VICTORIA, B.C., August 11th, 1884.

SIR, I have the honor of sending as follows copies of three Resolutions which were unanimously passed at a public meeting held in the City Hall on Saturday evening, the 9th instant, Councillor Gowan in the chair, present a full house; also our Dominion representatives, Messrs. Shakespeare and Baker; the President of the Council, Hon. Mr. Drake; the leader of the Opposition, Mr. Beaven; the other members of Parliament for this city, and prominent citizens. For further details I would respectfully refer you to the Victoria Daily Standard of this date, also to the Colonist of yesterday's date.

First Resolution" Whereas the Provincial Government and the representatives of the Province in the Parliament of Canada and Provincial Legislative Assembly have for many years past petitioned the Dominion Government to pass a statute restricting the immigration of Chinese into the Province, and have supplied the Government of Canada with abundant information upon the subject: This meeting is of the opinion that the appointment by the Dominion Government at this stage of the question of Commissioners to enquire into the subject, instead of legislating as requested, is uncalled for and superfluous, and is equivalent to doubting the correctness of the information supplied through our constitutional representatives."

Second Resolution "That, in view of the apathy evinced by the Dominion Government to our repeated entreaties for the restriction of the Chinese immigration, which is thwarting our prosperity and threatening our very existence, we deem it necessary to reiterate our demands for the enactment of restrictive measures at the next meeting of Parliament."

Third Resolution- "Resolved that the Secretary of this meeting be requested to forward copies of the Resolutions just passed to the Government at Ottawa; also to the Hon. Mr. Chapleau and Hon. Mr. Justice Gray, the Commissioners on the Chinese question." I have the honor to be, sir, Your obedient servant,

The Honorable J. A. CHAPLEAU,

F. L. TUCKFIELD,
Hon. Secretary.

Commissioner on the Chinese question.

Copy of letters sent to Noah Shakespeare, Esq., M.P., Robert Dunsmuir, Esq., and Robert Beaven, Esq. :

VICTORIA, B.C., August 12th, 1884.

SIR, I am instructed by the Commission appointed to enquire into the "Chinese question," now sitting in Victoria, to ask if you have any facts, or information, which will be of use to the Commission, and if so, to lay the same before them.

I have the honor to be, sir,

Your obedient servant,

NICHOLAS FLOOD DAVIN,

Secretary, Chinese Commission.

VICTORIA, B.C., August 13th, 1884.

Hon. J. A. CHAPLEAU.

DEAR SIR,--Your reply to my communication of this date duly received, and I beg to state that Mr. Booth and myself will be delighted to have an interview with you tomorrow morning at the Driard, between nine and ten.

I remain, your obedient servant,

NOAH SHAKESPEARE.

VICTORIA, B.C., August 20th, 1884.

SIR, I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated August 12th. In reply thereto would most respectfully state that, from a careful investigation of this matter in all its bearings, I can add nothing further in relation to the Chinese question than the statements I have already made, and which are already on record in the "Debates" of the House of Commons.

I have the honor to be, sir,

Your obedient servant,

NOAH SHAKESPEARE.

TO NICHOLAS FLOOD DAVIN, Esq.,
Secretary, Chinese Commission.

(Telegram.)

VICTORIA, B.C., November 2nd, 1884.

To N. FLOOD DAVIN, Esq.,

The Board of Trade by Resolution declined to give evidence, and I felt as if I gave personal views they might be liable to be construed as an expression from the Board to some extent, hence I decided not to give them.

R. P. RITHEL,

President.

WASHINGTON, November 7th, 1884.

SIR, I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 27th ultimo, and in reply thereto to enclose herewith copy of a note which I have received from the Secretary of State informing me that his department is unable to furnish you with more than one copy of the Senate Report on Chinese Immigration, which is herewith transmitted.

SIR, In reply to your note of the 31st ultimo, requesting to be furnished with 100 copies of the Report of the Joint Special Committee to Investigate Chinese Immigration, I regret to inform you that the Department is unable to comply with your request as the number of copies on hand do not exceed six or seven, one of which is herewith enclosed

The Honorable L. S. WEST, etc.

Accept, etc.,

FRED. T. FRELINGHUYSEN.

APPENDIX P.

On the night of Saturday, 9th of August, 1884, accompanied by the Chief of Police Superintendent Bloomfield, a visit was made to Chinatown, Victoria, B.C. Chinatown had

already been visited in the day time, and it was remarked what fine brick houses the Chinese had in Victoria, and how much superior they and their surroundings appeared to the Chinese and Chinatown in San Francisco.

