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U.S. Empire and Pacific Dislocations Davianna Pomaika'i McGregor Associate Professor of Ethnic Studies,
The Peabody Essex Museum, in quintessential orientalist fashion, proudly displays exquisite artifacts and treasures of the United States expansion into the Pacific and Asia through the China Trade. Early in the establishment of the United States of America as an independent country, the lucrative China Trade was a principal route targeted to enrich the fortunes of American commercial entrepreneurs in New England. Essential to the success of private American merchant and business interests in this trade was the deployment of the national resources of the U.S. federal government and its armed forces to protect and develop international trade and commerce. With the Western discovery of Hawai'i in 1778 by the British Captain James Cook, American maritime entrepreneurs viewed Hawai'i as an ideal "stepping stone" for the conduct of the trade in furs from the Northwest shores of North America for the riches of China such as tea, silks, and porcelain. In 1787, the first two American ships, the Columbia and the Lady Washington entered the China trade. Over time, the supply of furs declined and ships extended their trading range along the entire northwest coast and as far south as what is now California. When it took more than one season to acquire a full load of cargo, fur traders used Hawai'i as a wintering port. At the turn of the century, around 1810, a commodity was discovered in Hawai'i that could be traded in the China market—sandalwood. Its fragrant wood was valued in China for drawers, chests, fans and combs. As a result, Hawai'i became more than a stopover for provisions, but an integral part of the now complex fur and sandalwood trade route to the China trade. The islands also became a source of cheap and reliable labor for the American sailing ships and the American trade outpost settlements established in the American Northwest. By 1838, the United States Congress acted to fund the first National Exploring Expedition. The federal government and military collaborated with private commercial interests to promote a scientific and commercial expedition by the Navy Department. Three private societies of maritime entrepreneurs—the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, the East India Marine Society of Salem, Massachusetts, and the Naval Lyceum of New York—were called upon to help define the mission and activities of the expedition. These societies had lobbied Congress to fund the expedition to advance and develop U.S. navigation, shipping, commerce, exploitation of the whale and seal fisheries, and scientific knowledge. For example, the East India Marine Society of Salem justified the funding of the expedition to the Congress as follows:
The final instructions to Captain Charles Wilkes reflected both the commercial and scientific purposes of the mission. In part it stated: "The Expedition is not for conquest, but discovery. Its objects are all peaceful; they are to extend the empire of commerce and science; to diminish the hazards of the ocean, and point out to future navigators a course by which they may avoid dangers and find safety" through exploration of what was then called the South Sea. ". . . Although the primary object of the Expedition is the promotion of the great interests of commerce and navigation, yet you will take all occasions, not incompatible with the great purposes of your undertaking, to extend the bounds of science, and promote the acquisition of knowledge."[2] Between 1839 and 1841 the expedition reached and surveyed the Hawaiian Islands and collected natural specimens. The vast collection of specimens from Hawai'i and the Pacific comprises the original core collection of the Smithsonian Institution when it was mandated by the U.S. Congress to house the vast collection. On December 30, 1842 President John Tyler announced the policy of his administration to protect the independence of Hawai'i from colonization by any other foreign power. The Tyler Doctrine effectively extended the non-intervention policy of the Monroe Doctrine for Central and South America to the Hawaiian Islands. In his report to Congress, the President stated:
As U.S. investments in Hawai'i increased, American missionaries, merchants, and planters played a prominent role in the Hawaiian government and its military defense against European and Asian imperial powers. By the end of the nineteenth century the United States adopted its own imperial policy of expansion beyond North America. Annexations of 1898 "Remember the Maine" was the battle cry which provoked the United States of America to declare war on Spain on April 11, 1898. On February 15, 1898 the U.S.S. Maine had exploded and sunk to the bottom of the Havana harbor with more than 250 men. Later investigations showed that it was actually the ammunition stored in the hold of the ship which had exploded. What triggered the explosion, however was the subject of accusation and counter-accusation and still remains a mystery. The U.S. blamed Spain, Spain accused the U.S. of sabotage, and both pointed fingers at Cuban conspirators. The February 1998 issue of the National Geographic reported on a modern computer modeling study of the U.S.S. Maine wreckage, reminiscent of that shown in the movie, Titanic. The National Geographic study revealed that the explosion could have been caused by either an external mine or a spontaneous internal fire in the coal bunker. A key section of the ship's bent hull which could solve the mystery is buried in mud off the shores of Cuba. What is crystal clear, however, is that the U.S. declaration of war against Spain was an outgrowth of the U.S. economic crisis of the 1890's and a natural progression of U.S. foreign diplomacy. When American consumption could not keep up with the overproduction of both industrial and agricultural goods in the United States in the 1890's, economists looked to oversees markets to rescue the American economy from depression. Officially, the United States had been founded on a democratic