142
milies or clans only yielded to threats against which they
had neither power to resist nor had they protection from the
Government. Valuable rights are claimed over the foreshore un-
der supposed titles from the Chinese Government. All those
claims and disputed titles must be settled. To do this under
the practice of the ordinary Courts would be entirely beyond
the means of the people,most of whom are very poor, and would
practically place the occupiers at the mercy of comparatively
wealthy claimants. After mature consideration it was decided
that a local Court was necessary in which without the great
expenses of litigation in the ordinary Civil Courts, the titles
to the land might be readily settled. Mr. Bruce Shepherd whose
great experience and knowledge of Chinese land customs has been of immense value in the consideration of this question, estimates that of the 70,000 to 80,000 claims for title there will probably be over 6,000 disputed cases to be tried, for
the purpose of determining which the Land Court has been in-
stituted. It is not necessary that it shall be a permanent
Court for once the questions now at issue are settled the ca-
ses arising in future may he left to the regular Court or to
the Squatters Board.
!
3. I propose to appoint as President of the
Court Mr.Pollock, who has acted as Attorney General for over a
recently andona,
a prestors occasion a bran also acted as Puisna Judge, year a and who is a sound and cautious lawyer in leading prac- tice in the Colony. He is prepared to accept the position for
a fee of $50 for each sitting of the Court with a proviso that
the
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