The Straits Settlements in Context

Before exploring the notions of subjecthood held by Anglophile Straits Chinese and how it developed over time, it is necessary to first provide some insight into both the Straits Chinese community and the Straits Settlements, particularly the ways in which residency in the colony inculcated a distinct sense of belonging within the British Empire. In the first instance, it is important to acknowledge that the Straits Chinese were not a monolithic bloc but rather a heterogenous community constituted of both China- and overseas-born ethnic Chinese. The community at its broadest spanned a range of topolect groups, predominantly those with historical connections to the south-eastern provinces of Fujian and Guangdong in mainland China. Reflecting the diversity of their origins, Straits Chinese also had variegated conceptions of identity and belonging in relation to the Straits Settlements. There were sojourners—oftentimes newcomers to Malaya called sin-kheh who arrived during successive waves of Chinese migration from the mid-nineteenth century onwards—whose sole object was to earn a fortune in the Nanyang [Southern Seas] before returning to China. Alongside sojourners whose primary desire was a permanent repatriation to their homeland were peripatetic individuals like Khun Yiong based either in China or the Straits Settlements but travelling frequently between the two to conduct their business. Moreover, there were also hybridised communities like the Peranakan Chinese who held an unshakeable sense of belonging in the Straits Settlements, as they came from prominent families whose lineage could be traced back to the fifteenth century when the earliest Chinese merchants in the region married indigenous women from the Malay World.Footnote ¹³

The development of a significant Anglophile component among the Straits Chinese—particularly among the latter two categories outlined above—was a consequence of the nature of the Straits Settlements themselves. Part of this was a legacy of the formative years of the British imperial project in the Malay Peninsula as British and Chinese pioneers forged a mutually beneficial relationship as early as 1786 with the founding of the English East India Company (EIC) settlement on Penang Island by Francis Light. The nucleus of what would become the Straits Chinese community had made their way to Penang soon after the EIC's arrival at the behest of the trader Koh Lay Huan, who was seemingly attempting to diversify his commercial and political interests in the region by making an early investment in the Company, which at this point was an unproven entity rather than the pre-eminent power in the region that it would become. Light himself recognised Koh as a valuable asset for the fledgling settlement who not only commanded the growing Chinese population on the island but also provided entrée into networks of trade and commerce that stretched across Southeast Asia and beyond.Footnote ¹⁴ The trader was rewarded for his cooperation with the beginnings of the British imperial project by being appointed Kapitan Cina [Chinese captain] in 1787, marking the beginnings of Straits Chinese integration into the machinery of the colonial administration. More of the community were further entrenched within the fledgling British imperial presence in the Straits of Malacca following Stamford Raffles's establishment of an EIC outpost in Singapore in 1819 and the institution of British control over Malacca in 1824, as Straits Chinese individuals continued in their role as influential colonial intermediaries between the British, Chinese, and Malay communities across the peninsula.

The status of the Straits Settlements as a directly ruled colony also played a vital role in the development of a particular sense of belonging within the British Empire felt by Anglophile members of the Straits Chinese community. As residents of a British colony, Straits Chinese who were born in the Straits Settlements were granted jus soli subjecthood—with the caveat that both parents had to be British subjects either through birth or naturalisation as well—while those who could prove long-term residency had the option to be naturalised as a British subject. In contrast, those residing in the Federated Malay States of Selangor, Perak, Negeri Sembilan, and Pahang and the Unfederated Malay States of Johor, Kedah, Kelantan, Perlis, and TerengganuFootnote ¹⁵ were only ever eligible to the status of British protected persons. The category of British protected person was a vague and ill-defined status that identified citizens of a British protectorate as aliens falling under the protection of the British Empire but with no associated juridical rights—and responsibilities—like British subjects.Footnote ¹⁶ This distinction between the two legal statuses in the empire was further delineated by those designated British protected persons having no real avenue of achieving British subjecthood through naturalisation since they did not fall under the direct jurisdiction of Whitehall.

Under the policy of indirect rule, the Malay States were rendered as protectorates under the aegis of the British Empire that maintained their sovereignty, which meant that any subject of the Malay rulers remained as such and could only be granted the additional status of British protected person rather than British subjecthood. While those of Malay descent were automatically subjects of the Malay Rulers and consequently designated as protected persons, Chinese residents who were born in China and a majority of those born in the Malay States were not considered as such. Chinese communities outside of the Straits Settlements were instead classified by both the British and Malay administrations as resident aliens on the assumption that they were sojourners with no real orientation towards either the individual Malay polities or to the British Empire.Footnote ¹⁷ The Qing Dynasty's enshrinement of jus sanguinis—or blood lineage as the basis for citizenship— through the promulgation of the 1909 nationality law which set out that all those born to Chinese fathers, regardless of where they were born, were by definition Chinese nationals provided a further legal basis to reinforce the idea that they were an itinerant population.Footnote ¹⁸

