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SIR,
Attorney General to Colonial Secretary.
ATTORNEY GENERAL'S CHAMBERS,
25th October, 1886.
1. With reference to the letter of the Acting Registrar General dated the 17th April last on the subject of Child Adoption and Domestic Services which was referred to me for consideration, I have the honour to forward herewith for sub- mission to His Excellency the Officer Administering the Government a Draft Bill for the better protection of young girls.
2. His Excellency when administering the Government in 1882 had called for a report on this subject from Mr. RUSSELL who was then Registrar General and Protector of Chinese.
3. The further history of this question will be found in the Despatch of His Excellency the Governor dated the 15th August, 1883, transmitting Mr. RUSSELL'S report, and in another Despatch of His Excellency dated the 26th May, 1885, forwarding a Bill which had been prepared by Mr. STEWART then Registrar General, and which had been read a first time in the Legislative Council.
This Bill consisted practically of four Sections, and is annexed to the papers forwarded berewith, the first section of this Bill authorised the Registrar General to summon before him any person whom he reasonably suspected of having in his possession any adopted daughter or female servant between the age of six and sixteen, and it authorised the Registrar General on due enquiry to require from the custodian of the said child security that it should not be sold, pawned or disposed of for any immoral purpose.
For the better carrying out of this Section, Section 2 anthorised the Registrar General to require the production before him of any female child under adoption or domestic service.
And also to summon before him any person who give information touching the treatment of any such child.
By Section 3 the Registrar General could apply to a Judge in Chambers for a writ of Habeas Corpus with a view of taking away any female child from the custody of any one who had no legal right thereto..
Section 4 provided an appeal to the Judge in Chambers from any decision of the Registrar General.
The Attorney General made the following objections to the said Bill:- "The proposed measure provides that the Registrar General may summon before him any person whom he reasonably suspects of having in his custody any adopted daughter or female servant between the age of 6 and 16 with a view of disposing of her as a prostitute. There is no definition of what should constitute reasonable grounds of suspicion, and I think the provision confers too much arbitrary power to be exercised without the safeguard of publicity by the Registrar General.
"The measure provides for the summoning of the kind of persons above men- tioned and for calling upon them to give reasonable security against the pawning or selling of the child, but it does not say what shall be done with the person or the child if the security is not forthcoming, and indeed it is difficult to see what could be done in such case.
"Section 3 appears to give a very extraordinary power to the Registrar General to interfere with the domestic affairs of the Chinese population, and a kind of power which could not possibly be sufficiently exercised by a Government. department especially as nothing is provided touching what is to be done with a child who has been set free under the provisions of the section.
"Section 4 is objectionable as giving the Judges duties and powers which are in no proper sense of the word judicial.'
And the Governor in his despatch of the 26th May, 1885, seems to have admitted the force of some of them. The Secretary of State in his despatch dated the 12th September, 1885, acknowledged the receipt of the Bill and report of the Attorney General.