Audu
C. D.
R.
D.
THE CHINESE PASSENGER ACT 1855
HONG KONG ORDINANCE 1889.
634
44554
RECE Reef 3 DEC 06
OPINION of the LAW OFFICERS of the CROWN and
MT ROWLATT.
(a)
We are of opinion that the Ordinance as it stands does not prohibit the Governor of Hong Kong from granting a license for a single voyage for carrying indentured coolies to a place outside His Majesty's dominions.
There is nothing in either Act to prohibit it and Schedule B. of the Act of 1855 and Schedule F. to the Ordinance of 1889 clearly show that the possibility of such trade was contemplated.
(b)
Whether the instructions referred to are, or are not, ultra vires depends, in our opinion, upon the position which the Legislature of Hong Kong occupied in making regulations under Section 2. of the Act of 1855. If it was acting merely as the depository of a special power to make regulations it could not validly confer either upon the Governor or upon the Secretary of State the discretionary power given by Section 11 of Ordinance. We are, however, upon the whole of opinion that the functions of the Legislature of Hong Kong under the Act of 1855 were not so limited.
The Legislature had enjoyed since 1843 power to make laws for the peace,