Political distinctions between the directly ruled Straits Settlements and indirectly ruled Federated and Unfederated Malay States was reflected in the domestic legal status of their residents as British subjects and British protected persons respectively. It is worth noting that this delineation was blurred somewhat outside the borders of the empire due to both categories of persons being issued with British passports for travel.Footnote ¹⁹ Consequently, the Foreign Office viewed the two as holding the same prerogative for protection under the aegis of the British flag, though as we have seen in the case of Khun Yiong, whether this was put into practice was a different consideration altogether. Nonetheless, the starker contrast between the two statuses within Malaya as a whole would come to play a vital role in socialising groups like the Straits Chinese within the imperial edifice. As subject-citizens whose everyday lives were governed by the machinery of the colonial state and who were regularly confronted with the symbols, personnel, and institutions of empire, Anglophile communities in the Straits Settlements were imbued with a particular sense of belonging in what was visibly an imperial constituency. This stood in stark contrast with how residents of the Malay States—both Federated and Unfederated—conceptualised their place within the British Empire. In the first instance, the predominantly Malay population residing outside the major urban centres on the Malay Peninsula dominated by British colonial administrators retained a political culture centred around kerajaan, the long-standing custom of orienting their allegiance towards the ruler of their state in whom sovereignty was invested.Footnote ²⁰ Meanwhile, Chinese coolies recruited to work the tin mines on the mainland from the mid-nineteenth century onwards were predominantly sojourners whose notion of identity was tied with kinship and locality in China more so than Malaya and the British Empire.Footnote ²¹ Perhaps the only exception to the largely limited sense of place in the empire in the Malay States was in terms of the Indian labourers transplanted from the subcontinent—which was itself under direct British rule—to work on agricultural plantations and public works. Yet, in a similar vein as their Chinese counterparts, their sense of belonging was contingent not on imperial linkages but rather longstanding historical associations with one's caste, religion, and place of origin. Moreover, the nature of mass Indian migration in the nineteenth century, particularly the influx of “assisted migration”—a euphemism deployed by British authorities to obfuscate what was in effect indentured servitude—further complicated how ethnic Indians in Malaya related to their new surroundings.Footnote ²²

Which is not to suggest a complete absence of those on the mainland whose allegiance gravitated towards the British Empire. Economic and political elites from the Malay, Chinese, and Indian communities of Peninsular Malaya whose fortunes and influence were underpinned by their relationship with the British imperial project oftentimes articulated a strong connection to the empire. Moreover, within the discourse around modernisation and progress within the intellectual milieu of the mainland, there were also as many of those who were admirers of colonial forms of modernity as there were critics of imperial dominance. Among Malay elites, exposure to ideas of the modern took place within the context of their appropriation within the colonial bureaucracy either informally through the co-opting of the court structures of the Unfederated Malay States or formally within the Malayan Administrative Service in the Federated Malay States.Footnote ²³ Yet, the extent and depth to which the population in the Malay States associated themselves with the British Empire never quite matched the level and speed of identification reflected among their counterparts in the Straits Settlements. In no community was this Anglophile tendency more apparent than among the Straits Chinese, who not only took up employment with the political and economic institutions of the empire but also adopted a range of cultural practices as a means of displaying their commitment to it.

(Re)Constructing the Straits Chinese as “British”

Over the course of British rule in Malaya, Straits Chinese identity came to be deeply intertwined with notions of Britishness. One instructive anecdote from Singapore Free Press editor J. D. Vaughan is demonstrative of the community's self-perceptions regarding the depth of their connection to the empire. In his 1879 tract on the Chinese communities of the Straits Settlements, Vaughan described how “Babas Footnote ²⁴ on being asked if they were Chinamen bristle up and say in an offended tone ‘I am not a Chinaman, I am a British subject, an orang putih [white man]’” and that there was nothing the community would consider a higher honour “than being British subjects.”Footnote ²⁵ One major outlet by which the Straits Chinese (re)constructed their identities as British was through education. Following in the footsteps of Koh Lay Huan in embracing British colonists as an opportunity rather than a threat, the progenitors of what would become some of the most powerful Straits Chinese families in the colonies made the conscious decision to learn English in order to develop a working relationship with the EIC during the early years of the British presence in the Straits of Malacca.Footnote ²⁶ To build on the early connections they forged with the colonial apparatus, these families would also send successive generations of their children to the new English-language schools established by the colonial government and Christian missionaries over the course of the nineteenth century.Footnote ²⁷ By the end of the century, English education had become so entrenched among the Straits Chinese that their children could be found filling the majority of places in these schools across the Crown Colony.Footnote ²⁸ In eminent educational institutions like the Penang Free School, Malacca High School, and Raffles Institution, Straits Chinese children developed an affinity not only for the English language but were inculcated with the traditions, cultural practices, and central tenets of Britishness as part of their education.

