2.5 The Alien Poll Tax

In 1852, Congress passed a new foreign miner’s tax. This required that every month, a foreign miner had to pay four dollars. While the tax was called the foreign miner’s tax, it was more specifically targeted at the new waves of Chinese immigrants. There were other foreign miners, such as the Irish, but the Chinese composed the largest minority group to be mining, particularly in California where the Gold Rush was happening. While this was a result of anti-Chinese racism, it also resulted in large mining companies wanting to keep the Chinese in the United States because they would then profit off of the taxes. This sentiment would not last long though and was not held by most of the general public.