THE VANCOUVER RIOTS.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 12906, 11 September 1907, Page 6

THE VANCOUVER RIOTS.

The statement cabled a fern- days ago, tbat the people of British Columbia were almost panic-stricken in the presence of what was believed to bo an organised attempt to make the Pacific Coast a "Yollow" country, is to some extent confirmed by the details of the serious anti-Japanese riot in Vancouver. So far aa we hear, nothing had occurred to inflame tho public so suddenly against the Japanese. It is quite possible that the original attack on the Japanese and Chinese stores, some ten days ago, was due to the fiery speeches at a meeting of one of the Anti-Asiatio Leagues, delivered! under tho stimulus of the fear that British Columbia wiaa on the verge of becoming the scene of an organised system of Japanese immigration. It was stated in the Vancouver papers some weeke ago that such a system was to be put in operation, and that thousands of Japanese from Hawaii, afraid t> venture into California, intended' to descend upon British Columbia. Tho story may or may not have been well founded, but obviously it was accopted in Vancouver, and it may have proved tho spark that fired the powder. There is already a considerable body of Japanese in British Columbia, whose chief port is only thirteen days distant from Yokohama, and it is not unlikely that recent events in California havo not only diverted Japanese immigration from San Francisco to Vancouver, but have induced numbers of Japanese already settled in California to leave a country where they were exposed to insult and injury, and migrate to British Columbia, which appeared to offer an acceptable refugo from the anti-Japanese riotere of San Francisco. They would find themselves among a large number of their fellowcountrymen. There were 5000 Japanese at the end of last year in close contact with the British population, being engaged as hotel servants, on the railwaye, and in the mines, in tho salmon fisheries, and many other industries. They are not popular with the whites, yet thbugh Chinese are admitted only on payment of a poll tax of £100, there is no such restriction on Japanese immigration. The fact that two important trans-Continental railways are now being constructed in Canada may here something to do with inducing more Japaneso to enter tho country, for though, as our late visitor, Mr C. H. Gibbons, told a Dunedin interviewer, tho railway builders are debarred by the terms of their charters from using alien workers, their enterprises must further exhaust the available white labour supply, so that the incentive to Japanese labour would be greater at present than under normal conditions. From whatever cause it arose, the riot was a deplorable and disgraceful affair. It is not probable that Japan will make trouble over the incident, but it places her ally, England, in an awkward position, and will make any continuance of tho negotiations that have been going on for the restriction of Japanese immigration a matter of some difficulty.