The enthusiasm for an English education among the Straits Chinese presents a striking contrast with the intentions of the colonial powers-that-be in offering it. Though writing towards the end of the British Empire's hold on Malaya rather than during its zenith, the Malaysian author Han Suyin presents an evocative description of what constituted an English education under colonial rule and its reverberations:

While colonial officials were certainly motivated to provide an English education to communities like the Straits Chinese by a practical desire to reinforce their own power, English-educated Straits Chinese had other ideas for how to utilise their tutelage in the ways of their colonial rulers. In making the case for establishing a free universal system of English education in the Straits Settlements, the eminent Straits Chinese leader Tan Cheng Lock encapsulated the position held by many of his contemporaries in arguing that sending their progeny to English schools “inculcates good citizenship, it enables him a good living, and … is eminently fitted to give the best training to his mind, body and spirit,” which in turn would allow them to develop a “British outlook, in order that they may grow up to be loyal British subjects, and good, useful and patriotic citizens of the British Empire.”Footnote ³⁰ Education was thus not only a practical pathway for members of the community to acquire the working language of the colony to gain otherwise inaccessible economic opportunities. It was also a means by which the Straits Chinese could (re)construct themselves as British through the adoption of the cultural mores and values of the empire.

Academically inclined Straits Chinese students embedded themselves deeper within the imperial milieu through higher education, which they often undertook beyond the confines of the Straits Settlements. This was partly a consequence of tertiary education facilities in the colony itself being found lacking until the establishment of the King Edward VII College of Medicine—the forerunner to the University of Malaya—in 1904.Footnote ³¹ And even then, demand consistently outstripped the number of places available for taking up more advanced studies. Straits Chinese individuals and their families were moreover deeply enthusiastic about the prospect of travelling overseas to gain higher qualifications as it meant not only advancement within one's selected profession but also the ability to express one's Britishness within the wider empire. The establishment of the Queen's Scholarship scheme in 1889, which defrayed the costs of steamship travel to the metropole as well as providing its holder with a small stipend, enabled a range of remarkable Straits Chinese individuals like Dr Lim Boon Keng, Sir Song Ong Siang, Dr Wu Lien-teh, Yeoh Guan Seok, Leong Yew Koh, and Dr Lim Chong Eu to attend some of the best universities in Britain.Footnote ³² Queen's Scholars were not the only Straits Chinese who gained an education in the metropole. The scion of elite Straits Chinese families would also oftentimes be sent by wealthy relatives to study overseas as an investment into a future tied deeply to the British Empire.Footnote ³³ A majority of Straits Chinese youths were sent to Britain, but some were also sent to other institutions of higher learning elsewhere in the empire including Hong Kong and Rangoon.Footnote ³⁴ In these educational settings, successive generations of Straits Chinese socialised with fellow subject-citizens from all corners of the empire, providing an impetus for the development of a strong imperial-oriented identity built from their commonalities and shared experiences. It should be noted, however, that attending university in the metropole could sometimes have the inverse effect, particularly from the interwar period onwards as some Straits Chinese students came to be influenced by fellow subjects from other parts of the British Empire who held deeper anti-colonial convictions.Footnote ³⁵ Nevertheless, this represented a much smaller proportion of those who undertook their studies abroad, with the majority developing either an affinity towards the British Empire or a desire to reform it from within rather than outright enmity against it.

Promising Straits Chinese men—and increasingly women from the early twentieth century onwards—were not only trained in their chosen professions of engineering, law, and medicine in the storied university halls of Cambridge, Edinburgh, and Oxford. Their time in the metropole also yielded professional connections with white Britons who would later become senior officials in the Straits Settlements Civil Service and in Whitehall that they could call on, integrating them deeper within the machinery of the imperial bureaucracy. But more than that, Straits Chinese students at these leading universities also received valuable cultural tutelage from socialising within an elite British context, which equipped them with the language and tools to better engage in what Lynn Hollen Lees has evocatively described as “performances of Britishness.”Footnote ³⁶ Yet, engagement with Britishness as a cultural phenomenon went far beyond performance and instead reflected a deep-seated conviction in what they believed to be their rightful place within the empire as subjects of the Crown. For Anglophile members of the Straits Chinese community, the adoption of the vocabulary of empire was not simply an act of colonial mimicry in the sense of expressing subservience or engaging in mockery of the coloniser, as in Homi Bhabha's influential conceptualisation.Footnote ³⁷ Rather, it was part of a deliberate process to (re)construct themselves as cultural citizens of the empire.

Displaying Straits Chinese Citizenship

This process of, in a sense, becoming British was expressed not only in the written and spoken word but within a visual repertoire as well. Corresponding with increasing numbers of young Straits Chinese men and women receiving an English education both at home and abroad, members of the community could be seen more frequently sporting “Western” fashion in public from the turn of the century. As Katon Lee demonstrates in his study of suit-wearing among elite Chinese men in early twentieth-century Hong Kong, the process of adopting Western dress was intimately connected with colonial education. English-medium schools in both the Straits Settlements and Hong Kong—and in colonies across the empire—fostered a predilection towards Western style through programmes of cultural Westernisation. This was done through the regulation of fashion, manner, and etiquette, which was in turn reinforced by everyday encounters between local students and British educators and students who modelled how to look and act British.Footnote ³⁸ In wearing Western vestments outright or Westernising traditional attire, Straits Chinese men and women engaged in a process of refashioning not only their wardrobes but their cultural identities as well. For elite and middle-class Straits Chinese, the conspicuous adoption of Western dress symbolised an embrace of colonial modernity and a means by which to signify their social status and distinguish themselves from their Sino-centric counterparts.

