華裔移民的故事 從暗處來到聚光燈下

Frail and dignified at 88, the man leaned on his cane and smiled as the story of his immigration in 1936 flashed behind him on a museum wall. Like tens of thousands of others who managed to come to the United States from China during a 60-year period when the law singled them out for exclusion, the man, Tun Funn Hom, had entered as a “paper son,” with false identity papers that claimed his father was a native citizen.

這位男士現年88歲，看起來有些虛弱，但不失體面。他拄着手杖微笑着，身後的博物館牆面上正在播放他1936年移民來美國的故事。他名爲洪敦豐（Tun Funn Hom，音），當年是以“紙生仔”(paper son)的身份進入美國，拿的是聲稱其父是美國公民的假身份。在爲期60年的美國法律排華時期，有數以萬計的中國人都是通過這種方式從中國來到美國。

For years, it was a shameful family secret. But Mr. Hom, a New York laundry worker who helped build battleships in World War II and put three children through college, outlived the stigma of an earlier era’s immigration fraud.

多年來，這一直是個令人感到羞恥的家庭祕密。不過在紐約做洗衣工人的洪先生足夠長壽，已經擺脫了更早年間移民欺詐的恥辱烙印。他曾在“二戰”時期幫助建造戰艦，還供三個孩子讀完了大學。

A narrow legalization program let him reclaim his true name in the 1950s. His life story is now on permanent display at the Museum of Chinese in America, which reopened last week at 215 Centre Street. And it illuminates an almost forgotten chapter in American history, one that historians say has new relevance in the current crackdown on illegal immigration.

上世紀50年代，一項名額有限的新移民項目使他得以重新啓用自己的真名。他的人生故事現在成爲了美國華人博物館(Museum of Chinese in America)的永久展覽項目。該博物館於上週在曼哈頓中街215號重新開放。它展示了美國曆史上一段幾乎被遺忘的篇章。歷史學家表示，這段歷史與眼下針對非法移民的嚴厲打擊具有新的關聯性。

“When we think about illegal immigration, we think about Mexican immigrants, whereas in fact illegal immigration cuts across all immigrant groups,” said Erika Lee, the author of “At America’s Gate: Chinese Immigration During the Exclusion Era, 1882-1943.” The book traces how today’s national apparatus of immigration restriction was created and shaped by efforts to keep out Chinese workers and to counter the tactics they developed to overcome the barriers.

“說到非法移民，我們會想到墨西哥移民，而實際上非法移民涉及所有的移民羣體，”《在美國的大門前面：1882-1943排華時期的中國移民》(At America’s Gate: Chinese Immigration During the Exclusion Era, 1882-1943)一書的作者李漪蓮(Erika Lee)說。這本書追溯瞭如今限制移民的國家機構是如何因排斥中國工人和打擊他們想出來的克服障礙的策略而誕生，如何因之改變。

The current parallels are striking, said Professor Lee, who teaches history at the University of Minnesota. And though some descendants of paper sons do not make the connection, many others have become immigrant rights advocates in law, politics or museums like this one, which hopes to draw a national audience to its new Chinatown space, designed by Maya Lin.

在明尼蘇達大學教授歷史課的李教授說，目前的這種相似之處令人震驚。儘管若干“紙生仔”的後裔並不會做這樣的聯想，但他們當中也有很多人在法律界、政界或博物館領域成了移民權利的支持者；這家美國華人博物館由林瓔(Maya Lin)設計，希望能吸引全國參觀者來到這處位於華埠的新址。

“In the Chinese-American community, it has only been very recently that these types of histories have been made public,” Professor Lee said. “Even my own grandparents who came in as paper sons were very, very reluctant to talk about this.”

“在華裔美國人社區，這類的歷史近期纔開始面向公衆，”李教授說。“我的祖父母也是以‘紙生仔’的身份來到美國，就連他們也很不情願談起那段歷史。”

For Mr. Hom, who was a teenager when he arrived to work in his father’s laundry on Bleecker Street, the past is now a blur. “It was so long ago that I hardly remember,” he said, as his wife, Yoke Won Hom, 82, straightened the lapels of his suit for a photograph.

