CLEAN BREAK WITH TRADITION

In the summer of 1885, Lee Yick, a Chinese citizen operating a laundry in San Francisco, California, refused to pay a $10 fine the city had levied for doing business without a license. A municipal court sentenced the laundryman to jail; he served a day for each dollar of the fine. That skirmish not only went to the U.S. Supreme Court but established two important principles that continue to guide American jurisprudence.

Punning on his name, Lee Yick called his laundry, on Third Street between Harrison and Folsom, Yick Wo, which in Chinese means “harmony and tranquility.” When Sheriff Peter Hopkins arrested Lee Yick, he confused the business’s