Dressing in Western clothes among Anglophile Straits Chinese began as a predominantly male affair in the late nineteenth century, reflecting the educational opportunities and role in public life afforded to them in contrast to their female counterparts. The primary outfit by which men within the community demonstrated their inculcation within the milieu of Western fashion was the suit. Putting on a suit created a distinct visual identity for Straits Chinese men who were not only cast within the mould of a European gentleman in terms of style but also served as a marker of wealth given the high costs associated with sartorial production. Alongside the donning of suits, Straits Chinese male fashion also involved cutting off the towchang (queue), which began as a practical measure to ensure that Straits Chinese men travelling to China would be able to avoid the same predicament that befell Khun Yiong in 1897, but quickly took on a powerful symbolic meaning. The act of cutting off one's towchang by Straits Chinese to distinguish themselves from Chinese nationals—who were required by law to sport the braid—became a symbolic rejection of the perceived backwardness of Qing Dynasty rule in China and an embrace of British subjecthood as part of their cultural identity.Footnote ³⁹ In an article advocating for queue-cutting among Straits Chinese men, the prominent legislative councillor and community leader Dr Lim Boon Keng conceptualised the act as belonging to a broader programme of cultural reform which would demonstrate “by the lives and conduct and works of our people that we are deserving of the citizenship of the British Empire.”Footnote ⁴⁰

Straits Chinese women also underwent a transformation in style towards Western vogue but did so later than their male counterparts and in a distinctly more cosmopolitan fashion. This shift occurred as part of broader global developments during the interwar period as increasing educational and employment opportunities for women brought the phenomenon of the “Modern Girl” to life in major cities around the world. Challenging traditional expectations of a woman's role in society, the “Modern Girl” cut an alluring figure on both the page and the screen, selling an idea of female independence and modernity that was ultimately underpinned by conspicuous consumption.Footnote ⁴¹ The Straits Chinese incarnation of the “Modern Girl” adopted a more mediated approach to Western fashion, followed in the footsteps of her counterpart from Shanghai, the modeng xiaojie, in deploying a repertoire of fashion that included both traditional outfits updated to reflect a modern style as well as taking up Western dress outright. She exhibited a striking new look that brought together a shortened and form-fitting qipao or cheongsam—or kebaya in the case of Peranakan Chinese women—sporting Western motifs with bobbed hair, high heels, and make-up.Footnote ⁴² Beyond a visual demonstration through fashion, the Straits Chinese Modern Girl could also be seen as engaging with Western cultural norms through her embrace of independence from traditional social structures and gender roles, her participation in civic life, and her consumption of the products of capitalist modernity.Footnote ⁴³

Identification with the symbols, language, and style of the empire by Anglophile members of the Straits Chinese community was not solely a cultural exercise. It had a distinctly political impetus, demonstrating one's Britishness as a means of claiming the political and juridical rights that leading members of the community believed the community were entitled to as full subjects of the empire. This understanding of subjecthood among the Straits Chinese as a status entitling them to broader rights and privileges should be understood within the context of “becoming imperial citizens”—to borrow the evocative phrase used by Sukanya Banerjee—both in the sense of the process of claiming citizenship as well as reflecting their suitability to be citizens.Footnote ⁴⁴ Like their contemporaries in the British Raj, Straits Chinese political figures were drawing on an affective conception of citizenship wherein they abstracted themselves as part of an expansive community of equals that stretched across the empire. This reflected the discourse around subjecthood within the empire during the Victorian period, particularly in relation to how imperial thinkers and policymakers were attempting to define the status of white Britons in the settler-colonies of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa. While such ideas were never codified into law nor seen to be applicable to anyone other than white British subjects, there existed a universalist discourse of citizenship that all those born or naturalised within the British Empire “whether in London or Lagos, were technically subjects, all owing allegiance to the crown,” which was in turn “reciprocated through the protection the State provided its citizens.”Footnote ⁴⁵

This understanding of subjecthood as citizenship was a major feature of Straits Chinese political life and can be seen in how Straits Chinese elites attempted to construct the community as an engaged citizenry. One major outlet for their civic activities was the Straits Chinese British Association (SCBA), which acted as a hybrid between a community organisation and a political lobby group. The SCBA was initially established in Singapore on 17 August 1900 with subsequent branches opened in Penang and Malacca in the next few years. From its earliest days, the SCBA served as a proving ground for many Straits Chinese individuals who would rise to prominence in both the colonial and postcolonial periods.Footnote ⁴⁶ It acted as a space for them to set out their bona fides as community leaders as well as providing opportunities for them to socialise and network with not just fellow Straits Chinese luminaries but also British elites who were oftentimes invited as guests of the association. The SCBA was the product of prominent Chinese from all three settlements including Dr. Lim Boon Keng, Sir Song Ong Siang, Tan Jiak Kim, Seah Liang Seah, and Wee Thiam Tew coalescing around a desire to demonstrate the community's loyalty to king and country.Footnote ⁴⁷ Beyond an external display of allegiance, the SCBA was also designed to inculcate a sense of imperial belonging amongst the Straits Chinese, as made evident in its founding charter, which described the organisation's ultimate objective as promoting “among the members an intelligent interest in the affairs of the British Empire and to encourage and maintain their loyalty as subjects of the British Empire.”Footnote ⁴⁸ Both the internally and externally oriented facets of the SCBA's mission can be seen clearly in their public contributions to the cultural life of the colony.