洪先生來到父親位於布利克街上的洗衣房工作時只有十幾歲，如今這段往事在他心中已經模糊。“時間太久了，我都不記得了，”說話時，他的妻子——82歲的洪玉媛（Yoke Won Hom，音）正幫他整理西裝的領子，準備拍照。

But when his memory was still sharp, his daughter Dorothy transcribed 48 pages of his taped recollections, which became the basis of a four-minute first-person narrative produced by the museum. It is one of 10 such autobiographical videos that form the museum’s core exhibit.

但在他記憶力依舊清晰的當年，他的女兒多蘿西(Dorothy)曾經把他的錄音回憶錄謄寫爲一份48頁的文件，美國華人博物館以此爲底本，製作了一份四分鐘的第一人稱敘述視頻。此次展覽的核心部分就是10份這樣的自傳視頻。

“To get into the U.S. under the laws back then, I had to pretend to be another person,” Mr. Hom wrote. His father had bought him immigration papers that included 32 pages of information he was to memorize in preparation for hours of interrogation at Ellis Island.

“當時，爲了合法進入美國，我得假裝成另外一個人，”洪先生寫道。他的父親給他買來了移民文件，其中包括32頁的信息，他必須花費幾個小時背下來，應付埃里斯島上的盤查。

Such cheat sheets were part of an elaborate, self-perpetuating cycle of enforcement and evasion, historians say. The authorities kept ratcheting up their scrutiny and requirements for documents, feeding a lucrative network of fraud and official corruption as immigrants tried to show they were either merchants or native-born citizens, groups exempt from the exclusion laws.

歷史學家們說，這樣的欺騙性文件是一個精心打造、長久存在的執法與犯法怪圈的一部分。當局持續加強對文件的仔細審查和要求；而移民又試圖表明他們是商人或本地出生的居民，不屬於排外法案的對象，從而滋生出利潤豐厚的造假與官員腐敗網絡。

Mr. Hom was allowed ashore as Hom Ngin Sing, a student and son of a native. In reality, his father had made it to the United States only about six years earlier, through a similar subterfuge, like an estimated 90 percent of Chinese immigrants of the period.

洪先生以“洪迎新”（Hom Ngin Sing，音）的身份入境，這個身份的主人是學生，一個本地居民的兒子。事實上，他的父親6年前才靠着類似的詭計來到美國，據估計，當時大約90%的中國移民都是這樣做的。

Like many poor families from Taishan, a region that sent many emigrants to California during the Gold Rush of 1849, the Homs had deep ties to the United States. Mr. Hom’s great-uncle, for example, died in the San Francisco earthquake of 1906.

與許多來自台山的貧困家庭一樣——在1849年的淘金潮期間，台山有很多人移民到了加利福尼亞——洪家在美國也有密切的親戚關係。比如說，洪先生的大伯就是在1906年舊金山地震中喪生的。

But unlike any other immigrant group, the Chinese were barred from naturalizing. That bar was part of the Chinese Exclusion Act, which was passed in 1882 after years of escalating anti-Chinese violence in the West spurred by recessions, labor strife and a culture of white supremacy.

但是和很多移民羣體不同，華人羣體被排除在入籍之外。受到經濟衰退、勞工糾紛與白人至上文化影響，美國西部的反華暴力事件幾年來持續上升，最終導致1882年通過的《排華法案》(Chinese Exclusion Act)，不得入籍也是其中的一部分。

The law was expanded in 1892 with a measure that required all Chinese to register with the government and subjected them to deportation unless they proved legal residency, which required the testimony of at least one white witness.

1892年，該法案又被延長生效年限，並要求所有華人在政府登記，除非他們能證明自己的合法居留身份（要求有至少一名白人證人的證詞），否則便有可能被驅逐出境。

In a comment that reflected the tone in Congress, one senator asserted that the government had the right “to set apart for them, as we have for the Indians, a territory or reservation, where they should not break out to contaminate our people.”

