CO129-341 - Acting Governor May Governor Lugard - 1907 [7-10] — Page 444

Ini Fiddes

how

send these to you to be dealt with by your Dept, but submit

a draft to be sent to Koney the point referred to at the end

of Davis' minute.

m2 725500

54928/11

You saw this with

G00739263/07 Jea

worth while

7

It seems hardly Bosen 5 paras

now

this to 7.0.

1-357 this

? Put by

a.l. 10/2/08 alone P. 10/2

Akons

38186

IT

439

You promised to entertain a further expression

of my views on the legal question.

It is admitted that a ship carrying from

Hong Kong a certain number of Indians is a "Chinese

Passenger Ship" within the meaning of the Imperial

Act of 1855 and that the only difficulty arises out

of the wording of the Hong Kong Ordinance, the provisions of which you regard as not applying to Indians.

Ships carrying Indians are of course still

liable to the provisions of the Imperial Act, but I

understand you to hold that no Court would forfeit

under Section 8 for having cleared without the papers

mentioned in Section 4 seeing that the action of the

Hong Kong Legislature has in fact made it impossible

for them to obtain such papers.

Does not what has, according to your view,

happened amount to this, viz:- that the intention of

the Imperial Act has pro tanto been defeated by the

Legislature of Hong Kong? But the Law Officers state

in their opinion of the 28th February 1907 that the

Hong Kong Legislature has not the power to alter the

definition of a "Chinese Passenger Ship" and that the

power of that Legislature to make regulations respecting

the class of ships defined by the (Imperial) Act does

not extend to altering the definition of the class of

ships respecting which the regulations may be made.

It