582
THE HONGKONG GOVERNMENT GAZETTE, 31st JULY, 1880.
"No doubt, the repeated representations I ventured to address to Lord CARNARVON in 1877 agmine "the Conditional Pardon and Deportation system, were mainly based on the clear evidence That obtained that, however well intended or adinirable in theory, it was a bad system, inconsistent with prison discipline, and that instead of checking crime it fostered and enlarged a criminal class on Kowloong frontier and even within the Colony; but I was not insensible either to the sound principles His Lordship had laid down on this subject in addressing the Governor of New So "Wales in October 1874 in certain despatches, copies of which had been transmitted to my predeces "in 1875, and in which the Secretary of State had said :---
66
6
generi
"The effect upon neighbouring Colonies, the Empire generally, or foreign countries, of letting lo a highly criminal or dangerous felon to reside in any part of the world except only that principa ⚫ concerned to take charge of him, was a step which might clearly and not unreasonably give rise t
complaints from without the Colony.
To release a criminal upon the condition the
*
*
'he should inflict himself either upon other Colonies and foreign countries or upon this country, w.. 'altogether in opposition to the theory now generally adopted.'"
"I am happy to say that, as the Chief Justice points out in his Report, Chinese criminals can le "effectually dealt with in Hongkong without having recourse to this dangerous expedient.
"I have, &c.,
(Signed)
"J. POPE HENNESSY."
Extract from the "Daily Press" of 24th November, 1879.
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL, HONGKONG.
A meeting of the Legislative Council was held on 22nd November, 1879. There were present:-
His Excellency the Governor, J. POPE HENNESSY, C.M.G. ~
Honourable SIR JOHN SMALE, Chief Justice.
Honourable W. H. MARSH, Colonial Secretary.
Honourable J. RUSSELL, Acting Attorney General.
Honourable M. S. TONNOCHY, Acting Colonial Treasurer. Honourable P. RYRIE.
Honourable W. KESWICK.
નં :
o
On the "Chinese Emigration Ordinance Amendment Bill," His Excellency the Governor said :--- Now, there was another proposed emigration about which I refused to issue my license, and th was the emigration of skilled artizans to Sydney and other parts of Australia, which Messrs. STE & Co. put before me. Some members of iny Executive Council appeared to think favourably of th scheme, and we had a good deal of discussion on the subject, but I adhered to the opinion which, o looking at the papers, I had originally formed, that I should not relax in any way the rules of t Colony with respect to contract emigration with the object of facilitating the traffic which Messrs STEVENS & Co. had in view. The idea of sending to Sydney or other parts of Australia a number skilled Chinese artizans from Hongkong, would, it was pointed out to me, benefit considerably the Chinese who should be so taken, but I had to look to other considerations. I had to consider how t it was desirable for the Governor of this Colony to do anything in the way of relaxing the strict lett of the law so as to facilitate the emigration into Australia of Chinese workmen or labourers, at de very time when it seemed to me that the Governments of Australia were more or less embarrassed i this very question. Accordingly I refused to issue my license, and it happened that six or eight mott after some trouble did occur at Sydney with the very steam-ship Company in question, owing to the is that though I did not give my license in the form they had sought, yet some Chinese were conv**** in another way not in violation of our Ordinances, and the fact of these people arriving in Sydney r to disturbance and caused the local Government no small trouble.
There was another form of emigration to Sydney, Queensland, and other parts of Australia, agat which I set my face in this Colony the moment I saw its possibility, or knew that it had taken place. That comes under the category more indeed of another subject recently discussed at t Council, the deportation of criminals,-than under that of emigration properly so called, and it is re to by Mr. DEANE in his evidence before the Committee on Police and Crime. Mr. Deane tells Committee that some of the deportees or criminals who received conditional pardous were sent Australia. The practice was: in the event of an emigrant ship being about to sail, these Chinese minals were asked where they would like to go to, because neither the conditional pardon nor tå deportation warrant of the Governor recited the place to which the criminal was to be deporte · simply stated in the one case the man was willing to leave the Colony and not to return for life. *** in the other case he was ordered to leave and not return for five years, as the case might be. How