Enclosure No.2.
118
Written statement of their views on the system of
adoption of daughters, submitted by the members of the
District Watch Committee to the Secretary for Chine se
Affairs.
The system of adoption of daughters in China
has existed since ancient times. This can be proved
by many references to law and custom. We have recently
heard that there exists some doubt on this subject among
foreigners.
After full and careful discussion, we are
setting forth the facts as known to us personally and
firmly believed by us. The statement which we now submit
is a responsible statement of our unanimous views.
The origin of the system of adoption of daughters
is lost in antiquity, but its practice has long been recognized by society. Among our own relatives and friends
there are not a few women who were adopted daughters and
who have helped their husbands to establish families.
We are in a position to give actual names, and are not
just recording an unfounded opinion.
Leaving the present and going back to the past,
we find that in the history of the Five Dynasties by
On Yang Hsiu, under the biography of Queen Liu of Emperor
Chuang Tsung of the Tang Dynasty, it is related that
"Chuang Tsung commanded Queen Liu to do obeisance to
Chang Chuan Yi as her adoptive father", which shows that
Queen Liu was an a dopted daughter.
This was over a thousand years ago, in A.D. 922
When recorded history shows that the title of adoptive
father and adopted daughter was in use in China as far
back as a thousand years ago, who can deny the existence
of
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