One notable way the association sought to make their mark within the more immediate confines of the Straits Settlements as well as in the broader empire was through ostentatious acts of pageantry, which were on display during two visits by the royal family in the first decade of the twentieth century. The first royal visit took place in March 1901 when the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York embarked on a world tour of the British Empire—the longest in the history of the royal family to date—which included a stop in Singapore.Footnote ⁴⁹ To commemorate the event, nearly three hundred members of the SCBA volunteered to organise a grand reception in honour of the royal visitors, with the association's executive committee approving the exorbitant sum of $2,800 Straits dollars for the event's budget.Footnote ⁵⁰ What eventuated was indeed magnificent as the SCBA contribution to the royal visit included a seven-storey pagoda surmounted by a figure of Britannia holding an illuminated torch, which was “intended to express the [Straits] Chinese belief in the advancing influence of Great Britain for the benefit of mankind.”Footnote ⁵¹ A visit by the Duke of Connaught and Strathearn on the way to Japan in January 1906 featured a similarly illuminated welcome, with members of the association putting on a torchlight procession in their honour as well as a fireworks display following the formalities.Footnote ⁵² These displays of “public spirit” earned them the title of the “king's Chinese” in the metropole as they were lauded for their stirring demonstration of loyalty to the Crown, a moniker that they proudly adopted to reflect their sense of belonging within an imperial milieu.Footnote ⁵³

Imperial Citizenship in Action

Beyond spectacle, Straits Chinese political actors also demonstrated their engagement with imperial citizenship through their recurrent involvement in the apparatus of the colonial state. This was an expression of their citizenship in the sense of contributing to civic life, which was demonstrative of the community's stake within the Straits Settlements and the British Empire more broadly. But perhaps more importantly, it also reflected a nuanced understanding that being a citizen constituted not only rights but responsibilities as well. Prominent community leaders were active participants within the machinery of government in the Straits Settlements, serving as unofficial councillors in the Straits Settlements Legislative Council, community liaisons in the Chinese Advisory Board, commissioners in the municipal commissions of each of the three settlements, and as justices of the peace. Straits Chinese involvement in the Legislative Council—the hybrid legislative and advisory body intended to serve as a facsimile of Parliament in the colonies—was of particular note as the men who took up appointments as unofficial legislative councillors were a veritable who's who of Malaysian and Singaporean politics. The trader Hoo Ah Kay—more commonly known as Whampoa—was the inaugural unofficial legislative councillor representing the Chinese communities of the Straits Settlements and took up the position in 1869, just two years after the establishment of the Legislative Council.Footnote ⁵⁴ His successors included luminaries like Seah Liang Seah, Dr Lim Boon Keng, Tan Jiak Kim, Sir Song Ong Siang, Yeoh Guan Seok, Lee Choon Guan, Tan Cheng Lock, and Lim Cheng Ean, whose voting records and speeches highlight just how seriously they took on their responsibility in the colonial legislature.Footnote ⁵⁵

They did not serve as token representatives who were solely there to rubberstamp government policies but took on an active role in challenging the colonial state when it violated its ostensible values as well as putting forward their own political agendas. During their tenure, the aforementioned Straits Chinese unofficials used their position in the colonial legislature as an opportunity to construct a more representative system of governance by variously cooperating with, cajoling, and contesting their counterparts within the colonial government. They conceived their role in the Legislative Council as providing representation for their community by giving voice to their concerns and priorities in the administration of the Settlements. Later councillors like Tan Cheng Lock from Malacca and Lim Cheng Ean from Penang articulated a particularly cosmopolitan imagination of who their constituents were, advocating not only for their fellow Straits Chinese but also for other Asian communities resident in the Straits Settlements.Footnote ⁵⁶ In the aftermath of the First World War, both men mounted vociferous challenges against the racialised hierarchies inherent in the colonial system in an attempt to remake the Colony into a distinctly more democratic and representative space for their fellow non-European subject-citizens.

