It is May 6, 1882. The U.S.'s first Transcontinental Railroad has been in place for almost 13 years to the day. The 19th century gold rush, which saw San Francisco's population boom, is kind of gone. The economy is in the shitter, and politicians are railing against yellow people as being the source of this malaise, since they'll work themselves to death. (Union what?) The Statue of Liberty, meant as a centennial gift but delivered 10 years late, is still being financed.

With the U.S.'s no longer needing cheap labor to risk life, limb and bucket blowing holes in mountains, the Burlingame Treaty, a piece of goodwill legislation enacted in 1868 with China, is essentially tossed aside. (Apparently Chinese ambassadors didn't ask the pre-Euro invasion inhabitants of this land about our history of honoring treaties.) Initially this is done by suspending Chinese immigration — but assuring the Chinese people in America, however long they have been here, that their rights will be recognized.

On May 6, 1882, the U.S. drops any pretense of honor, passes the Chinese Exclusion Act, and screws the Chinese in America until 1965.

As the immigration issue becomes the wedge issue for the 2006 election cycle, legality is the issue people from both sides of the aisle hide behind in defending any type of divisive policy. Though forgotten, the United States has gone through a number of cycles declaring one group or another "illegal" in terms of immigration. But they've only gone so far as to outright ban the immigration of one group through the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.