The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, The Morning News and The Echo. MONDAY, JANUARY 9, 1899.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 6, 9 January 1899, Page 4

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, The Morning News and The Echo.

MONDAY, JANUARY 9, 1899.

For tie tauso- t&at la»k» asssistaaes, Fer tie mans tktit aessss rssiEtaase, Fwthe fatwe i» tko iistasis, And lis £itd that ira can i.».

THE AUSTRIAN INFLUX,

Whatever diifference of opinion there may be about the legality of the action taken by the Government in excluding Austrian • immigrants who cannot prove that they have sufficient money to maintain themselves until they can obtain licenses under the law of last- session regulating the gumfields, we believe there will be a pretty

unanimous sentiment against the right claimed by great foreign shipping companies to exploit this country as they please. There is not the slightest doubt that the Austrian influx has been chiefly promoted by these companies, but especially by the German lines; the Austrian Government certainty does not desire the exodus which is taking place from their shores, and will probably welcome any measures adopted at this end to. stop it; but the shipping companies take up a much more arrogant attitude—they say, \ye will force these people" upon you whether you like it or not. Advices have been received that there are forty-one Austrians aboard tbe Orizaba, so that with those by the Konigen Louise, about one hundred of these immigrants, are now awaiting transhipment to Auckland. The shipping companies have made a demand for passages upon the Union Steamship Company, accompanied by a threat of pains and penalties if they refuse. On this side the Government declare that these immigrants will not be aUowed to land unless they give proof that they can comply with the conditions which must be fulfilled before they can follow the occupation which they have been induced to come here for, so that a very pretty complication has arisen. It remains to be seen who will prevail —the Government of the colony or the foreign shipping companies. We do not think it can be questioned for a moment that every Government in the exercise of sovereign rights over its own territories - can exclude aliens. Such rights are constantly exercised by European Govern- | ments; the United States has compelled shipping companies over and.

over again to take back pauper passengers; Prussia is now exercising such rights against the Danes; and Russia against all nations by closing Talienwan and Port Arthur in its recently acquired Manehurian territory. In one case referred to it, the Privy Council, the highest Court in the Empire, decided that the Victorian Government had the power to pass and enforce laws excluding Chinese. The single question about which there may be a reasonable doubt is, whether such exclusion can be enforced by Executive authority without the enactment of a specific statute, but that is not- a matter involving any principle of international law—it can only be determined by suit in the local Courts. The South Australian Gov-

ernment, as well as our own, has assumed the existence of Executive power to exclude aliens, and has acted

upon this assumption in a notice which appears in the South Australian 'Gazette' of the 28th of July last.

However, the matter is one that may be very easily settled. If the shipping companies and the Austrian Consul are satisfied that these immigrants will not become a burden on the State, let them enter Into the guarantee of £10 per head, which the Government estimates as necessary to maintain an immigrant for three months, fit him out, and pay for his gum lif.en.se. If they are not willing to do this, why should the State accept the risk for the benefit of the shipping- companies. which are making money by the conveyance of these immigrants'?