The 'Two Per Cent' Shylock of Tacoma
As Tacoma voters head to the polls, bitter memories of the 1885 anti-Chinese expulsion flare up, branding a mayoral candidate with a nickname that still stings.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Some folks imagine they can tell which way the wind blows by keeping tab on the bookmakers. Bets of the usual assorted sizes are being made on the result of Tacoma's city election. Among the candidates is Parker, who was a well-known character in pioneer days. Parker used to sit around stores whittling and curbing the people who were trying to drive the Chinese out of Tacoma. W. B. Coiner, who presided at the first anti-Chinese meeting, recalled: 'Parker was very bitter toward the men who wanted to drive the Celestials out of town.' Parker gained the cognomen of 'Two Per Cent' Parker, not because he was the only one who lent money at 2 per cent, but because he was an ideal, grasping Shylock—one who believed that he owned the man because the man owed him money. Chinamen, cues, and joss sticks are as a red rag in the eyes of Tacoma voters—that is, the great bulk of them. Those who do not snort and paw the earth at the sight of this rag believed and still believe Mayor Weisbach should have been jailed for leading the people to drive the Chinese out of town.
“Parker gained the cognomen of 'Two Per Cent' Parker... because he was an ideal, grasping Shylock—one who believed that he owned the man because the man owed him money.”
This 1892 report captures the toxic legacy of Tacoma’s 1885 expulsion of its Chinese community, where racial grievance and predatory lending became tools for political character assassination. Today, the city reflects on this history through memorials like the Chinese Reconciliation Park, contrasting with the era's brutal rhetoric which equated economic status with moral character.
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