Crowds cheered as Chinatown burned. Do the descendants of burned down Chinatown deserve reparations?

Onlookers gathered to watch San Jose's Chinatown burn because of arson.

OPINION

Here's a question for you legal experts: Should the Chinese Americans who were burned out of their Chinatown homes in the early part of this century receive reparations?

Could the case of Willa and Charles Bruce, a black couple who owned beachside property in upscale Manhattan Beach, set a precedent for Chinese American reparations?

In 1912, the Bruces bought an oceanside plot in Southern California before Manhattan Beach became a city.

They bought the property and turned it into a resort catering to Blacks, who wanted to swim and enjoy other beach recreation without tension that comes with any racist harassment.

The Bruces success encouraged other Blacks to buy nearby property. By 1924, Manhattan Beach became a city and residents started to complain about the growing Black presence.

They city responded by using eminent domain to seize the property of the Black residents. The Bruces parcel eventually became a city park.

Last year, in the spirit of righting the wrongs of the past, Los Angeles County voted to give the park back to the Bruces.

In the late 19th century and the early part of the last century, in the wake of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, several Chinatowns in the West and Hawaii burned down, some under "mysterious" circumstances. Some were burned down under the guise of "health reasons." to prevent the spread of cholera or leprosy or some other disease. Some of the Chinatowns occupied what is now prime real estate.

Honolulu, New York City, Denver, Philadelphia, Reno, and the California cities of Santa Ana, San Jose, Pacific Grove, Antioch, Los Angeles and San Francisco, among others, issued formal apologies. Some put up historic plaques saying a particular neighborhood was the site of what used to be a Chinatown.

It was not uncommon for the Chinatown conflagrations to attract a crowd of cheering white residents.

On May 25, 1906, over 1,000 Santa Ana residents looked on and cheered as firefighters torched each building; a resident decades later said the event "was like a big picnic, or a Fourth of July." Nearby, Chinatown residents looked on, imprisoned in a pen ringed with barbed wire.

Honolulu's Chinatown fire lasted 17 days in 1900.

The Honolulu Chinatown inferno of 1900, that was supposed to be a controlled burn to cleanse the neighborhood of bubonic plague, went out of control as the wind-driven blaze spread. It  would burn for 17 days, scorching 38 acres and 4,000 homes.

Apologies and plaques are all well and good, but nobody, thus far has made an attempt to right the wrongs of the past by compensating the Asian residents who were burned out of their Chinatown homes and businesses, losing their sparse belongings and family treasures brought from their homelands.

There is precedence. Japanese Americans who were unjustly incarcerated during World War II, were successful in receiving $20,000 compensation each from the federal government. In 1992, the US government awarded more than $1.6 billion in reparations to 82,219 Japanese Americans who had been incarcerated.

The state of California recently formed a Reparations Task Force to study how the state could compensate the descendants of former slaves who faced generations of racist institutional barriers in achieving the American Dream and denied the chance to build the generational wealth enjoyed by white families.

Not surprisingly, Japanese American advocates, who fought for decades for incarcerees' compensation, are among the strongest supporters for reparations for descendants of former slaves. Black lawmakers in Congress such as former Rep. Ron Dellums and Mervyn DYmally, were among the most outspoken supporters for Japanese American reparations.

As for the Bruce family, their descendants decided to sell their valuable beachfront back to L.A. County for $20 million, opening opportunities' doors for family members of  generations to come.

Will the descendants of the homeowners and business owners of burnt down Chinatowns be given similar opportunities?

Reparations for former Chinatown residents who lost everything when their homes were burned down and who had to live with the racist covenants designed to keep them "in their place" is just now being raised. Most likely, the answer to that question of reparations for this class of people is most likely still decades away. But the long  discussion begins by  asking the question.

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