Editing Issei (section)

===Racial segregation and immigration law===
{{main|Anti-Japanese sentiment in the United States}}
The post-1900 cause to renew the [[Chinese Exclusion Act (United States)|Chinese Exclusion Act]] became generalized protests against all [[Asian people|Asian]] immigrants, including the Issei.<ref>Mercier, Laurie ''et al.'' [http://www.vancouver.wsu.edu/crbeha/ja/ja.htm "Historical overview,"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080513165141/http://www.vancouver.wsu.edu/crbeha/ja/ja.htm |date=13 May 2008 }} ''Japanese Americans in the Columbia River Basin,'' Washington State University web project.</ref> Since Chinese immigration to the U.S. was largely limited, hostility fell on the ''Issei.'' American labor organizations took an initiative in spreading [[anti-Japanese sentiment]]. [[White American]]s wanted to exclude them since they did not want any Asians to take their jobs away. As a result, they formed the [[Asiatic Exclusion League]] that viewed Japanese and Chinese as a threat of American workers. The protest of the league involved picketing and beatings of the Issei. In October 1906, amid this anti-Japanese milieu, the San Francisco School Board, carrying out a campaign promise of the mayor, ordered all Japanese and Korean pupils to join the Chinese students at a [[Racial segregation|segregated]] school.<ref name=densho>{{citation| last=Densho and The Board of Trustees of The Leland Stanford Junior University| title=Reading: The Issei immigrants and Civil Rights| url=http://www.densho.org/learning/spice/lesson2/2reading2.asp| access-date=25 April 2008| url-status=dead| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080417110939/http://www.densho.org/learning/spice/lesson2/2reading2.asp| archive-date=17 April 2008}}</ref> The ''Issei'' were displeased with the situation and some reported to Japanese newspapers. This caused the Japanese government to protest against the former president, [[Theodore Roosevelt]], and as a result, they signed the [[Gentlemen's Agreement of 1907]]. This agreement led the period of settling and family building to come.

By 1911, almost half of the Japanese immigrants were women who landed in the U.S. to reunite with their husbands. After the Gentleman's agreement, a number of ''Nisei'', the second-generation Japanese, were born in California. Yet, it did not stop some white Americans from segregating Japanese immigrants. The ''Issei'' were a role model of American citizens by being hardworking, law-abiding, devoted to family and the community. However, some Americans did not want to admit the virtues of the ''Issei.''

The [[Immigration Act of 1924]] represented the Issei's failed struggle against the segregation. The experiences of the Issei extend from well before the period before 1 July 1924, when the Japanese Exclusion Act came into effect.<ref>Kirmura, Yukiko. (1988). [http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED344810&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED344810  ''Issei: Japanese Immigrants in Hawaii,'' (abstract).]</ref>

The ''Issei,'' however, were very good at enhancing rice farming on "unusable" land. Japanese Californian farmers made rice a major crop of the state. The largest ''Issei'' community settled around [[Vacaville, California]], near San Francisco.