No. 237.
Mr. Denby
to Mr. Bayard.
Peking, September 20, 1888. (Received November 2.)
Sir: Your telegram to the effect that the bill for the total exclusion of Chinese laborers from the United States had been passed by both houses of Congress and awaited the President’s approval, and that in view of the excited state of public feeling on the Pacific coast in favor of the measure, and the critical situation thereby created, it became necessary to impress upon the Chinese Government the urgency of coming to a decision, in the interest of treaty relations and friendship, reached me at 5 p.m. the 19th instant.
In that sense I immediately sent to the Yamên the communication of which a copy is herewith inclosed.
[Page 353]This communication reached the foreign office about 6 o’clock p.m. the 19th. I knew that it would probably not be considered that evening, because the ministers had gone to their homes. I knew also that the question of ratification could not be finally acted on to-day, the 20th, because the Emperor would have to be consulted. His official audiences take place early in the morning, and he could not be consulted before the morning of the 21st. I did not, therefore, demand an instantaneous reply, but limited the time for an answer to forty-eight hours.
I could not telegraph to you yesterday because the gates of the Tartar city are closed at dark, and after that time there is no access to the telegraph office, which is situated in the Chinese city.
Early this morning I sent you a telegram reporting that your instructions had been communicated to the Yamên, and that an answer could not be obtained inside of forty-eight hours.
If my previous dispatches have reached you, you are in possession of all my acts and doings.
By my dispatch No. 701, of September 17, you will see that the Yamên, at their interview with me, agreed to send me, in twenty-four hours, suggestions as to alterations in or additions to the treaty. I did not telegraph an account of that interview to you, because I expected to receive these suggestions the 18th, and intended to embody all information in one telegram; but the Yamên has, up to this writing, sent me nothing.
We asked nothing of China except the exclusion of laborers. This has been the essence of the agreement of the two countries for eight years. The new treaty simply strengthens an assured right. China is the last country in the world to complain of exclusion. She excluded all the world from the earliest times. She excludes laborers to-day by forbidding foreigners to engage in manufacturing in her borders. She permits foreign access only to some twenty points on the sea-board and the great rivers. There are no American laborers in China. There are comparatively few merchants. The body of our people are missionaries, who are here for no purpose save to exercise philanthropy and to promote religion.
I have, etc.,