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(2). The Chinese from the mainland on finding that they would be fined or imprisoned for spitting in this Colony would avoid Hongkong as much as possible and your Petitioners' trade and business would greatly suffer thereby.
Your Petitioners also submit that it is impossible to enforce such a law in this cosmopolitan community of Hongkong; and if it were enforced, it would only create misunderstanding and stir up bad feelings without attaining the desired object for the following reasons:-
(1). On account of the floating nature of the inhabitants of this Colony it is highly impracticable to make the majority of them guard themselves from offending a law against spitting which they have long regarded as a harmless habit.
(2). The houses in this Colony are principally Chinese tenement houses and each house has a common entrance. The tenants of these houses would not prosecute any one against this law except out of spite.
(3). There is no provision in the said Bill requiring public buildings to provide spittoons, and for want of such a provision it may lead the Chinese to think that the passing of this Bill was only a means of getting the Public Revenue increased by fines in view of the impending abolition of the Opium Farm.
(4). In enforcing the law it is necessary to entrust to Police Constables the power and discretion to make immediate arrests of offenders. Although the Police Force of Hongkong is under the best of disciplines yet its members are composed of various nationalities, such as Europeans, Indians and Chinese, and it is very dangerous indeed to place into their hands such discretionary powers.
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