Doubtless the proposed amendment will receive the support of a majority of
the members of the present Legislature, but the principal contest will occur
at the election two years hence, when the proposed amendment must be agreed
to by two-thirds of all the members of Legislature then elected before it
shall become part of the constitution.
The bill referred to on page 6 of the report of the committee, requiring
laborers to procure a license, was referred to and has been considered by a
newly-appointed special committee, and the committee this day returned the
bill, accompanied by an adverse report, but recommend the adoption of the
proposed amendment to the constitution and stringent
[Page 869]
restrictive measures against the further influx of
Chinese pending the adoption of the amendment.
Restricting the immigration of Chinese to this Kingdom, and the proper
legislation touching those resident here, while conserving the interests of
the planters and the white laboring classes, are vexed questions for the
Legislature to determine.
The Chinese residents of the Kingdom will use all influence possible to
prevent any legislation in the premises.
[Inclosure 1 in No. 201.]
report of special committee on the chinese
question.
The Hon. W. R. Castle,
President of the legislative assembly, A. D.
1888:
Sir: The undersigned, a special committee to
whom was referred several matters relating to Chinese and Chinese and
Asiatic immigration, beg leave to submit their report.
Three petitions and one constitutional amendment were referred to them,
to wit:
- First. Petition number 12 merely commending the course of the
legislature in attempting to control Chinese immigration, and
which, therefore, we here recommend be received and laid on the
table.
- Second. Petition number 93 from certain prominent Chinese
merchants, praying that the law requiring photographs of persons
seeking return permits may be repealed and that the fee for
return permits be reduced to two dollars.
- Third. Petition number 55 from a large number of citizens and
residents, relative to Asiatic immigration and containing
fourteen specific prayers relating thereto and to Asiatic
residents in this Kingdom; and
- Fourth. A constitutional amendment numbered bill 57, relating
to Chinese.
In regard to petition number 93 from prominent Chinese merchants, your
committee recommend that the same be laid on the table. This petition
prays that the regulation be abolished requiring that Chinese departing
the Kingdom and desiring return permits shall be photographed as a means
of identification. The frauds perpetrated upon the Government in regard
to Chinese return permits when it retained no means of identifying those
who received them showed that Chinese could not be allowed the same
freedom in this respect as other citizens and residents without abusing
it, so that the Government was compelled either to adopt some means of
identification in issuing return permits or to become the sport of those
who received them. The Chinese have compelled this regulation in regard
to photographs by their own conduct. By Chinese we do not mean all
Chinese, but Chinese as a class. If there was any practical way of
relaxing this regulation in individual cases where it was clearly
unnecessary, the committee would recommend it, but, in their opinion,
there is no way to do this without seriously impairing the law. While
your committee sincerely believe that the Chinese merchants in this
Kingdom as a class have many admirable qualities, yet your committee are
compelled to say that in too many cases many of them render but scant
assistance or information to the Government in its necessary efforts to
control the mass of their countrymen residing here.
The same wholesale evasions of law in regard to passports exist, it is
believed, in still greater degree in the matter of taxation and the
vagrancy law, and the Government receives so little assistance from the
abiding Chinese in these respects, that it is time the Government
protected itself, and while the Government would undoubtedly fain give
Chinese all the immunities enjoyed by other citizens it can not safely
do so until they themselves learn better to use them. In justice to the
Chinese, however the committee wish to say that undoubtedly the main
reason that Chinese as a class evade the revenue taxation and kindred
laws more than other races, is that there is far greater opportunity and
therefore more temptation for them to do so, owing to the fact that the
mass of them can not be identified or individualized.
This petition also prays that the $5 fee for return permits be reduced to
$2. The committee believe that the extra expense to the Government
necessitated by this class of passports will about offset the extra fee
charged therefor; therefore think it unwise to reduce the same.
Petition No. 55 with fourteen specific prayers relating to Asiatics.
[Page 870]
Instead of entering into a detailed recital and consideration of each
prayer of this petition, your committee consider that the same results
can be obtained by giving in brief the findings of facts and conclusions
the committee has come to after having very carefully canvassed the
whole subject of Asiatic immigration, and having taken evidence and
consulted with many persons of different views on this subject.
Your committee find that the classification and identification of
Japanese with Chinese is not justified by the facts; that the habits,
traits of character, and tendencies of the two races are radically
different and therefore recommend that the consideration of Japanese in
the issue now before us be eliminated.
Undoubtedly some legislation in regard to Japanese immigration may from
time to time be required, but it will be of a class entirely different
from that required in regard to Chinese. Japanese immigration under
proper restrictions should be encouraged as the best partial substitute
for Chinese labor in this Kingdom, bringing as it does a class who are
willing to adopt western civilization and who can be incorporated into
our industrial system without seriously disjointing it.
In regard to the Chinese your committee find the following facts: Chinese
labor in company with other labor is needed for field work on rice and
sugar plantations in this Kingdom, it not being safe to rely exclusively
on Japanese labor, the same being liable to recall by the Japanese
Government, and Portuguese with large families needing wages that can
only be permanently assured to them in the higher class of labor on
plantations, and in the minor or middle industries of the Kingdom.
