Page 132 - Merchants and Mandarins China Trade Era

118.

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By the 1830 s American merchants, like other foreigners,

had begun to chip away at the regulations governing their resi­

dence at Canton. They learned that ignoring many of the ordi-
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1
th
't approva o
nances receive d th t aci 1 f 1 oca au ori ies. O 1 y
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when "illegal" activities grew to excessive proportions
(usually a British group at fault) or when the Imperial govern­
ment periodically decreed that the system be more thoroughly
administered, did local officials tighten their enforcement of

laws and regulations. While Americans considered this retrench­

ment an inconvenience, they conceded the Chinese right to such

action and seldom complained. They merely adjusted their methods

of trade. But they increasingly became dissatisfied with the

"Canton system" and especially the officials who enforced it.

Although Americans were generally willing to adhere to Imperial
1
law before the 1840 s, they lost respect for local authorities.

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By the late 1830 s American residents viewed Canton and
provincial officials as corrupt, dishonest, insincere, untrust­

worthy and dissolute men. After the Opium War Americans'

respect for the Chinese Empire's laws and system of trade

declined further.

When the first Americans appeared at Canton, the Chinese

judged them by the Europeans already there. As they pursued an

independent course relative to Chinese laws and regulations and

trade, the Chinese perception of them changed. While the most

common description of the foreign "barbarians" was that they

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Hunter, Bits of Old China, pp. 1-3.