forced to pay more taxes and license fees than any other group in california while also not being permitteded to vote or use many government services sustained by their taxes. they could not testify against whites, or work for a public corporation, and their children were the only group to be denied a state-funded education. and matters would only grow worse when the chinese actually found themselves peoplenized all t demonized all the more, a crucial swing state during president's elections. adopting anti-chinese platforms to court california. in washington, officials found it convenient to blame the nation's ills on the chinese rather than to have the public scrutinize their own corruption and their own acceptance of bribes and their collusion with big industry which was rampant at the time. and so in 1882, congress passed the chinese exclusion act which would shut the gates of immigration to chinese labor for the next 60 years. other laws passed over the next few decades would lock the chinese out of the country when they were visiting china, even if they had property and families in the u