The opium dens were visited, under the guidance of the Chief of Police, and turned out to be the exact counterpart of what was seen in San Francisco, only, of course, they are not nearly so numerous. We found, to us, one novel feature. We had abundant evidence that in San Francisco whites smoked opium; but we saw none. In Victoria, however, we found dens where one or two whites were huddled in with Chinese indulging in this powerful narcotic. In one, a young woman, well dressed and full of intelligence, lay fixing her pipe with a practised hand and inhaling the smoke. After much persuasion on our part and on that of the Chief of Police she consented to answer questions, and such information as she had to give will be found in the Minutes of Evidence.

APPENDIX Q.

The following is a report of a decision rendered by the Honorable George Ogden Hoffman, of the United States District Court.

IN THE MATTER OF

TUNG YEONG

ON HABEAS CORPUS.

The very great number of cases in which writs of habeas corpus have been issued out of this Court by Chinese persons claiming to be illegally restrained of their liberty, and which were of necessity summarily investigated and disposed of, has rendered it impossible for the Court to deliver a written opinion in each case. The evidence in the various cases, and the rulings of the Court have been very imperfectly reported by the press, and the latter though much criticised, have not, it is believed, been thoroughly understood. It is deemed proper to set forth in an opinion, as succinctly as may be, the general nature of these cases, of the evidence upon which the decision of the Court has been based, and its rulings upon the more important of the questions which have been presented for its determination.

The applications for discharge from a restraint claimed to be illegal, may be divided into three classes:

First-Applications on the ground of previous residence.

By the second article of the Treaty it is provided that "Chinese laborers now in the United States shall be allowed to go and come of their own free will and accord, and shall be accorded all the rights, privileges, immunities and exemptions which are accorded to the citizens and subjects of the most favored nations." (22d U. S. Stat., p. 827.)

By the third section of the law known as the Restriction Act, the same privilege indirectly extended to laborers "who shall have come into the United States before the expiration of ninety days next after the passage of this Act.

The date of this Treaty is November 17, 1880.

The date of the passage of the law is May 6, 1882.

During this interval large numbers of Chinese laborers who were protected by the Treaty have left the country, of course, unprovided with Custom House certificates, for there was no law then existing which required them to obtain them or authorized the Custom House authorities to furnish them.

The language of the law is ambiguous and perhaps admits the construction that the laborers who left this country during the interval I have mentioned should be required to produce the Custom House certificate provided for in the Act. It was not doubted by the Court that if the Treaty and the law were irreconcilably conflicting the duty of the Court was to obey the requirements of the law, but it was considered that no construction should be given to the law which would violate the provisions of the Treaty,

if such construction could be avoided. It was, therefore, held that a Chinese laborer who was here at the date of the Treaty, and who left the country before the law went into operation, might be admitted without producing a Custom House certificate, which it was impossible for him to obtain, and that it was inadmissible, if not indecent, to impute to Congress when legislating to carry into effect our Treaty with China, the intention to deprive laborers, whose right to come and go of their own free will and accord was explicitly recognized and secured by the Treaty, of that right by exacting as a condition of its exercise the production of a certificate which it was out of their power to obtain. (In re Chin A. On, 18 Fed. Rep., p. No. 8, p. 506.) It was also held that Chinese who were not in the country at the date of the Treaty were not embraced within the provisions of the second article, and also that a Chinese laborer, who, although in the country at the date of the Treaty, had left after the law went into practical operation, and who neglected to procure a certificate, was not entitled to return. As to the soundness of this last ruling, doubts may be entertained. It is understood that the question will shortly be submitted to the Circuit Court.

If there be error in these rulings it is assuredly not in favor of the Chinese. The right of laborers who can prove they were in the couutry at the date of the Treaty, and had left before the law went into effect, to be allowed to land without the production of a Custom House certificate, being thus recognized, the Court held that the burden of proof was on them, and that satisfactory evidence of the facts would be rigorously exacted. In some cases this evidence was such as to establish the facts beyond all reasonable donbt: as, for instance, the former residence and departure of the petitioner was in one case proved by the testimony of the reverend gentleman at the head of the Chinese Mission in this city; who swore not only to his personal recollection of the fact, but produced a record of the proceedings of the sessions of his church, in which the departure of the petitioner and his resignation of the office of deacon, which he held, and the appointment of his successor is recorded. These records, he testified, were in his own handwriting and were made at the date which they bore. In another case, a young lady connected with the mission, proved the departure of the petitioner (who was a convert and her pupil), not merely by her own testimony as to the fact, but by the production of a religious book which she gave him at the time of his departure, on the fly-leaf of which were inscribed in her own handwriting, and signed by herself, some expressions of regard, together with some texts of Scripture. This book, she testified, was handed to him on board the vessel at the date of the inscription on the fly-leaf, with the injunction to keep it and bring it back on his return. The book was accordingly returned and produced in Court. On proofs such as these no rational doubt could be entertained, and the petitioners were discharged.