一位參議員斷言，政府有權利“就像我們對待印第安人那樣，把他們隔離在一個區域或一塊保留地之中，讓他們沒法出來毒害我們的人民。”這個說法頗能反映議會的態度。

Lawyers argued that the law was repugnant to “the very soul of the Constitution.” But it was upheld in a sweeping Supreme Court decision of 1893, Fong Yue Ting v. United States, which held that the government’s power to deport foreigners, whether here legally or not, was as “absolute and unqualified” as the power to exclude them. That finding reverberates today, said Daniel Kanstroom, a legal scholar and the author of “Deportation Nation.”

律師們稱，這項法律與“憲法精神”相矛盾。但是，1893年，它得到最高法院在馮越亭訴美國(Fong Yue Ting v. United States)案中做出的壓倒性判決的支持。那項判決認爲，與排斥他們的權力一樣，政府也具有“絕對的、不受限制的”驅逐外國人的權力——不管是否是合法居留。法律學者、《驅逐國度》(Deportation Nation)的作者丹尼爾·坎斯特盧姆(Daniel Kanstroom)稱，那一判決在今天依然有影響。

Long after exclusion laws were repealed by Congress in 1943, after China became a World War II ally, that vast power over noncitizens was deployed in raids against immigrants of various ethnic groups whose politics were considered suspect.

1943年，在中國成爲美國的“二戰”盟友之後，國會廢除了排華法律。但是在那之後很久，對非公民的巨大權力依然被用來對政治傾向可疑的各個種族移民進行突然搜查。

In the 1950s, Mr. Hom and his relatives, like many Chinese New Yorkers, suddenly faced the exposure of their false papers in just such an operation. The government was tipped off by an informer in Hong Kong as part of a cold war effort to stop illegal immigration.

在20世紀50年代，和紐約的很多華裔一樣，洪和親戚們的假身份在這樣一次搜查中突然曝光。政府從香港的一名告密者那裏獲得了消息——這是政府阻止非法移民的冷戰努力的一部分。

“We were very scared,” said Mrs. Hom, who worked at the family’s laundry, first in the Bronx, then in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. “Everybody was very worried on account maybe they all be sent back to China.”

“我們非常害怕，”洪夫人說。她在家族的洗衣店工作，開始是在布朗克斯，後來是在布魯克林的貝里奇。“大家非常擔心會被一起遣送回中國。”

But in a government “confession program,” Mr. Hom and some of his relatives admitted their illegal entry; because Mr. Hom had served in the military, he received citizenship papers within months.

不過，在政府的一個“認罪項目”中，洪和一些親戚承認自己非法入境。由於洪曾在軍中服役，所以幾個月後，他收到了公民身份文件。

As someone who never made it to high school, he now beams over his children’s professional successes and his six multiethnic grandchildren. His son, Tom, is a dentist in Manhattan; his daughter Mary is a physician in the Syracuse area, and Dorothy, an interior designer, works with her husband, Michael Strauss, a principal with Vanguard Construction, which recently completed DBGB Kitchen and Bar, Daniel Boulud’s latest restaurant.

作爲一個從未上過高中的人，洪現在很爲孩子們的事業成功和6名多種族孫輩感到欣慰。他的兒子湯姆(Tom)是曼哈頓的一名牙醫；女兒瑪麗(Mary)是錫拉丘茲地區的一名內科醫生；多蘿西是室內設計師，和丈夫邁克爾·斯特勞斯(Michael Strauss)一起在Vanguard Construction建築事務所工作，該公司前不久剛建好丹尼爾·布魯德(Daniel Boulud)的最新餐館DBGB Kitchen and Bar。

At a time when debates about immigration often include the claim that “my relatives came the legal way,” referring to a period when there were few restrictions on any immigrants except the Chinese, the Hom family has a different perspective.

曾經有一段時間，關於移民的辯論經常包括這樣的聲明，“我的親戚是通過合法途徑來的”。那段時期，政府對中國移民之外的其他移民幾乎沒有任何限制。洪一家人對此有不同觀點。

“One’s status being legal or illegal, it’s two seconds apart at any point,” Dorothy said. “For some, the process is more difficult than others.”

“一個人的身份究竟是合法還是不合法，是相當微妙的事情，”多蘿西說，“對有些人來說，這個過程要困難得多。”