Richard Gibbs to Evarts, May 11, 1877

No. 244. Mr. Gibbs to Mr. Evarts.

Sir: In my dispatch No. 107, of November 13 last, on the status of the Chinese in this country, I referred to a contract, then in treaty, between the government of this country and Mr. H. S. Geary, an American citizen and partner of the house of Olyphant & Co., China.

After a great deal of discussion the contract was finally signed and approved of by the President of the republic, April 20. I inclose copy of Mr. Geary’s second proposition and the modifications proposed by the government, which were accepted by him.

My opinion is that this proposed new immigration will be important and of great advantage to this country. Many attempts have been made to induce European immigration, but up to the present have failed, there being so many other fields more favorable than Peru.

Here the Chinaman is an industrious, hard-working, patient laborer; the climate all along the coast, where the great agricultural fields exist, suits him 5 his wants are few, and he saves money, when other races live in penury and misery under the same circumstances.

As this plan for Chinese immigration is altogether different from the old one of coolie-labor, the immigrant arriving freely without any trammels, choosing his own work, and earning good wages, at the least one sol per day, with certain knowledge of employment, there will be a superior class of emigrants to leave China for a country which they have some knowledge of, through their countrymen, of whom many traffic up and down the coast from San Francisco to Callao.

The standing of the old and well-known house of Olyphant & Co., of Hong-Kong and New York, is quite a guarantee that they will not be a party, nor lend their influence, to any system that will in any manner be the cause of abuses, as were perpetrated under the name of coolie-labor of former times, which was slavery.

I am, &c.,