But in the large majority of cases proofs hardly less satisfactory were exacted and furnished. The Chinese on returning to their country almost invariably procure permits from the companies of which they are members, and which are furnished them on payment of their dues. The departure of the members and the payment of their dues are recorded in the books of the company. These books the Court invariably required to be produced. It also appears that in most cases their savings, accumulated in this country, were remitted to China for their account by mercantile firms in this city, and also that their tickets were, in many cases, purchased through the agency of those firms. The production of the firm's books showing these transactions was in like manner required, and they, together with the books of the companies, were subjected to the critical scrutiny of Mr. Vrooman, the very intelligent, competent, and entirely reliable Chinese interpreter.

In very many cases all these books were produced in Court, and in some instances the evidence they afforded was corroborated by testimony of white persons in whose employ the petitioner had been, and who testified to the time of his departure. It is, of course, possible, that in some instances the Court has been deceived, but considering that in no case has a person been allowed to land on the plea of previous residence on unsupported Chinese oral testimony, the number of such instances cannot be large. The proofs were in all cases sufficient to satisfy any candid and unbiassed mind. Of the whole num

ber thus far discharged by the order of the Court, it is believed that those discharged on the grounds stated, constitute nearly one-half. In justice to the Six Companies, I should add that their presidents have spontaneously offered to the Court to cause copies of their books, with records of departures of their members during the interval I have mentioned, to be made at their own charges, such copies to be verified by Mr. Vrooman, by comparison with the original records, and then to be deposited with the Court. When this is done no means will any longer exist of interpolating or adding new names on the books of the companies. It will still remain possible for a Chinese laborer to assume the name, and personate the character of some one whose name appears on the records; but this mode of deception it seems impossible wholly to prevent.

Secondly-Applications founded on the production of Canton certificates.

The investigation of this class of cases proved exceedingly embarrassing to the Court, and is attended with difficulties almost insuperable. The certificates furnished at Canton by the agent of the Chinese Government, the law declares, shall be primâ facie evidence of a right to land. This provision of the law, whatever distrust might be felt as to the reliability of these certificates, the Court could not disregard. The counsel for the petitioner usually presented a Canton certificate to the Court and rested his case. The District Attorney was necessarily without the means of disproving the truth of the certificate except by such admissions as he might extract from the petitioner himself when placed on the stand, or had been gathered from him upon his examination by the Custom House officials. The District Attorney was, therefore, allowed to call the petitioner, and cross-examine him in a most searching manner, and contradict, if he could, his statements; in short, to treat him as an adverse witness called by the opposite side. This method, though somewhat irregular, seemed to be the only one to be adopted with any hope of arriving at the truth. Another embarrassment under which the Court labored was the inability to attach any distinct and definite signification to the term "merchant,” but inasmuch as the Treaty expressly declares that the only class to be excluded are "laborers" and that no other class is within the prohibition of the Treaty, it was held by the Court that the enquiry was not so much whether the person was a merchant as whether he was a laborer, and that that enquiry should relate, not to his occupation or status in China, but to the occupation in which he was to be engaged in in this country; as the intention and object of the law was to protect our own laborers from the competition and rivalry of Chinese laborers.

At first sight it would seem that the production of the books of a respectable mercantile firm in which the name of the petitioner was inscribed as a partner, would be sufficient to establish his status as a merchant. It was soon found, however, that this mode of proof was, to a great extent, unreliable; for, first, the books might be falsified, and the entry made to meet the exigencies of the case; and, secondly, it appeared that the Chinese are in the habit of placing their earnings in stores or mercantile establishments, and in virtue of this investment they are admitted to a share of the profits. It might, therefore, often happen that a Chinese laborer would appear on the books of the company as holding an interest to the amount of a few hundred dollars in the concern, while he himself remained a laborer, and could in no sense of the term be called a merchant or a trader. The books above spoken of were in all cases subjected to a rigid scrutiny, with a view of detecting interpolations and falsifications. I am satisfied that in spite of the efforts of the Court, which in almost all cases itself subjected the petitioner to a rigorous cross-examination, and in spite of the efforts of the District Attorney, some persons have been admitted on Canton certificates who had no right to land. In what numbers it is impossible to say, but this result seemed to be the necessary consequence of the fact that the law made the certificates primâ facie evidence of the petitioner's right and of the difficulty of ascertaining the facts. A considerable number of cases were also

presented to the court where the petitioner claimed to be about to enter some mercantile establishment in which his brother or his uncle or his father was interested. The existence of the establishment was usually proved beyond a doubt, but the court was at the mercy of oral testimony as to the intended adoption of the petitioner as a partner.