86th July.
Papers from Washington mention that President Roosevelt held conference on the 12th ultimo with a delegation of members of the American Asiatic Association, representing the cotton textile industry and the iron and steel trade of the United Stutes. "The delegation," we read, "entered a formal of the Chinese Exclusion laws as protest against such an enforcement
might imperil the export trade of this country with China It was pointed out that the commercial organisations of China were threatening to boycott the American merchants, especially cotton and steel products, unless arrangements were made whereby Chinese merchants, s: udents, literary men, and travellers could enter the United States without the serious difficulty which they uow encounter. The Chinese urge that members of the classes which, under our exclusion laws, are permitted to enter the United States, are often subjected to inconvenience and humiliation by the immigration officers, and they insist upon a more liberal treatment of the exempt classes of their countrymen." Though we may feel that the present boycott is a regrettable mistake, and that the Chinese, remembering the goodwill that the United States has evinced time after time towards their Government, might well have waited to see what the President and Congress would do, the very fact of this conference shows what a potent weapon the boycott is Outrages on up our battleship strength. "At alli Chinese entitled by treaty to freely enter the United States have been going on for years, and though individual Americans who knew the facts and sympathised with the victims have protested, it required the threat of a boycott to rouse any organised attempt to get justice done to the Chinese, Mr. John Foord, the Secretary of the American Asiatic Association, was the spokesman of the delegation, and, in introducing it to the President, he pointed out that the object of the Association was to ce-operate with the Government in maintaining and defending the trade and treaty rights of the United States in the Far East. He went on to The occasion of this visit is to invite your attention to the present unsatisfactory relations with the Chinese empire, and the conditions growing out of those, which directly threaten the continuance of a profitable and highly essential part of our commerce. The friendly chat-acter of those relations has been of late adversely affected by the absence of a satisfactory immigration treaty between dise ion of the mercantile class in the United States and China, and by the China with what they conceive to be the unjust and oppressive operation of the rules adopted and enforced by the im. migration officers of the United States in dealing with those of their country. men whom our laws declare entitled to visit the country.
It must be held to be unfortunate that these laws are at variance with the treaty stipulations, which, since the expiration of the treaty of 1894, are in force between the two countries. "We are not here to question the competency of Congress to modify the provisions of any frosty with e Foreign Power, but we do question the expediency of the Govern. ment of the United States occupying an attitude in opposition to the principles which it has long maintained that a nation cannot plead its domestic legisla. tion as a bar to the observance of its international obligations.
The treatment accorded by the immigration officers of this Government to the exempt clasgos of Chinese visiting our
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.