1907, the Asiatic Exclusion League held a parade and public meeting at City Hall to protest Japanese immigration. Speakers to the crowd, estimated to be 8 000 to 30 000, included Rev. G.H. Wilson, an Anglican clergyman whose son became the chief anti-Japanese agitator during World War II in Vancouver and A.E. Fowler, secretary of the Asiatic Exclusion League of Seattle. Fowler told the crowd of how a group of 500 white men attacked the Sikhs and Hindus by dragging them from their beds and driving them out of the city of Bellingham on September 5. He hinted that Vancouver could do the same.

Prime Minister Laurier and the Government

The Vancouver Trades and Labour Council established the Asiatic Exclusion League as a separate entity and invited the local members of Parliament and legislature and "all persons, whether members of labour unions or not, who believe[d] in keeping Canada a white man's country" to its founding meetings. The constitution was deliberately drafted so that all advocates of "a white man's country" would be comfortable in organization, no matter what their political views. Demonstrating the associations moved and seconded many resolutions. Although two Conservative member of legislature, Bowser and Francis Carter-Cotton, sent regrets, former speaker, R.G. Macpherson, the Liberal MP, stressed the need to inspire sympathy in Templeman, the Minister of Inland Revenue and MP for Victoria, later accused him of helping to "incite the mob."
Those present at the meeting called for an early prohibition of Asian immigration. "The question of today," the resolution explained, " is easy of solution. In time when these men are not only laborers but merchants and manufacturers with large material interests in the country their ingress can only be prevented to the expense of the peaceful relations now existing between this country and Japan." The resolution, designed to get support from all economic classes, reflected the broadening of Japanese competition to many fields of endeavour, and as the World commented, it demonstrated "unity of the economic interest of the white settlers on the Pacific coast."