29 pages • 58 minutes read
Edith Maude EatonIn the Land of the Free
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1912A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Limits of Freedom
The title of “In the Land of the Free” references the American national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner,” in which the US flag waves “o’er the land of the free.” By drawing the reader’s attention to the national anthem, the story seems to signal that it will be an aspirational immigrant narrative, wherein the characters are welcomed to America with open arms. However, the narrative quickly indicates that freedom is not equally accessible to all and remains especially out of reach for nonwhite individuals, such as Hom Hing and his family.
When the customs officials explain that they will need to take custody of Little One, Hom Hing believes there must be some kind of misunderstanding, noting to the officers, “He is my son […] I am a Chinese merchant and have been in business in San Francisco for many years” (5). He repeats himself at the end of his explanation: “I had no fear of trouble. I was a Chinese merchant and my son was my son” (5). From Hom Hing’s perspective, his time spent in America building his fortune is enough to lay claim to his right to belong and sufficient to allow his son to call America his home as well. Hom Hing believes that his wealth is enough to make him American, but the rules are different for immigrants and nonwhite Americans; his claims to American identity and community ties are trumped easily by the customs officials’ assertion that they “have no proof” (4) that Little One is Hom Hing’s son. This encounter exposes that Hom Hing and his family cannot access the same level of freedom and liberty as they were led to believe.
The reader sees the same contradictory nature of freedom emerge in the story’s depiction of Hom Hing and Lae Choo’s living quarters in San Francisco’s Chinatown. While Chinatown is described as lively and friendly, it is nonetheless a segregated space, wherein Chinese families live and work separately from the dominant white culture. They are able to create homes and build livelihoods, but they remain removed from the rest of the city—both part of society and apart from it. Hom Hing and Lae Choo are consistently unable to be seen as Americans despite their years living in this community, demonstrated not only by their prolonged legal trouble but also by their lawyer continuing to see Hom Hing as a “Chinese merchant.”
While money is not universal enough to let Hom Hing and Lae Choo keep their child in the first place, they do eventually get Little One back because of their relatively elevated economic status. By alluding to the amount they have given up, Eaton uses subtext to introduce the idea of class as a limitation to freedom. Between Hom Hing’s cash and Lae Choo’s jewelry, they are able to pay enough legal fees to achieve a resolution. This calls to mind the people who might endure the same family separation who lack the resources to fight it, reinforcing that this is a form of structural racism and formalized discrimination. The story’s closing section emphasizes that wealth or individual solutions are not sufficient to correct these wrongs; though Lae Choo is reunited with Little One, he does not remember her or speak her language. Little One’s uncertain future ends the story on a fraught note, where the reader must question how free one can be in a country that alienates children from their parents and culture.
The Effects of Legal Racism on Families
Throughout “In the Land of the Free,” the protagonists are continually restricted and oppressed by the law. In adhering to laws surrounding immigration, citizenship, and kinship, Hom Hing and Lae Choo become victims of unsympathetic and racist legislation. Their situation is affected directly by the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act but also echoes other US policies that forcibly separated nonwhite children from their families, such as the practice of sending Indigenous children to residential schools to assimilate them into white American culture.
The customs officials justify their need to take Little One into custody, removing him from his rightful family, because he has no papers and is not listed in his parents’ immigration documents. One of the officers states, “I don’t like this part of the business” (4), highlighting that for him and so many other customs officials, separating families is merely part of the job he must fulfill. Later, after having removed Little One from his parents, the narrator describes a pitiful scene: “Little One protested lustily against the transfer; but his mother covered her face with her sleeve and his father led her silently away. Thus was the law of the land complied with” (5). By ending the paragraph and this section of the narrative with this matter-of-fact line, the reader can understand that all parties in question are doing the “right” thing in following the letter of the law. At the same time, if the law as it exists allows for families to be separated from one another, it prompts the reader to question the effects and intentions of a law so lacking in empathy, especially its effects on individuals that are already marginalized by their race, citizenship status, and lack of power.
