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| Chinese laundry family in Vancouver 1874 |
Incredible but true: Montreal police arrested and imprisoned at between 125 and 300 Chinese laundry business owners in 1900 for failing to pay a new tax directed at their businesses.
How long they stayed behind bars is not made clear in news reports but the men stayed incarcerated for at the very least 10 days, as noted in the case of On Lee who was jailed on 21 May and still there on 31 May.
In early 1900 Montreal passed a special bylaw ordering Chinese laundries to pay $50, somewhere in the ballpark of $1,800 today.
Virtually none of the Chinese laundries had paid the special tax by the end of May, which was decried by an Alderman St. Pierre who called it "an attempt to drive the Chinese out of the country." He urged the city to reduce the tax to $12 but the plea fell on deaf ears.
It is unclear whether the tax was on top of, or instead of a difficult-to-collect water tax that the Chinese laundries were expected to pay.
By the end of May 1900, 125 Chinese laundry owners were behind bars and their businesses closed down. Police were meanwhile seeking another 75 of them to imprison at the time. Some of those Chinese laundrymen had paid deposits on the $50 payment but were jailed nonetheless.
Some Montrealers, including Reverend Dewey and Dr. Thompson organized a meeting a St. Paul's Church and launched a petition to free the men.
Some Montrealers distrusted the Chinese for their differences, including religious differences. Some labour union officials also targeted the Chinese laundries, as they were a commercial threat to women-run laundries, steam laundries and convents, which did similar work but less efficiently.
Other cities, such as Boston, which had four times as many Chinese laundries, had no such dedicated tax.
One of the incarcerated laundrymen, Yip Hop, 29, died at the House of Refuge of a respiratory ailment 29 May 1900.
Commercial landlords appreciated the Chinese laundries because they operated thriving businesses where previous efforts had failed and they paid a higher rent rate to boot. At least one landlord consulted a lawyer to see if he could force the city to release the men.
Authorities frequently had difficulty finding the Chinese laundry owner to arrest, as all routinely denied being the boss upon visit.
The precise legal mechanism that permitted authorities to imprison people who failed to pay a tax remains unclear, although one reference mentions a Judge Wurtele who ruled that people could not be jailed for costs arising out of a debt to the city. But there they were behind bars anyway.
The Chinese laundries, in many cases, were robbed and looted while the operators were incarcerated.
Occasionally somebody would visit the Chinese laundrymen men in jail, inspiring a sense of hope, but the visitor would invariably be a customer asking about their status of their laundry.
By June it had become abundantly clear that the new tax was a failure and Montreal's Finance Committee recommended that it be reduced to $25. The suggestion found support but was not adopted into law as some aldermen opposed the reduction including Lavallee and Lebeuf.
Alderman Ekers's motion to reduce the tax to $25 was unanimously adopted in mid-September but it appears that it still did not turn into law.
By October the city of Montreal was forced to admit that it had spent over $1,000 incarcerating the Chinese while only collecting $1,200 on the tax. Some pointed out that the city would have collected $7,0000 had it taxed the Chinese only $25.
La Presse reorted on 13 November 1900 that Montreal authorities had jailed 300 Chinese laundrymen. A group of 14 attempted to sue the city for $55 in compensation for the incarceration but Judge Dorion tossed the case out.
Newspapers made no further reference to the Chinese laundry tax and it remains unclear what its fate was.
The Chinese laundrymen put in jail included: Yick Ham, Wing Wah, Wing Loung, Lee Kee, Kin Kee, Song Lee, Tom Woo, Yon Lee, Sing Lee, Ack Lee, Yun Lung, Charles Lun, Yea Lea, Hop Chong, Chum Wah Lung, Sam Sing, Sam Sing, Lee Kee, Quong Chon, Sing Kee, Quong Sing, Charlie Mark, Hum Kim, Quong Sang, Charlie You, Sam Hing, Sam Hing, Charlie HopLee, Sing Kee, Sam WahSing, WahLee, Sing Lee, SendLee, Charrlie Sam Tong, Charlie Ling, John Lee, Quing Sing, Yea Lea, Yea Leo, Yick Lee, On Lee, Yep Quond Sang, Quong Lee, Quong Sing, Sing Lee, Wong Sing, Tom Hope Lee, Yee Sing, Wing Chong, Sung Kee, John Thomas, Wong Sung, Quong Sing, On Sing, Hop Sing, Sang Lee, SamKee, Sing Lee, Charle Wing Kee, DueLee, Lion Sam, Quing Sing, Lee Hong,Ho Dog, op Hing Long, Wong Sing, Quong Kee, Chung Wah, Sam Lee, HopLee, Sam Hop Quong Kee, Sing Kee, Lee Chung, Quong Chong, Quong Sing, Junk Lee, WahLee, Charlie Wah, Sing Lee, Hung Wah, Song Lee, SamLee, Lee Wing,Tom Lee, Quong Chong, Tom Sing, Quong Sing, Wah Lee, Fung Lee, Wee Sam, Mark Sing, Wing Song Lee, Tom Sing, Sam Hing, Wah Lee, Hop Lung, Hope Lee, WahKee, Jam Lee, Hop Lee, Lee Kei, Charlie Wing, Sam Hop Lee, Charlie Lin, WahHing Lung, Wong Huen, WahLung, John Lee, Youth Lee, Hop Lee, Charlie Wah, Kim Long, Song Lee, Wing Wah, Song Sing, CharleyYoung, Song Lee, Song Chon, Quong Chong, Sang Lee Lang, Sam Lee.
-From "Laundry Tax Ruins Many Celestials" Montreal Daily Star. Thursday 31 May, 1900.
For more on Chinese laundries in Montreal, see this story.
Thanks….interesting….
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