Between 1923 and 1933, Tan undertook a long-standing campaign to dismantle the colour bar—both the formal restrictions preventing non-Europeans from advancing beyond a certain level in the Civil Service as well as the unwritten constraints in other bodies—imposed in the Straits Settlements. He began by making the case that the government ought to “appoint more than one Asiatic member on the various government committees, boards, and other bodies appointed to deal with questions in which the entire community is concerned” and that there were “many able, educated, and public-spirited Asiatic gentlemen who are willing to serve if called upon to do so” in the Colony.Footnote ⁵⁷ Tan found it “so absurd, so contrary to actual fact and manifest truth, so opposed to the plain dictates of common sense, so preposterous” that the governor would justify the colour bar on the grounds that the majority of the populace preferred having Europeans in positions of authority.Footnote ⁵⁸ Going beyond challenging the colour bar, the unofficial councillor from Malacca also proposed further democratic representation in the Legislative Council itself in 1926, bringing forward the proposition that there should be one unofficial councillor for each of three major ethnic communities in the Colony—Chinese, Indian, and Malay—rather than the more ad hoc system of always appointing a Chinese councillor and sometimes appointing an Indian or Malay councillor.Footnote ⁵⁹ He made the case that expanding the legislature and giving the population a greater voice within it was a matter of principle as it would mean an engaged citizenry had the “effective constitutional means of repelling the invasion of our rights.”Footnote ⁶⁰ In his advocacy for increasing Asian representation in the institutions of power, Tan revealed a fundamental principle motivating Straits Chinese political activity, that those with the privilege of being subjects of the Crown were deeply invested in the Straits Settlements and had a duty to improve conditions for their community, which included more than just fellow Straits Chinese.

Like his contemporary, Lim Cheng Ean also used his privileged position in the Legislative Council to voice the concerns of the myriad communities that constituted the populace of the Straits Settlements. The unofficial councillor from Penang was similarly active in challenging the government's discriminatory approach to staffing the Civil Service and campaigned for the abolition of the colour bar.Footnote ⁶¹ Yet, Lim's priorities extended far beyond high politics and included a political programme focussed on social issues on the ground in the three settlements. He was a consistent proponent for welfare provision during the Great Depression, arguing that the government ought to provide unemployment benefits and engage in large-scale poverty alleviation programmes rather than just subsidising the largest—predominantly European—commercial firms.Footnote ⁶² Lim colourfully took the colonial government to task when they proved reluctant to support the unemployed, describing it as “doleful news indeed … that relief cannot be given to them because it has to be in the way of doles and the Government does not approve of doles.”Footnote ⁶³ In campaigning for social welfare, he made no distinction on the basis of ethnicity on who should be eligible, demonstrating a distinctly cosmopolitan conceptualisation of who the communities he represented were. More remarkably, Lim Cheng Ean viewed himself as not only responsible for all those already residing in the Straits Settlements but for future ones as well. He strenuously objected to the government's attempts to introduce the Aliens Bill (1932), which sought to restrict Chinese immigration by introducing excessively high entrance and landing fees as well as imbuing the colonial government with draconian powers of deportation and banishment. He questioned the administration's seemingly paranoid fear of new Chinese migrants and countered that if he headed up the government, he would not charge them to enter the country and would instead “pay immigrants $5 or $10 to come to this country” and would travel to China to “get the best possible immigrants, the most suitable immigrants, for this country.”Footnote ⁶⁴

Another major outlet for Straits Chinese expressions of civic responsibility was decidedly more martial, as men from the community volunteered to participate in the defence of the colony through the auspices of the Straits Settlements Volunteer Force (SSVF). Straits Chinese contribution in the empire's armed forces had its origins in 1901 when the unofficial legislative councillor Tan Jiak Kim—lobbying on behalf of the SCBA—was able to convince the government to allow for the creation of a Chinese regiment within the Singapore Volunteer Force.Footnote ⁶⁵ Their counterparts in Malacca attempted to follow suit in 1902 but were refused the privilege of forming their own regiment by the powers that be. Not to be discouraged, those that did volunteer opted to join a mixed-race Rifles Corps in the Malacca Volunteer Force which consisted of “Malays, Portuguese, Klings [Indians], Chinese, Eurasians, and Orang Puteh [Britons]” to fulfil what they saw as their responsibility to defend the colony.Footnote ⁶⁶ It was not until 1916 that the community was finally granted permission by the governor to form an exclusively Straits Chinese contingent—dubbed the Malacca Chinese Volunteer Company—within the settlement's defence forces.Footnote ⁶⁷ Straits Chinese men from Penang were able to form their own company sooner, constituting a rifle corps in the Penang Volunteer Force in 1907.Footnote ⁶⁸ While their numbers and perceived efficacy in the eyes of British officers fluctuated, the Straits Chinese companies were a long-standing fixture of the SSVF, demonstrating the community's sense of patriotism towards the empire through a commitment to its defence.Footnote ⁶⁹

Following the outbreak of World War I, the SSVF—and the Chinese companies in particular—took on a vital role in home defence as it replaced the regular British and Indian garrisons which had been sent off to fight on the Western Front. The SCBA were especially active in recruiting more men to serve in the volunteer forces and, in doing so, declared that it was because the Straits Chinese were a “thoroughly loyal and happy community owing allegiance to the King of England” who believed that there was “nothing better than to live in and die for the land of their birth.”Footnote ⁷⁰ Alongside taking up defensive duties, Straits Chinese also sought to express their commitment towards being loyal citizens of the empire through generous financial contributions to the war effort. They did so primarily through the mechanism of the War Loan Bonds, with the community investing so enthusiastically in each new issue of bonds that they ended up investing an astronomical sum of $1,346,000 Straits dollars by 1917.Footnote ⁷¹ Perhaps the clearest demonstration of Straits Chinese loyalty in contributing to the war effort—especially considering the community's long-standing opposition to any government attempts to levy them—was the SCBA's vociferous campaigning within and outside the Legislative Council to ensure the passage of the War Duties Bill (1916) which imposed an income tax on all residents in the Straits Settlements.Footnote ⁷² Their firm support for the war elicited effusive praise, such as the Straits Budget's declaration that the Straits Chinese “were a model community in the sense of the interest that they take in civic and Imperial affairs,” a view also reflected by not just the colonial government but authorities from the metropole as well.Footnote ⁷³

