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UNITED STATES The Asian Exclusion League was formed on May 14, 1905 in San Francisco , California , by 67 Labor Unions . Among those attending the first meeting were labor leaders (and European immigrants) Patrick Henry McCarthy and Olaf Tveitmoe of the Building Trades Council of San Francisco and Andrew Furuseth and Walter McCarthy of the Sailor's Union . Tveitmoe was named the first president of the organization. The group's stated aims were to spread anti-Asian propaganda and influence legislation restricting Asian immigration. Specifically targeted at first were Japanese, Chinese, and Koreans. The league was almost immediately successful in pressuring the San Francisco Board Of Education to segregate Asian school children. Indians were later targeted as were any other Asians. By 1908 , the Asiatic Exclusion League reported 231 organizations affiliated, 195 of them labor unions. CANADA A sister organization with the same name was formed in Vancouver , British Columbia , on September 7, 1907 (as reported in the ''Vancouver News-Advertiser''.) Their stated aim was "to keep Oriental immigrants out of British Columbia." On September 8th, serious riots erupted in Vancouver as the league members besieged Chinatown. Screaming racist slogans, a crowd of 9,000 marched into Chinatown, vandalizing and causing thousands of dollars worth of damage. On September 12, a mere five days after it was formed, the Vancouver organization disbanded. Both of these organizations were part of an overall atmosphere of racism against Asians which prevailed in Canada and the United States from the 1800s on, culminating in the imposition of a Head Tax on Asian immigrants to Canada, and the internment of Japanese Americans and Japanese Canadians during World War II . SEE ALSO EXTERNAL LINKS
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