anti-imperialist philosophy. The oppressed American colonies had asserted their democratic independence from the autocratic British imperialist monarchy. According to the "American Myth" it was inherently un-American and undemocratic for the United States, itself, to acquire colonies. In reality, the United States had been expansionist from its inception. The new American Republic was constantly warring with Native American nations in order to conquer them and incorporate their national lands into the union. In 1846, the United States went to war against Mexico and under the 1848 treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, Mexico ceded its claims to territory that eventually became the states of California, New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, Texas, Nevada, and Utah. By the 1890's, the United States extended from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. With no "frontier" remaining on the continent, American economists recommended the acquisition of overseas colonies as the cure to the recurring economic crises of overproduction. Congressional debates raged between the imperialists and the anti-imperialists. To resolve the dilemma, the imperialists advocated for "insular expansion" to keep an "Open Door" for U.S. exports in Asia and South America. Alfred Thayer Mahan, Frederick Jackson Turner, Theodore Roosevelt, Henry Cabot Lodge Albert J. Beveridge, and William McKinley emerged as the principal architects of this strategy. A speech by Albert Beveridge in Indianapolis on September 16, 1898 captures the rationale and the spirit of the expansionists:
Insular expansion, involved the development of a powerful navy, the construction of an isthmian canal, and the acquisition of island (insular) colonies for naval bases which would serve as coaling stations for a superior navy. The United States would not have to acquire "real" colonies on the continents, nor carve out zones of influence as the imperialistic European powers had done. An isthmian canal zone and small island nations would suffice as colonial possessions for the deployment of a powerful U.S. Navy. The Navy would police the seas to keep them open for the free flow of American industrial and agricultural surpluses to the large populations of Asia and South America on a most-favored nation basis. Puerto Rico and Cuba in the Caribbean and Guam and the Philippines in the Pacific, colonies of a weak and moribund Spanish empire, were ideally suited to the strategy. Panama was chosen for the construction of the isthmian canal. Hawai'i, with its proximity to the West Coast, its large protected deep draft harbor at Pu'uloa (Pearl Harbor), and an economy dependent upon the United States, would serve as a strategic staging ground for U.S. naval forces in the Pacific and Asia. American control of Samoa would deny use of its harbor by competing European navies. On July 7, 1898, in the middle of the Spanish-American War, and two months after Admiral Dewey defeated the Spanish in Manila Harbor, President McKinley signed the Newlands Joint Resolution of Annexation of Hawai'i. On December 10, 1898 the U.S. and Spain signed the treaty of Paris under which the Spanish government ceded its interest in Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and Guam to the United States of America and Cuba became independent. In April 1900, Samoan chiefs signed a deed ceding Eastern Samoa to the United States. Under the Platt Amendment of 1901, Cuba became a U.S. protectorate and the U.S. established a naval base at Guantanamo. The United States entered the twentieth century as a world power determined to Americanize the multi-ethnic peoples of the Pacific and the Caribbean islands which they had just conquered. Structures of Colonization From 1898 to 1902 America waged a war against the people of the Philippines. In May 1901, the New York Times interviewed General J. Franklin Bell who estimated that over 600,000 people in Luzon, alone, had been killed or had died of disease as a result of the Filipino-American War. After 1901, 400,000 more Filipinos were killed in military campaigns against the people of Panay, Samar, Batangas and Mindanao. A million Filipinos were killed in what the Americans insisted was just the Filipino Insurrection. Hawai'i proved to be an important staging and refueling base for American troops being transported to fight the war in the Philippines. The colonization of Guam, Samoa and Hawai'i was not as brutal as that of the Philippines, although it was equally successful in suppressing the sovereignty of the Chamorros, Samoans, and Hawaiians. Americanization of the island peoples who came under the American flag in 1898 was primarily implemented through an educational system which required English as the medium of instruction; agricultural capitalism which displaced subsistence farmers from rural countrysides and tracked them into urban wage labor; and the confiscation of national lands for American military bases. Hawai'i is a case study of this process. Hawai'i: Case Study of Colonization Under the Organic Act which served as the constitution for Hawai'i as a Territory, English became the official language of the islands. When schools closed for summer vacation in June 1900, it was the last time that Hawaiian was to be heard in the classrooms and playgrounds. Children were punished for speaking Hawaiian in school—made to stand in the corner with one leg raised for several hours or to make a fist that was beaten with a ruler. It was too late to assimilate the adults. The colonial power structure aimed at training a new generation of Hawaiians to think in English, as Americans. The Hawaiian language was threatened with extinction. In 1900, plantations harvested 289,544 tons of sugar from 66,773 acres of Hawaiian land. By 1920, the plantations harvested 556,871 tons of sugar from 114,100 acres of Hawaiian land. This increased in 1930 to 930,627 tons of sugar from 136,136 acres of land. The security of a stable American market for Hawaiian sugar, after Annexation led the sugar planters to expand the number of acres planted in sugar and to