While the political cartoons seem to portray the United States as bringing ideals of democracy and freedom to the Philippines, Filipinos living in the United States are looked at warily for conforming to the American society. The spread of American ideals was a good thing when it was being spread to “uncivilized” territories such as the Philippines because they were outside of the U.S. and thus not a threat to American society. Filipinos assimilating to American ideals and society in the US, taking on their style of dress and material goods, were treated with disdain and villainized.

 

Judge Rohrback highlights this exact paradox in Evening Pajaronian, 

“Fifteen Filipinos will live in a room or two, sleeping on the floor and contenting themselves with squatting on the floors and eating fish and rice. The same group will form a club and buy a partnership in a classy automobile and, attired like Solomon in all his glory, will roll along the highways.”

Fears of Filipinos permanently settling in the United States was spread throughout the country and this assimilation did nothing to assuage those fears.

Due to the influx of Filipinos to the United States in the 1920s and 1930s, racialized rhetoric and stereotypes began circulating, especially in California. Many white men did not want white women and Filipino men inter-mingling which led to legislation being passed in an attempt to bar them from  interacting, marrying and settling. Anti-miscegenation laws were passed in certain states like California, prohibiting Filipinos from marrying white women and relationships between white women and Filipino men were often sensationalized by media outlets, including Evening Pajaronian. In the lead up to the riots, white men were especially concerned about Filipinos attending “taxi-dance halls” that employed white women.  By paying a fee, Filipinos could dance with one of the women employed at these dance halls. In the media and across the state, these dance halls were portrayed as degenerate spaces filled with crime, where white women were coerced into dancing with Filipino patrons. The Palm Beach Dance Hall in Watsonville was not exempt from the popular rhetoric around dance halls.

Considering how dance halls were described as degenerate spaces, the Palm Beach Dance Hall was a perfect target for the rioters to enact violence against Filipinos. On January 21, 1930, a large mob approached the dance hall with lit torches and weapons. Evening Pajaronian justifies the mob’s motives were due to allegations that “Filipinos had been keeping several white girls in seclusion on the premises of a Filipino pleasure club, located outside the city.” By alleging Filipinos had been holding white girls captive at the dance hall, Evening Pajaronian helped in cultivating the narrative that Filipinos were a threat to the anti-miscegenation policies and to segregated social order.

Published on January 21, 1930 in Evening Pajaronian, this article reports on different occasions where mobs targeted and attacked Filipinos. [click here to view pdf version]

 

Originally, Evening Pajaronian coverage practiced rather neutral portrayals of the white rioters. However, after the murder of Fermin Tober, the paper explicitly condemns the acts of rioters, calling them “wild” and denouncing the actions of the mob. But unlike portrayals of Filipinos,  Evening Pajaronian portrays them as young white boys who are in a rebellious phase, looking to have some fun and create a little chaos. However, prior to the murder of Tobera, the paper characterizes these rioters as “adventurous,” “flaming youths.” The violence perpetrated against Filipinos was characterized as a “Roman Holiday,” acknowledging how the rioters celebrated the violence perpetrated against Filipinos, but the paper fails to highlight the systemic issues that led to the riots in the first place, pushing the narrative of the rebellious teen rioter. Fears and mythos around the dance hall were perpetrated in the paper, implicitly justifying mob violence against Filipinos. By downplaying the actions of rioters, along with characterizing them as younger white men looking to create chaos, the paper lessened the severity of the crimes committed by the rioters.

Published on February 8 in Evening Pajaronian, this is a report concerning the eight boys who were arrested and charged for the murder of Fermin Tobera. [click here to view pdf version]

 

On February 8, 1930, the newspaper reported on the trial of eight boys responsible for the murder of Tobera. A Charles Morrison was called as a witness and stated that the eight boys on trial were at Storm ranch “for the purpose of rescuing the Filipinos from the attacks of gangs who were visiting isolated farm houses where Filipinos were employed and beating them.” Morrison believed that the white boys who were there during the crime were not attacking Filipinos but rather rescuing them from potential attacks. This was an interpretation of the events that occurred, but it was also indicative of the sentiments that white people held around violence enacted by white mobs. This interpretation allowed the white boys being charged for the murder of Tobera to be seen as aids or even brothers to the Filipinos, looking out for them in times of fear. This is not the only time the paper alludes to white people being neighborly to Filipinos.

The paper writes,

“That dreaded cry ‘The whites are coming’ seems to have lost its terror with the Filipinos. They mingled freely with the Americans, both in and out of the crowded court room. All thoughts of riot and terror had fled and together with the white brethren, the little brown men watched with morbid interest, the proceedings of the court.”

The paper calls into question the fear perpetrated by the mob and its effects on the Filipino community by calling into question how Filipinos could fear whites but show up beside them in the courtroom.  By referring to the white people in the room as “brethren” to the Filipinos, it implies that white people were not to be feared, rather they were neighbors or friends of the Filipinos, while also demeaning them highlighting their unequal standing by referring to them as “little brown men.” This characterization helps to lessen the burden of guilt from mob violence and perpetrate that white people were in fact aids to the Filipinos.

Different renditions of the narrative of the guiltless white man were portrayed in the paper. Evening Pajaronian had a public forum where community members could input their own opinions around the news being reported. In one of these public forums titled, “The Filipino Problem,” a white farm owner blames the cause of the riots on a communist plot writing,

“Were those misguided rioters aware that, back of all this trouble were communist agitators, who were using these rioters as mere catspaws to obtain their ends?”

Here the burden of guilt is once again taken off the rioters and instead placed onto theoretical communist agitators.. Rioters were “misguided,” swindled into believing they were fighting against a different enemy. The identity of the communists is left unknown, yet they are characterized as cunning tricksters while rioters were unassuming victims to their plot.. The rhetoric around white people in the riots serves to lessen the amount of guilt around their crimes as much as possible, and this is done through framing them as the gullible victims.

 

Next section >>> Police Portrayal in the 1930 race riots