The committee, on the other hand, find that the competition of other
races with Chinese is impossible, and that whenever other races are
forced into such competition the result is not competition, but
substitution of the Chinese for their competitors. That the Chinese are
absorbing the different minor industries, mechanical, agricultural, and
commercial in this Kingdom, and your committee see nothing to prevent
them ultimately reducing the Kingdom practically to a Chinese colony,
with scattering people of other nationalities here and there among them,
and this even though no more Chinese are introduced for the present,
because outside of the sugar and rice industries very few comparatively
find employment, but what there is of such employment serves to retain
in the country the higher class of artisans and middlemen upon whom the
Government must rely to preserve constitutional representative
government in average purity, and there are enough Chinese now in the
country to swallow up such employments unless checked by law.
How to remedy this evil is a most serious question, and one that has been
very fully discussed by the committee.
After mature deliberation the committee believe the Government should
adopt the following policy in regard to Chinese:
- First. That no Chinese shall hereafter be allowed to immigrate
to this Kingdom except such as are needed to supply labor for
the rice and sugar industries, and all who are allowed to enter
for that purpose shall be prohibited by law from engaging in any
other occupation whatsoever, and shall stay for a term of years
only, to return home thereafter unless an extension of time is
granted upon like conditions.
- Second. As to Chinese already in the Kingdom, that Government
shall by law prevent those now employed as day laborers from
engaging in any other occupation. And, as to those who are
already engaged in other occupations, that the power be given to
the legislature of abridging from time to time their rights to
continue in the same, more particularly the trades, whenever
opportunity offers of so doing without undue injustice or
infringement of vested rights, and the exigencies and needs of
people of other nationalities demand it.
To carry out such a policy the constitution needs to be amended, and the
committee therefore recommend that the proposed constitutional
amendment, numbered bill number 57, and referred to this committee with
certain amendments, do pass and be submitted to the elections in 1890. A
copy of such constitutional amendment as modified by the committee is
hereto attached and made a part hereof. The house is already acquainted
with its main points. It has been modified in some respects and widened
in others by the committee, but as it now stands will, it is believed,
if ultimately adopted, give the legislature power to deal with the
Chinese question along the line of the policy above outlined.
The only other legislation that your committee can recommend is a bill
hereto attached requiring laborers to take out a license before
authorized to do common labor in this Kingdom, such license to be given
as a matter of right for a nominal fee, to be good only for two years
and only for the district in which it is granted. This bill it is
believed is constitutional and necessary as a police regulation, serving
to identify, individualize, and locate laborers, thus doing much to
prevent evasion of taxation, vagrancy, and other laws and to eliminate
that class of semi idle perambulatory labor that is now floating around
the country and congregating in the towns.
In conclusion, your committee consider that, in recommending the passage
of the constitutional amendment and bill in question, they have granted
the main relief
[Page 871]
asked for in
petition numbered 55, popularly known as the anti-Chinese petition, and
therefore recommend that the same be laid upon the table, to be
considered with the report and the bill and constitutional amendment
accompanying the same.
Respectfully submitted.
- W. E Foster.
- W. A. Kinney
- J. Maguire.
- Geo. H. Dole.
- Jos. U. Kawainui.
The undersigned concur in the recommendations of the above report and
the legislation therein proposed.
- Jona. Austin.
- H. P. Baldwin
[Inclosure 2 in No. 201.]
proposed amendment to the
constitution.
Be it resolved by the legislature of the Hawaiian
Kingdom, That the following article be and thereby is, proposed
as an amendment to the constitution:
I.
The legislature may by law name or limit the occupation or employment of
every kind whatsoever in which Chinese, or any body or class of Chinese,
may lawfully engage or continue to pursue; the estate and interest in
land they may acquire, or acquiring, hold, and the duration thereof; and
the number of years, not less than six, during which any Chinese may
lawfully reside in the Hawaiian Kingdom; and may provide for the
registration and identification of Chinese: Provided,
however, That no law shall operate to make it unlawful for any
Chinese to engage in the cultivation or manufacture of rice or sugar:
And provided, further, That no Chinese in the
Hawaiian Kingdom, when this amendment becomes a part of the
constitution, shall thereafter be compelled to depart the same, except
such Chinese as shall be legally sentenced to transportation or
deportation for felony.
The legislature may enforce the provisions of this amendment by
appropriate legislation; and no such legislation shall be declared
unconstitutional because confined in its operation to Chinese, or any
body or class thereof.
In this amendment “Chinese” means any person or persons; male or female,
wholly of Chinese or Mongolian birth or descent, whether born in China
or elsewhere, and whether citizens or subjects of China or any other
country, and shall include and apply to all and every person or persons
wholly of Chinese or Mongolian birth or descent who now are or hereafter
may be a citizen or citizens, subject or subjects of the Hawaiian
Kingdom: Provided, however, That the provisions
of this amendment shall not be construed to include or apply to persons
of Japanese birth or descent.
