Gentlemen’s Agreement

At the beginning of the 20th century, Japanese immigration to California grew drastically. This caused much anxiety among American settlers who felt farmland might go to Japanese immigrants instead of Americans.¹ The cascade of racial discrimination this anxiety produced eventually produced a policy of discrimination by the San Francisco Board of Education. This policy would separate Japanese children and American Children “to save white children from being affected by association with pupils of the Mongolian race.”² Such discriminatory polices drew the attention of the Japanese Empire, leading to anger among its population, and overtures from its diplomats to Theodore Roosevelt to encourage him to address the issue.

Not wanting to upset the Japanese Empire who had just won the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-1905, and with whom relations had historically been generally positive, Theodore Roosevelt sought to address the issue. Working with Secretary of State Elihu Root, Roosevelt developed what would come be known as the Gentlemen’s Agreement. Rather than a formal treaty dealing with Japanese Immigration, the Gentlemen’s Agreement was an informal arrangement between the United States and the Empire of Japan in which Japan would bar the availability of passports to laboring men, and in exchange the United States would repeal its discriminatory policies in San Francisco.³

Although the former side of the arrangement was followed, with the Japanese government only allowing access to passports for businessmen and men of high repute, or wives and children of those who had already moved to the United States, the American part of the bargain took some extra effort, as the matter of education was one that was left to the states. While Roosevelt and the federal government attempted to sway the Board of Education in San Francisco, it did not have the ability to unilaterally change the policies, which remained discriminatory.⁴

On February 8th, 1907, Roosevelt and Elihu Root met with the San Francisco Board of Education to come to a compromise. In exchange for the overage students being excluded from the deal, the San Francisco Board agreed to repeal its ban on Japanese Students.⁵ While this helped lessen the immediate tensions along the Pacific coast, much of the Anti-Japanese sentiment that existed in California would remain, sparking once again in WWII when President Franklin Roosevelt formed the Japanese internment camps. Additionally, the Gentlemen’s Agreement itself led to some unintended social consequences. While the number of Japanese immigrants was indeed reduced, the implementation of the family clause led women who wished to emigrate to sometimes send pictures of themselves to Japanese men in the United States in the hope of marrying so they could acquire a passport, leading to them being known as “Picture Brides.”⁶

Sources: 

1. Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Gentlemen’s Agreement”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 27 Sep. 2019, https://www.britannica.com/event/Gentlemens-Agreement. Accessed 5 November 2024. 
 
2. Imai, Imai. “Gentlemen’s Agreement.” Densho Encyclopedia. 18 Jan 2024, 16:06 PST. 6 Nov 2024, 11:30 <https://encyclopedia.densho.org/Gentlemen’s%20Agreement>. 

3. Britannica

4. Imai

5. Ibid.

6. Britannica

Entry contributed by Isaac Baker – Theodore Roosevelt Center Student Employee