Otin to F. F. Low, May 27, 1873

Mr. Otin to Mr. Low.

Sir: The difficulties that have been raised to the Spanish legation by the imperial’ government in the emigration question having to be definitively settled by a collective arbitration of the foreign representatives accredited in Peking, I consider it my duty to submit to your consideration a short statement of the facts in order to enable you to form an impartial opinion upon the question which you are called to decide.

Towards the middle of the month of January last, I received a communication from the Spanish consul at Canton, in which he informed me that a Spanish emigration agent had asked, through the consulate, the authorization of the viceroy of the two Kwangs for the opening of an emigration office in Canton, in order to engage, according to the regulations of 1866, three thousand workmen which his employer required for the cultivation of his plantations; whereupon the viceroy had refused to grant the required authorization, founding his refusal on orders received from the Tsung-li Yamun by him.

As soon as these facts had arrived to my knowledge, I repaired to the Yamun, where the Ministers Mao-Chang Hri, Chunghow, and Chéng-Tin repeatedly assured me that no such order had ever been transmitted to the viceroy of the two Kwangs; but two days later, to my great astonishment, I received a communication in the shape of an official letter, in which the Yamun confirmed the prohibition to engage emigrants for the island of Cuba.

The foundations on which this decision was based were, the slanderous talk of a foreign newspaper that falsely interpreted a decision of the local government in Cuba, and represented the Chinese there as being submitted to a forced re-engagement, and the officious reports of some consuls residing in Amoy, most of them merchant consuls, who guaranteed the truth of the facts advanced in the said papers. These reports of (extra) non-official origin, and of which no one had even thought to prove the accuracy, justified, in the eyes of the imperial government, the adoption of an extreme measure, the abrogation of an international compact!

Out of the animated and often violent correspondence that took place on this subject between the Tsung-li Yamun and the Spanish legation, the only result on the part of the first was the following argument:

“The cruelty and tyranny of the Spanish government to the Chinese subjects having been duly proved by the reports of a newspaper and of the consuls at Amoy, we forbid the emigration to a country where our subjects have to suffer such ill treatment.”

This solitary argument, adorned with all the charm of Chinese diction, and reproduced under a thousand different forms, has been the only defense opposed by the Yamun to the legitimacy of my right and to the arguments by which I enforced it.

Newspaper abuse is too common and vulgar to be taken serious notice of; as to the semi-official reports of the consuls, these functionaries being 6,000 leagues away from the scene of the events, they had no other means of knowing anything of them but from the adulterated relations in the said papers, and are, of course, not able to guarantee their veracity. Besides, according to international law the interference of foreign and non-authorized agents is inadmissible.

The facts of the case are as follows: The accumulation in Havana of Chinese who do not possess any known means of sustenance, constitutes a permanent danger for the Spanish province of Cuba, which, besides, is at present unfortunately agitated by a rebellion now coming to an end. In view of the circumstances, the local government, exercising an indisputable right, has decided to separate the vagabonds from the industrious mass, and to give the first the alternative either of leaving the country or of re-engaging themselves; the mechanics, merchants, and all honest men have not been molested. Where, then, is the tyranny; where the cruelties?

Another fact that has been put forward by the Tsung-li Yamun in the last conference is that the workmen engaged in Cuba according to the regulation of 1866 did not receive, after the expiration of the contract, the sum stipulated for their return home, and that these wretched people were without means of returning to their country. The Tsung-li Yamun went even so far as to assure me that the information received on this subject was not to be doubted. It is sufficient to state that the first emigrants were engaged in the Chinese ports under the new regulation only, in 1869, and that the term of the-contract is five years. To understand that, it is impossible that a stipulation in the contract can have been broken, which stipulation could only have effect after the expiration of the engagement, and the workmen of 1869 have not yet terminated it.

