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for leave to issue Notes of the value of One Dollar each, and the application having been referred to the official Members of the Legislative Council, and finding that the proposal met with their support, I laid the matter before Executive Council.
The power of allowing issue of Notes of other amounts than Five Dollars or the multiple of such sum is vested in the Governor by Section XII of Ordinance No. 5 of 1866. The only question, therefore, was as to the expediency of granting the request of the Corporation.
There is no doubt that owing to the practice of chopping dollars which is in vogue here, and in parts of China, the Coins became, after being a short time in circulation, much deteriorated, and lost a portion of their value.
It was hoped that the establishment of a Mint in Hong Kong would have caused such a supply of new Coins, not liable to defacement, to be thrown into the market that "chopped" dollars would in due course have disappeared.
Unfortunately, the closing of that establishment, and the scarcity of the dollars which it coined, leaves matters in status quo, and the Community suffers materially from ...
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