Outside the confines of the imperial edifice, the Straits Chinese idea of citizenship as an act of contributing to the betterment of the empire can be seen in the community's philanthropic endeavours. Leading individuals from the community generously donated both resources and time to an eclectic selection of causes, including poverty relief, anti-trafficking, public health and medicine, education, and opium eradication among others. Straits Chinese munificence was partly driven by adherence to longstanding Chinese cultural practices of philanthropy, which was underpinned by the Confucian virtues of ren (benevolence) and gong (public-mindedness).Footnote ⁷⁴ This coalesced with the agenda of social betterment held by progressive members of the community who viewed the improvement of conditions for their fellow subject-citizens as a social responsibility for good imperial citizens like themselves. The charitable institution which best reflected the synthesis of philanthropy as an expression of both Chinese cultural tradition and of imperial citizenship was the Po Leung Kuk [Office for the Preservation of Virtue]. Established in Singapore and Penang under the auspices of the Chinese Protectorate in 1888 with a subsequent branch opened in Malacca in 1915, the organisation was an offshoot of a body set up a decade earlier in Hong Kong to provide a refuge for young Chinese women who had been rescued from forced prostitution.Footnote ⁷⁵ As responsibility for administering the association on a day-to-day basis shifted from the colonial government towards the community, the remit of the Po Leung Kuk expanded, and it became a women's shelter that provided housing, welfare, and education to girls and young women from less fortunate backgrounds.Footnote ⁷⁶

The role of Straits Chinese leadership in the organisation—which included both men and women from the community—and their contributions to what had begun as a colonial rather than Chinese enterprise reflected a commitment to reflecting and enforcing ostensibly British liberal values geared towards the protection and uplifting of women and children. Nowhere was this more apparent than in the Po Leung Kuk's position on the mui tsai (little sister) controversy—the practice of girls from less fortunate families being adopted by wealthier families to work in their households until they reached marriageable age—that took place in the post–World War I period. As Rachel Leow has demonstrated, the mui tsai controversy was an intricate and complex imbroglio involving anti-slavery organisations, feminist groups, the colonial government, and competing factions of the Straits Chinese elite which should be understood not as an essentially Chinese issue as it has historically been characterised, but a transracial problem that imbricated non-Chinese mui tsai and adopting families.Footnote ⁷⁷

Nevertheless, the salient point for the purposes of this article is the way in which the issue pitted Anglophile Straits Chinese against more conservative members of the community. The former camp aligned with the colonial government's view of the practice as a form of slavery, believing that its continued existence was antithetical to their embrace of modernity, reflecting a cultural identification with British ideas and principles.Footnote ⁷⁸ Consequently, Anglophile members of the community energetically threw themselves into the work of rescuing and rehabilitating mui tsai via the Po Leung Kuk as well as campaigning in favour of the colonial government's efforts to abolish the practice altogether, actions that demonstrated their commitment to executing their duty as good imperial citizens.Footnote ⁷⁹ This clearly distinguished them from their compatriots more attuned to Chinese cultural traditions who made the case that rendering mui tsai as slaves was a fundamental mischaracterisation of a custom of legitimate adoption that saved girls from infanticide or lives of crushing poverty.Footnote ⁸⁰

While charity began at home in the Straits Settlements for Anglophile Straits Chinese, it very much extended abroad to the rest of the British Empire and oftentimes went beyond it as well. Members of the community were generous donors during an intensified period of philanthropic activity geared towards their fellow subject-citizens over the course of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a phenomenon evocatively described by Mark Ravinder Frost as an “overseas aid craze.”Footnote ⁸¹ Straits Chinese from all social classes and walks of life displayed a deep sense of imperial compassion by donating to appeals organised by the colonial administration. The community demonstrated an enduring sense of solidarity with their Indian counterparts in particular, with individuals and organisations donating generously towards famine relief in India in 1874, 1897, and 1900.Footnote ⁸² Beyond India, Straits Chinese could also be found contributing to other humanitarian efforts within the British Empire, including the Irish Famine Relief Fund in 1880 and the South Africa War Relief Fund in 1900.Footnote ⁸³ The generosity shown by the community should be understood not only through the lens of Straits Chinese demonstrating a sense of public spirit and loyalty towards the empire but also as a mechanism to make claims as imperial citizens. One member of the community going by the pseudonym of “A Chinese Resident” demonstrated this layered positionality in a letter to the Straits Times in 1880, challenging the colonial government's attempts to forcibly acquire a piece of land in front of the Chinese temple in Teluk Ayer, Singapore, that had historically been used for religious ceremonies. They questioned whether the administration's heavy-handedness towards the community was “an appropriate return for their such acts of liberality” given that the Straits Chinese had always “readily responded with a free hand and a liberal mind to the demand of Government for subscriptions in the case of any distress, such as the late famine in India and the present one in Ireland.”Footnote ⁸⁴ Straits Chinese philanthropy was thus a microcosm for the community's conceptualisation of their reciprocal relationship with the British Empire, where their enactment of subjecthood as citizenship entitled them to fair treatment from colonial authorities.

