303
153
he discussed with him the question of raising the Tariff duty and li-kin excise upon opium, with a view to diminishing the taste for it. Nor had Thomas Wade any objection to make thereto. But, when Li Hung-chang arrived, your servant and he farther discussed the matter with Thomas Wade on two occasions; Li Hung-chang having besides one separate conference with him alone; and at these conferences Thomas Wade maintained opinions at variance with those of your servants. There was a considerable change in his language (or he retracted much), and with reference to the augmentation of the price of opium, he showed as much irritation as if the change were something to be deplored.
Were your servants to have agreed to a proposition he subsequently made, that 80 taels a chest should be the fixed amount [of opium taxation], this would have added little [to the present cost of the drug, and not only could it have effected nothing towards diminishing the appetite for it, but, by increasing the trade in foreign opium, it would have expanded the area of its distribution, and would have supplied an excuse for the cultivation of the poppy in the interior, and the trade in native opium. Great incon- venience also would have attended the additional levy of the li-kin.
His scheme, therefore, while its proper object, namely, the increase of the duty and li-kin, would be in great part defeated, being also otherwise impracticable, your servant would propose that, in addition to the import Tariff duty of 30 taels, which will be collected as beretofore at a central port, the collection of li-kin at such central port shall be left in the hands of the Chinese authorities. A central li-kin collectorate should be established in the vicinity of this central port, and a clean-handed and capable officer of high rank should be deputed to take general control of the collection of li-kin upon foreign opium. All foreign opium, after payment of the import Tariff duty, should be allowed to be distributed for sale by the foreign merchants amongst the different ports, being deposited [on arrival at the central port] in hulks or godowns at his option. The Commissioner of Customs should then ascertain the number of chests imported, and report the same to the Central Collectorate, who should again inspect them, enter the number in a register, and affix a seal thereto. A triplicate certificate should then be drawn up, one portion of which should be retained in the Central Office as a counterfoil; one filled in and sent to the Commissioner of Customs as a means of verifying the third portion, which should be given to the foreign merchant as an authority to ship the opium for sale at any other open port. Seals should be placed on the folds of the triplicate pass, and numbers affixed, whereby the holder of any portion can check his certificate by the other portion. Thus smuggling, the mixture of foreign and native opium, and other frauds, will readily be detected at a glance.
The places of sale being thus clearly defined inspection and prevention will become possible, while uniformnity of rates will make it easy to ascertain the exact amount of duty and li-kin [that is collected].
The above suggestion may possibly not be out of place in connection with a scheme for increasing the duty and li-kin on opium in the hope of successfully securing a restriction of its consumption.
vary.
As regards the manner in which duties are to be increased and li-kin raised, opinions Some maintain that the treatment should be wholesale. In other words, that [all] the extra li-kin should be collected at the central port simultaneously with the duty taken from the foreign importer. Others contend that the treatment should be separate. In other words, that, in addition to an increase of one Tariff duty to the li-kin at the central port, a further li-kin should be levied from the native dealer at the centres of sale inland. One of these two methods must be the correct one, and the right of deciding between the respective merits of each rests with the Court, foreigners having nothing whatever to do with the question.
By the rules under which li-kin is now proposed to be levied, two inspections are to be made on two occasions, and herein is a vestige of the principle (cited above) under which, in the Chou dynasty, the idle agriculturist was kept in awe, and, in the Han dynasty, prohibitions against the use of wine were rigorously enforced. For every 100 catties of foreign opium will pay in all 150 taels duty and li-kin, a rate which will satisfy the require- ments of principle and right. Although this amount is much lower than the tax of 100 per cent. of their value levied on local products exported from foreign countries, and of 200 per cent. levied on articles of consumption that are considered luxuries, the arrange- ment does not conflict with the ancient maxim, that "punishments should be sparingly used and levics lightly imposed.”
As regards opiumn prepared from the poppy grown in China, in contravention of rule, the sale of which is extending, its use should be taxed by an increase of l-kin in the same manner as in the case of the foreign drug. As, however, the flavour of the native drug is
150
not so rich or 50 strong as that of the foreign drug, it is not held in such esteem by smokers, and the price is lower than that of the latter. The increase of duty and li-kin upon it should, therefore, not be at the same rate as in the case of foreigu opium, and the prohibitive principle will be complied with if it he muleted according to weight and price in the same proportion as foreign opium. The poorer classes, being then deterred by the price, will reduce their craving, and the results will be equally successful [with those predicated in the case of foreign opium].
The memorialist, in his ignorance, ventures to believe that the enforcement of strict prohibitions against the consumption of opium is a radical essential in the restriction of a popular vice and the ordering of public morality. At the present time, the ever-increasing diminution of price creates a corresponding increase of consumption, the evil effects of which become worse as they grow. And so, when prohibitive measures come to be considered, it becomes apparent that the only plan is to increase the duty and li-kin both on the foreign and on the native drug. It is not merely with the object of reaping a richer revenue that this increase is suggested. In ancient times [money] was only taken from the people within restricted limits; and, although taxation should undoubtedly incline towards the side of lightness, if the object in view is to regulate the morality of the present day on modern questions of principle, the principle involved being the prevention of the commission of what is wrong, the imposition of duty and li-kin to illustrate this prohibition cannot but lean towards the side of heaviness.
When the people are purified from unclean habits, and are no longer cut off in their prime, the benefits that will spontaneously arise on the suppression of such vices will bring about results that will be apparent in the immediate future-results which will obviate the necessity of recourse to those arts by which a nation is enriched and strengthened, or to plans for securing the general welfare.
The memorialist would humbly beg their Majesties the Empress and the Emperor to send down this Memorial to the Princes, Ministers, six Boards, and nine Ministries of State, with orders to consider them in Council, and to decide in what points he is right He would and in what wrong, submitting a statement of their views to the throne. further pray that the provincial high authorities and Superintendents of Customs be directed to furnish Returns of the sales of foreign opium within their respective jurisdic- tions, the duty and li-kin originally imposed upon it, and the loss that is at present Also to submit Returns of the extent of poppy entailed by smuggling, with the reasons. cultivation, with the quantity of prepared opium that it produces, with draft Rules as to the manner in which the two inspections are to be conducted, and propositions as to the amount of increased duty and li-kin that should be imposed.
He would finally pray that they, one and all, be directed to furnish the above Reports within the space of one month from the date of the receipt of the Decree.
Inclosure 2 in No. 76.
Sir T. Wade to the Prince of Kuny.
Peking, January 13, 1882. Sir,
I RETURNED from the south to Tien-tsin on the 27th November, and having exchanged visits with the Grand Secretary Li, bis Excellency banded me for perusal an Imperial Decree which he had had the honour to receive on the 20th October, directing him, in concert with the Tsung-li Yamêa, to consider the propositions of the Grand Secretary Tan regarding opium taxation, and to report thereon.
With this intimation of the Emperor's pleasure before me, I could have no difficulty whatever in at once resuming discussion of this important question with his Excellency, and I have now the honour to submit to your Imperial Highness a summary of the propositions which it becomes my duty to lay before Earl Grauville as, in my opinion, entitled to the serious consideration of Her Majesty's Government.
I must be allowed in the first place to recall to your Imperial Highness' recollection the circumstances under which the taxation of opium came once more to be discussed in 1876 at Chefoo.
The merchants of all nations having Treaties with China had been for years com- plaining that their trade was subjected inland to the imposition of taxes, especially of -kin, in violation of Treaty engagements, and the Representatives of the Treaty Powers had in vain endeavoured to obtain for their respective mercantile communities such exemption from taxation as the Treaties, according to their interpretation of them, engaged to secure.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.