Despite popular support for the bill, President Chester Arthur vetoed it. He claimed the twenty-year ban was too long, but it seems clear that he feared the Qing government might respond to such a law by shutting Chinese ports to American trade. In a speech no doubt intended to fortify diplomatic relations with China, Arthur praised the contributions of the Chinese émigré workers in building the transcontinental railroad as well as in developing industry and agriculture, and he argued the bill’s potentially adverse economic consequences. “Experience has shown that the trade of the East is the key to national wealth and influence,” he said. “It needs no argument to show that the policy which we now propose to adopt must have a direct tendency to repel oriental nations from us and to drive their trade and commerce into more friendly lands.” (Chang 131-132)