Note 68 — Chapter XIII · RESOURCES AND FINANCE

“There had been,” says Mr. D. W. Stevens, “some criticism because such a law was considered necessary; and Japanese legal procedure was accused of being defective, on this account, by certain foreign critics. But in the late seventies the British Court at Yokohama released a man who had been detected counterfeiting Japanese money, on the ground that there was no British law under which to punish him, and that Japanese law against counterfeiting did not apply to British subjects in Japan. And the highest British courts have held that a contract to smuggle goods into a foreign country is a valid contract as between British subjects in Great Britain.” The entire matter is dwelt upon at such length because it illustrates so well the inability of the Koreans for “independent” management of their own internal affairs, and also the animus and propriety of much of the anti-Japanese criticism.