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Twelve Hundred More 
Twelve Hundred More 
O workingmen dear, and did you hear The news that's goin' round? Another China steamer Has been landed here in town. Today I read the papers, And it grieved my heart full sore To see upon the title page, O, just "Twelve Hundred More!" 
O, California's coming down, As you can plainly see. They are hiring all the Chinamen And discharging you and me; But strife will be in every town Throughout the Pacific shore, And the cry of old and young shall be, "O, damn, `Twelve Hundred More' " They run their steamer in at night Upon our lovely bay; If 'twas a free and honest trade, They'd land it in the day. They come here by the hundreds The country is overrun And go to work at any price-By them the labor's done. 
If you meet a workman in the street And look into his face, You'll see the signs of sorrow there Oh, damn this long-tailed race! And men today are languishing Upon a prison floor, Because they've been supplanted by This vile "Twelve Hundred More!" 
Twelve hundred honest laboring men Thrown out of work today By the landing of these Chinamen In San Francisco Bay. Twelve hundred pure and virtuous girls In the papers I have read, 
Must barter away their virtue To get a crust of bread. 
This state of things can never last In, this our golden land, For soon you'll hear the avenging cry, "Drive out the China man!" And then we'll have the stirring times We had in days of yore, And the devil take those dirty words They call "Twelve Hundred More!" 
From American Labor Songs of the Nineteenth Century, Foner Note: In 1877-1878, Dennis Kearney's Working Men's Party achieved some political success in California by attacking, not the other political parties or the bosses, but the Chinese who were imported as a source of cheap labor. The party splintered and broke up shortly after, but left a legacy of exclusionary legislation aimed at the Chinese in California. 
tune: Wearing of the Green