The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1898-03-28
Bu>le Ne70s.
WIDENING ITS SCOPE.
Damage suits Against Merchants for
Helping the Chinese Boycott.

Damage suits Against Merchants for
Helping the Chinese boycott.
The Chinese boycott cases are widen
ing in their scope and according to the
present intentions OF counsel for the
Chinese the investigation now going on
will result in a score Of damage suits
against as many merchants and busi-
ness men of Butte. and the boycott is
to be made an unpopular institution in
Montana. During the examination of
witnesses before Judge Blake the facts
were brought out that a large lumber
of merchants. professional men and
others made monthly contributions to
a fund to be used in prosecuting the
boycott against the Chinese during the
past three, four or five years. Francis
Brooks. one of the attorneys for the
complainants. being questioned about
the matter yesterday, confirmed the
report that suits for damages would be
brought in behalf of the Chinese. who
suffered from the boycott, against ev-
cry person who has been in anyway
connected with the prosecution of the
boycott, or who has contributed money
to the fun solicited by committees
from the labor unions. 1t has even
been minated as most likely that per-
sons who discharged their Chinese en-
ployes under threat of a boycott Will
be made in the suits for
damages. Every Chinese merchant,
restaurant keeper, wash house proprie-
tor, gardener, vegetable peddler. cook,
servant and common laborer claims To
have suffered financially on account of
the boycott, and every mothers son of
them will have a claim for damages.
Every Chinaman in Butte has signed
a power of attorney. or authorization
OF some kind, by which Hum Fay n
the other complainants in the injunc-
ton suit will prosecute the wholesale
suits for damages in behalf of all the
Chinese.
Louie, the Chinese interpreter and
the Butte representative of the Six
Companies, stated yesterday that the
threatened suits for damages would
certainly De brought. but that no ac-
ton in that direction would be taken
until after the conclusion of the injunc-
ton hearing. When that investiga-
ton is finished a copy of the testimony
will be certified and sent to the Chi
nese minister at Washington, who will
then make a demand on the United
States government for an indemnity
for the alleged loss suffered by the Chi
nese of Butte. 1t is said that a similar
demand will be made by the Japanese
minister in behalf of the few Japs in
Butte who were included in the gen.
eral Monaghan boycott.
so far the boycott investigation has
been q sort of fishing excursion and
covered the whole range of possibilities
and probabilities, the object of which
was unknown to any one but the fish
ermen. 1t is apparent now that the
reason for it was to bring out the
names of every person in Butte who
gave the remotest announcement to
the boycott. Before Colonel Sanders
and his yellow friends get through with
the affair they promise to make the
Butte boycott noted and known the
world over.
The intention to have a number or
labor union officials cited to appear be-
fore Judge Knowles to show cause why
they should not be punished for con-
tempt for falling to produce certain
record books not in their possession,
seems to have been abandoned, tenn
porarily at least, for the matter has
not been presented to Judge Knowles,
and il is understood will not be.