Mamie Tape (top photo,middle) was a Chinese American born in San Francisco who in 1884, when she was eight years old, was denied entry to public school because of her ethnicity. The principal of Spring Valley School, Jennie Hurley, stood in the schoolhouse door way to bar Mamie’s entrance on the sole grounds that she was Chinese.
In a case that is still cited as precedent in racial quota lawsuits, the Tape parents sued the San Francisco Board of Education. They argued that the school board's decision was a violation of the California Political Code, which stated:
"Every school, unless otherwise provided by law, must be open for the admission of all children between six and twenty-one years of age residing in the district; and the board of trustees, or city board of education, have power to admit adults and children not residing in the district, whenever good reasons exist therefor. Trustees shall have the power to exclude children of filthy or vicious habits, or children suffering from contagious or infectious diseases."
On January 9, 1885, Superior Court Justice McGuire handed down the decision in favor of the Tapes. On appeal, the California Supreme Court upheld the decision.
He wrote that "To deny a child, born of Chinese parents in this state, entrance to the public schools would be a violation of the law of the state and the Constitution of the United States."
Tape v. Hurley, 66 Cal. 473 (1885) was a landmark court case in the California Supreme Court.
Yet even after the court found that the San Francisco Board of Education violated the fourteenth amendment in banning Mamie from the public school, the school still refused to admit her, stating that Mamie had not gotten her vaccinations in time.
Also, the San Francisco school board lobbied for a separate school system for Chinese and other "Mongolian" children. A bill passed through the California state legislature giving the board the authority to establish the Oriental Public School in San Francisco.
On April 16, 1885 Mary Tape wrote an impassioned letter to the Alta California newspaper, expressing her anger at this injustice:
“What right have you to bar my child out of the school because she is Chinese […] You have expended a lot of the Public money foolishly, all because of one poor little Child ….It seems no matter how a Chinese may live and dress…they are hated…I will let the world see sir What justice there is When it is governed by the Race of prejudice men!”
Mary Tape was an early Chinese American woman who took up an urgent and historic public cause. In the court and through the press, Mary Tape demanded the right to public education for her daughter and for the children of the Chinese community. Of course, Mary Tape is the heroine in this story.
More info about the Tape Family: http://berkeleyheritage.com/essays/tape_family.html
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