Since the emigration is going on in the Chinese ports under the new regulation, no case of abuse or violence has been signaled, no complaint has been presented on the subject, with the exception of the one that the Spanish legation brought forward last year against the Chinese delegates in Canton, who, in the absence of the Spanish consul, and notwithstanding the remonstrances of an agent of the legation, had allowed the departure of a young man who had not the authorization required for minors, mentioned in article 11 of the regulation. Well! The Tsung-li Yamun has not only left this abuse on the part of the delegates unpunished, but, turning a good deed into a crime, declares that this case constitutes an abuse, and that abuse being found in the emigration, the emigration must be forbidden. Most logical reasoning! Spanish subjects must atone for the faults of Chinese mandarins!

But let us suppose for one moment that all this is exact; that the Chinese government had, instead of bad pretexts, only good reasons to enforce its measures. When a government which is bound to another by an international compact has any remonstrances to make, or wishes to begin negotiations, it must do it by means of diplomatic agents; and it has no right to arrest the effects of the treaty, for it is under the protection of the treaty, and trusting in the good faith of the power that signed it, that foreign merchants have risked their capital in a hazardous speculation. If one of the two parties could voluntarily break off its engagements, what need would there be of treaties?

In the present case, the Tsung-li Yamun has not only violated article 10 of the Spanish treaty, but also the clause concerning the most favored nation—refusing, as it does to Spain, a right that it accords to other foreign powers; and the result of this violent measure, which has been adopted secretly, is the ruin of the agents in Cuba, who, under the guarantee of the treaty, had begun preliminary operations of chartering vessels, distributing sums to Chinese recruiting-agents, &c.

It is true that the Tsung-li Yamun considers the regulation about emigration to be as important as international treaties, and demonstrates that the Spanish government having (according to the Yamun) infringed the regulation, the Yamun forgets, or rather wishes to forget, that above all laws is the faith sworn in international treaties; that local laws can be abrogated or modified; while a treaty is unchangeable and permanent in its legal duration; that it is a gordian knot that can be severed only by the joint will of the two sides, or by the bayonets of the strongest.

Still, as a proof of sincerity and of the little fear we have of the examination of the condition of Chinese in Cuba, I have offered to the imperial government, on my own responsibility, a right which the treaty gives it not, that of appointing a consul in Havana, who could watch over the interest of his nationals. The Tsung-li Yamun has obstinately refused this, saying that at present it has no idea of appointing consuls in foreign countries, but when it would take place, Cuba should not be excepted, and that then the emigration could again be re-instated. Need we have a more flagrant proof of bad faith? I offer them the means of investigating the facts and of protecting their nationals, and they reject them; but if they refuse to lead the life of civilized nations, Spain cannot change the code of international law in order to serve their whims by admitting the intrusion of foreign elements into her affairs. But it is not the welfare of its expatriated subjects that the imperial government is so anxious about; this is only a pretext, and at the bottom of the question there is something very important—it is the long-prepared plan of the imperial government to break off one by one all the links by which it is bound to the civilized world; and it begins with the nations of which it is the least afraid, because it has not yet been punished by them. To-day, it is the emigration question; to-morrow, it will be the missionaries; later, the opium.

If we resume these observations, we find that the Tsung-li Yamun, taxing itself on reports deprived of all foundation, and the origin of which is irregular, has violated the treaty existing between Spain and China; that, notwithstanding my frank and loyal explanations, it has insisted in its decision; and, further, that when, moved by a spirit of conciliation, I offered it the concession of a right which would bring truth to the light and prevent similar complications for the future, Tsung-li Yamun has rejected my offer, without even informing me of the reason of such a refusal.

This, sir, is the truthful statement of the facts. I have not time to develop it more fully; but I hope that it will prove sufficient to give you a fairly correct idea of the question that is to be submitted to your judgment, and which could, in my opinion, be set down in the following concrete formula:

Is the conduct of the imperial government in the present affair in compliance with the principles of international right?

I am, sir, &c.,