Y Garcia to Wells Williams, August 25, 1873
Señor Garcia to Mr. Williams.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge receipt, in reply to my note to that legation, dated June 15, 1873, of the Hon. Mr. Low’s two dispatches to me, dated respectively July 5, (in duplicate,) containing a copy of his note of the same date, addressed to His Imperial Highness Prince Kung in regard to my mission in China, and July 17, inclosing a translation of the prince’s answer to Mr. Low, dated July 6, 1873.
I have since had the pleasure of a conference with Mr. Low, at Yokohama, in reference to his dispatches and their inclosures, and it is gratifying to me to address the present communication to you as the representative of the United States, a country which has always been friendly to mine. I feel more at liberty to do this, not only because you are authorized by your Government to aid this legation, and on account of Mr. Low’s kind offer, contained at the end of his dispatch of July 5; but also because I am convinced that the merited influence which your long residence and distinguished services in China must have given you will certainly help me to accomplish the highly honorable and worthy objects of my mission, which are as beneficial to the Chinese Empire as they are to Peru.
Before anything else, I may be permitted to express my great surprise and disappointment at the immediate result of Mr. Low’s friendly action. Although written only twenty-four hours after the American minister’s letter, Prince Kung’s reply is, as Mr. Low himself calls it, “decided” and “curt,” declining to make a treaty with Peru.
This is the more to be wondered at, in presence of the fact of a Peruvian mission being at the gates of that empire, having traveled an enormous distance, and come to confer with the Chinese government, and arrive at an agreement precisely on the subject about which the present liberal administration of Peru had heard that China had motives of complaint.
It is, sir, allow me to say, very strange that, when the Peruvian government wishes to explain to the Chinese government what is the real condition of its hundred thousand subjects in Peru, to state to it that we have been actively working to give them the greatest protection and guarantees in the republic, for which purpose new laws and regulations have just been enacted, and now desire to contribute to make the illicit practices disappear, and to establish, in accord with the Chinese government, a system of lawful emigration of the best kind from the open ports of China, like that which goes to California or Australia; and, finally, when the Peruvian government, in order to make all this known, employs the best means, the sending of a special mission to the Court of China, it is strange, I beg to repeat, that the Chinese government, giving such momentous matter only twenty-four hours’ thought, should answer, declining to enter into negotiations.
The principal and foremost aim of my government in accrediting me to that court is to enter into a treaty, convention, or agreement for the proper legal and moral regulation of Chinese emigration. I beg to be allowed to suggest that, probably on account of the prince’s not knowing the real intention of the Peruvian government, which is, settling the difficulties in regard to Chinese emigration before concluding a general treaty of amity and commerce, he came to the conclusion not to treat Peru with the same politeness, or, as he says, “to regard her in the same light,” as the other nations that have made treaties with China. Nevertheless, his imperial highness bases his reluctance “wholly on what he has heard as to the treatment experienced by his countrymen in Peru,” saying “that the manner in which that country has acted toward China is so different from the conduct of other nations.’
It is painful to see that the distinguished chief of Chinese diplomacy only re-echoes the false reports and exaggerations that have come to his notice. But anybody is to be excused for believing anything if he has not the means of verifying the truth or untruth of the rumors he hears. Rationally thinking, however, it is evident that an employer of a number of laborers is the person most interested in keeping them in the best health and condition; and, in respect to the Peruvians, let the truth be said, that they are proverbially averse to cruelty. The honorable Mr. Low states that the representations made to the Chinese government are strengthened by the fact that so few laborers have ever returned from Peru in comparison to the number who have gone there, and so little can be ascertained as to the actual condition of those still remaining. To the first observation the answer is, that the return is not so easy as from California, for instance, on account of the distance and the absence of a regular line of steamers between the two countries, which is on the point of being established by an English company; that, in point of fact, a great number do return, as statistics show; that formerly the contracts were for a long period of eight years, and the emigrants, after the term of their engagement, having acquired the language and become fond of the country, have settled there, raised families, gone into business, and made fortunes.