The Limits of British Subjecthood

Yet, despite their myriad displays of allegiance to the Crown and to the empire, Straits Chinese claims towards subjecthood as citizenship continued to be constrained by both administrative and societal limits. The plight of Khun Yiong which opened the article not only created the impetus for debates about who constituted a British subject and what rights and privileges that entailed but was also emblematic of the ways in which Straits Chinese were excluded from the entitlements they believed was their birthright as British subjects. Picking up the narrative thread left off earlier, the trader's travails did not end with the refusal by the British minister in Peking and the British consul in Amoy to countenance any aid to him. In an attempt to force British authorities to provide him with the consular protection he believed he should have been afforded, Khun Yiong went so far as to send a petition to Governor of the Straits Settlements Charles Mitchell in order to prove his status as a British subject.Footnote ⁸⁵ Mitchell immediately commissioned an investigation, and the report produced as a result did corroborate some of Khun Yiong's claims, particularly that he was born in Singapore to parents who were themselves British subjects and that transactions in the trader's accounts suggested that he was in Singapore at the time the German firm alleged he was chartering the steamship in Amoy. At the same time, the report also provided further ammunition to the initial accusations by the British Empire's representatives in China that while he was a de jure British subject, not de facto. Mitchell's inquiries into Khun Yiong also revealed that the merchant maintained two separate families in Amoy and Singapore, with his Singaporean wife also residing in Amoy at the time of his arrest.Footnote ⁸⁶

The British minister in Peking thus justified his initial and continued reluctance to intervene on behalf of Khun Yiong on the grounds that

Ultimately, Khun Yiong's petition was unsuccessful, and while Colonial Office records are unclear on his fate, it is most likely he ended up serving out his term in prison following Whitehall's determination that Her Majesty's Government ought not intervene given he was not a “true” British subject.Footnote ⁸⁸ Notions of Britishness as being synonymous with whiteness inflected this decision, particularly given the continued dominance of racialised hierarchies being the primary mode of social structure within both the metropole and in the colonies. Demonstrations of loyalty in word and deed by the Straits Chinese went far in pushing the discourse on what the status of subjecthood actually entailed, but would be confronted time and again with the realities of who held power and their interpretations of not only who could be considered a British subject but even if they were recognised as such, and what rights they were entitled to.

Another evocative example of these limits can be seen in the aforementioned campaign by Tan Cheng Lock to dismantle the colour bar in the institutions of state in the Straits Settlements, which was ultimately unsuccessful. Despite an acknowledgement by the colonial government that Straits Chinese civil servants had indeed demonstrated unfaltering loyalty and carried out their duties with distinction, the powers that be in the colony and the metropole nevertheless would refuse to allow the community and other “Asiatics” from advancing up the ranks on the basis of race. Though never explicitly articulated, the centrality of race in this decision can be seen in Secretary of State for the Colonies Lewis Harcourt's justification that the point was moot given non-European residents of the Straits Settlements would “dislike and resent officers of alien origin being placed in authority over them unless those officers are of pure European descent on both sides.”Footnote ⁸⁹ Race—alongside class and gender—would continue to serve as a powerful counterpoint to more liberal conceptions of subjecthood as citizenship within the halls of power and in the minds of imperial thinkers as well as more quotidian settings in the metropole and colonies. Within the eyes of imperial and colonial authorities, to be British was to be white, and as such, colonial subjects of colour were thus ineligible to make claims towards equal standing and treatment. But it is precisely because of such narrow-minded interpretations of belonging within the empire that prompted the Straits Chinese and many of their fellow non-white colonial subjects to articulate a new vision of what it meant to be British.

As Vivian Kong has masterfully demonstrated in her recent monograph about the nature of Britishness in Hong Kong—a study with implications in many settings across the British Empire including the Straits Settlements—the question of who was considered British and what that meant to both coloniser and colonised was not a static construction.Footnote ⁹⁰ These notions of inclusion and exclusion were shaped and reshaped by contestations not only between non-white British subjects and imperial and colonial authorities but also between the former and their white counterparts within the social and cultural milieu. Straits Chinese efforts to lay claim to a sense of British cultural citizenship operated in both official and unofficial settings should thus be read not only as a means of circumventing rigid racialised colonial hierarchies but precisely also as a means of challenging prevailing notions of Britishness and rethinking what it meant to be a British subject. In relation to being British, this meant expanding the horizons of race and nationality to accept a wider, more diverse range of communities as sharing particular characteristics of Britishness rather than equating identity with race. Concurrently, the status of being a colonial subject of the British Empire was also reinterpreted as holding equivalency in terms of holding the same rights—and responsibilities—as citizens in the metropole.