Page 234 - Merchants and Mandarins China Trade Era

220.
. . . . 21
f
Chinese b uyers to re use price increases in opium.
While economic conditions were hurting many American

merchants in the opium trade, the Chinese tightened their pro­
1
hibitions on the drug. After the Emperor s edict of 1800,
22
which banned all cultivation and importation of opiumu

officials in the Imperial government had reiterated his pro­

clamations. Yet edicts issued by the Hoppa and the governor­

general had little effect, as no one enforced them strictly.

1
Again in 1810 and 1811 the Chia-ch ing Emperor stressed his
opposition to the drug and urged his officials to increase

their efforts to enforce Imperial regulations. Shortly there­

after the Emperor discovered that some of his own bodyguards

had become addicted to opium. He then cormnanded authorities

to punish publicly all addicts and any officials who connived

1
in the illegal trade. As the Emperor s concern with the opium

trade increased, local enforcement of Chinese laws against

the trade grew more rigorous. American participation in the

trade after the War of 1812 developed against this background.

As a result several American vessels with the contraband

21
Problems in the Canton market for Turkey opium did
not bother Cushing. He noticed "a growing demand for it in
Java where it will not be out of the way for vessels that have
it to stop & take the chance of a market. 11 Letter, Perkins &
Co. to J. & T.H. Perkins, Feb. 20, 1821, Perkins & Co. MSS.
22
For a list of Imperial edicts concerning the opium
trade in the period 1729-1839, see Chang, Cormnissioner Lin and
the Opium War, pp. 219-21.