In several towns of Peru, and particularly in the city of Lima and commercial ports of the coast, whole districts are occupied exclusively by Chinese store-keepers and merchants, to some of whom ship-loads of goods directly arrive, and thousands of Chinamen, free from their former contracts, are domestics in the houses of the best families; there they gain good salaries, are well treated, do as they please, and if they remain in the country, it is because they wish it.
But, besides all these considerations, the new regulations just made by President Pardo impose on the contractors of Chinese laborers the obligation of returning them to their country when the term of their engagement is over, and this term has also been considerably reduced.
To the second of Mr. Low’s observations, in regard to how little can be ascertained as to the condition of Chinese in Peru, the answer is simple. China lives isolated from the world, and cannot learn what passes abroad, and less so in countries with which she maintains no relations; but other governments know well, and always learn when they desire, what transpires in Peru. But here is a mission sent expressly by the Peruvian government for the purpose of giving the government at Peking all the information necessary. Thus the nation I represent shows that she is more interested in the welfare of the Chinese than China herself, whose government seems disinclined to hear what that mission has to say. Prince Kung refers to certain documents, purporting to have been written from Lima, and sent to him from your legation in 1869 and 1871.
On this point I beg to say that my government does not pretend that Peru is entirely free from crime, or that some of its citizens may not commit abuses. The inhabitants of no country are perfectly virtuous and law abiding, and no government is answerable for all violations of the law by its citizens. But justice ought to be done to all equally, and this is what takes place in the republic of Peru, in which, no separate social classes existing, laws are indistinctly applied to all, and which is governed by free institutions, and now by an administraton who is attracting the attention of the world for the liberal measures it is carrying out and the noble motives by which they are inspired.
One of the first acts of President Pardo, on coming into office in August, 1872, was to attend to the condition of Chinese subjects in Peru. He had heard of some abuses having formerly been committed in the country, and a greater number practiced abroad. In regard to Peru, the congress and the President have taken the matter in hand, and now a Chinese finds himself in the republic in the same position as any other foreigners.
For any and all arrangements on this subject my government desires to negotiate directly with the government at Peking, and this is the origin of the mission with which I have been honored.
It seems inconceivable that the Chinese authorities should object to acquire the means of appointing agents in Peru to watch over the interests of their subjects there. If China should finally decide not to treat with Peru, the republic will have done her duty to herself and to the world, and she will have no responsibility for anything that may occur hereafter. One of the practical consequences of such a resolution will be that Peru must have Chinese laborers, (whose numbers have been increasing year by year, and only in 1872 the total of more than 14,000 arrived at Callao.) Private parties will do what they can, the Peruvian government being powerless to prevent abuses in foreign countries.
However, His Imperial Highness Prince Kung says that, but for the reports he has heard, “it is reasonable to admit her proposal (of Peru to enter into a treaty) with demur,” and further on declares that the Chinese government “considers that it will not be meet to repel the Peruvians too harshly or finally.”
These declarations of his imperial highness show that the determination of the Chinese government, communicated in his dispatch of July 6 to Mr. Low, is not final, and that the prince is willing to enter into negotiations with me under certain conditions.
Nevertheless, I am unwilling to present myself at Tien-tsin, if I were not going to be received there by his excellency the viceroy in a due and proper manner, according to international usages, and in conformity with the representation which I possess as the envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of a sovereign state.
It is in this view that I have taken the liberty to trouble you, sir, with this long communication. Availing myself of the friendly disposition of the United States Government toward Peru, and of your own upright character and clear judgment, I earnestly request you to please make known the contents of this dispatch to Prince Kung, and to favor me with your answer, forwarding it to the United States consulate at Shanghai, where I shall wait for it until I hear from you whether the Chinese government will issue the proper orders, so that the Peruvian mission be courteously received at Tien-tsin on its way to Peking.
I take this opportunity to inform you that on the 21st instant I had the honor of signing with His Excellency Toyeshima Tane-orni, His Imperial Japanese Majesty’s minister for foreign affairs, a treaty of peace, amity, commerce, and navigation, on the same basis as those which are now in operation between Japan and the other treaty-powers.
Thanking you most sincerely for the kind offices which I have no doubt you will render me, I have the honor to assure you of my highest consideration.