In the same vein, Hom Hing and Lae Choo also face obstacles when trying to navigate the American legal system. They turn to the young white lawyer, James Clancy, to help them communicate with the government and fight for custody. However, it quickly becomes clear that Clancy is more interested in receiving payment for his services rather than actually helping the protagonists make sense of an unfair, often senseless system. After asking Hom Hing for additional funds to go intercede in Washington on their behalf, Clancy explains that “you can’t get fellows to hurry the Government for you without gold in your pocket” (8). Hom Hing is prepared to accept Clancy’s proposition, but upon hearing his request for $500, he replies, “I think I told to you the time I last paid you for writing letters for me and for seeing the Custom boss here that nearly all I had was gone!” (8). Thus, the reader learns that Hom Hing has been paying Clancy for some time now, but no progress has been made. Nonetheless, Clancy remains their only real option, a conduit between them and the powers that be in Washington. They are following the proper protocols and processes to be reunited with Little One, but it is clear that the processes themselves are inherently flawed. The system as it stands places those who are most marginalized and lack the greatest resources (in this case, nonwhite immigrants) at an immediate and unfair disadvantage.
While family separations may be temporary—Lae Choo reunites with Little One after 10 months—separating families can have long-lasting or even permanent consequences. In some cases, legislation separates families with the explicit goal of eradicating a child’s birth culture; for example, xenophobic customs officials often used the Chinese Exclusion Act to “impede the formation of Asian-American families” (Kunzru, Hari. “As American as Family Separation.” New York Review of Books, 1 Jul. 2021). This effect is seen with Little One’s rejection of his mother in the story’s final paragraph; he has a new name, he no longer remembers his parents, and he cannot communicate in his mother tongue. Little One’s future is uncertain—he is young enough that this damage might not be permanent—but the legal racism endured by Lae Choo and Hom Hing may create a permanent separation between them and their child.
The Experiences of Nonwhite Women and Mothers
Lae Choo is the first character that readers hear from in Eaton’s story, and she immediately emerges as a driving aspect of the narrative. In particular, her role as a mother illustrates a key theme of “In the Land of the Free” and one that was of special interest to Eaton: the experiences of Chinese women in America.
When the reader first meets Lae Choo, she is hopeful and proud. She demonstrates great pride in the fortune that her husband has made for his family, and she is eager to show Little One the land that will be his “home.” Despite her confidence, the reader can also see that her lack of knowledge and language fluency makes her almost powerless. At first, she does not fully understand that the customs officials intend to remove her son from her custody: “‘What is it? What is it?’ quavered Lae Choo, who knew a little English” (4). She then attempts to prevent the customs officials from taking Little One away—emphasizing her strong maternal instincts, a common sentimental genre theme—but Hom Hing assures her that all will turn out fine. Hom Hing sides with the customs agents and the rule of law, aligning him with rationality and masculinity against his wife’s feminine emotionality. The conflict between Lae Choo’s sense of justice and her obligations as a woman is clear: “‘You, too,’ reproached Lae Choo in a voice eloquent with pain. But accustomed to obedience, she yielded the boy to her husband, who in turn delivered him to the first officer” (5). The chain of events in this moment shows that Lae Choo is marginalized by several external forces, first by the patriarchal structures of her family and marriage and second by the flawed system that renders nonwhite immigrants nearly powerless in American society. Ironically, while Hom Hing embodies logical masculinity in this scene, Lae Choo is proven correct. With this, Eaton subverts her society’s emphasis on masculine superiority and asserts the value of feminine knowledge, particularly that of mothers.
Lae Choo does attempt to assert herself in the face of adversity, particularly in her confrontation with James Clancy. When Clancy tries to extract more money from Hom Hing, Lae Choo attacks him: “You not one hundred man good; you just common white man” (9). It is key in this moment that Lae Choo calls out Clancy’s whiteness and his gender, as she understands that his position as a white man affords him the power she lacks, as well as the ability to wield that power over her. That being said, Lae Choo also knows that Clancy may well be her only hope of being reunited with her son. Therefore, while recognizing that he is exploiting their position—and, in particular, her emotional vulnerability as a mother—she resigns herself to providing Clancy with the capital he needs to go on his mission to Washington. As with many marginalized subjects, Lae Choo is cognizant of the ways that she is multiply oppressed by the society around her while also realizing that she has no choice but to try to navigate her way through the systems of her oppression.