invest in an infrastructure to accomplish that. Of critical importance to the expansion of the industry was the development of vast irrigation systems which carried millions of gallons of fresh water from the wet windward sides of the islands to the dry leeward plains. On O'ahu, the planters constructed the Waiahole tunnel and ditch system from 1913 to 1916. Ultimately, stream waters from Waihe'e to Kahana, on windward O'ahu were diverted for the production of sugar on the dry Ewa plains. On Maui, additional ditch systems were constructed to carry the waters of the Ko'olau streams from Nahiku through Ha'iku over into Pu'unene from 1903 to 1920. On Hawai'i, the upper and lower Hamakua Ditch systems were constructed in 1906 and 1910 respectively and the Kohala Ditch from 1905-1906. The impact of these irrigation systems upon rural Hawaiian taro farmers was devastating. Cut off from the free flow of stream waters into their lo'i kalo or taro pond fields, many had to give up taro farming and move into the city to find new livelihoods. Some families stopped paying taxes on their rural lands when they moved into the city and as a result eventually lost ownership of their ancestral lands through adverse possession by plantations and ranches. The military was another force in the Americanization of the islands. The U.S. began to develop Pu'uloa into Pearl Harbor in 1908—dredging the channel, constructing a dry dock, barracks, warehouses, an ammunition depot, a submarine base, a radio center, and a hospital. By 1930, the harbor was a major industrial base for the servicing of the U.S. Pacific Fleet. At the same time, the army established bases on Hawaiian national lands under its control at Leahi (Diamond Head) for Fort Ruger; at Waikiki for Fort DeRussy; at Kalihi for Fort Shafter; and in Wahiawa and the Wai'anae mountains for Scholfield Barracks. By 1941, the American naval presence at Pearl Harbor was so massive that the Japanese attacked Hawai'i convinced that this would cripple the American fleet in the Pacific. The military had become the largest single source of income and employment in the islands, thereby guaranteeing the support of a major part of Hawai'i's local population. One-hundred years ago, the American forces of colonization moved into the Pacific and our grandparents and great-grandparents were faced with the challenge—to assimilate? to resist? to participate? to withdraw? Decisions were made family-by-family, individual-by-individual. In 1897, over 38,000 Native Hawaiians signed petitions against a U.S. congressional treaty of Annexation and succeeded in defeating passage of that treaty. Unable to get the two-thirds majority vote of the U.S. senate needed to pass a treaty, congressional supporters and President William McKinley enacted a joint resolution of annexation the following year. Organized Native Hawaiian resistance against annexation had failed to stop the forces of American colonization. While Native Hawaiians initially continued their opposition to American influence through the Independent Homerule Party, this gradually gave way to effective participation in the Republican Party and the privileges of political patronage. Survival became the issue. Hawaiians were unusually vulnerable to introduced continental diseases and their extinction was feared when tuberculosis hit the islands and by 1920 they numbered only 41,750 and their life expectancy was only 35 years. Hawaiian leaders concentrated their efforts on establishing a functional program that would rehabilitate the Hawaiian people on rural Hawaiian Homelands. It is important to note that a significant number of Hawaiians never participated in American politics and interacted only as needed with the plantation economy. They mostly continued to live in isolated rural communities and islands, speaking Hawaiian, fishing, planting taro and living a subsistence lifestyle as their ancestors had before them. They were hardworking and did not enjoy the amenities of 20th century improvements, nor did they surrender their ancestral customs, beliefs, and practices. Although Asian immigrants made up 56% of Hawai'i's population in 1900, they were denied American citizenship, until 1943 for the Chinese and 1952 for the Japanese. It was not until their Hawai'i-born children matured to voting age on the eve of World War II that they became influential in electoral politics. Japanese and later Filipino immigrant workers did organize around issues of national discrimination and for decent working and living conditions. They went on strike against the sugar plantations in 1900, 1909, 1924, and the 1930's. Forming the International Longshoremen and Warehousemen's Union in 1939, the multi-ethnic work force succeeded in achieving recognition and improved living and working conditions through the sugar strike of 1946 and the dock strike of 1949. Hawai'i in the Postcolonial Era In 1946, the United Nations General Assembly, as required under Chapter XI. Article 73 of the UN Charter, "Declaration Regarding Non-Self-Governing Territories," included Alaska, Hawai'i, American Samoa, Guam, Panama Canal Zone, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands on the list of non-self-governing territories under U.S. Control. Of the 1898 annexations, Puerto Rico a commonwealth, Guam a commonwealth, and American Samoa a protectorate are still considered non-self-governing territories by the U.N. The Philippines gained independence in 1934, but until the Aquino administration defeated the Marcos dictatorship in 1986 it was considered to be a neo-colony of America. Cuba spun out of its neocolonial dependency on America in 1959, when the revolution declared a socialist republic. In 1959, a Hawai'i statehood plebiscite asked voters, "Shall Hawai'i be admitted into the Union as a state?" Any American citizen who had resided in Hawai'i for one year was eligible to vote. The result of the plebiscite was, 132,938 voters in favor of statehood and 7,854 opposed. Hawai'i became a state and it was removed from the U.N. list of Non-Self-Governing Territories when the U.S. submitted a memorandum to the U.N. Secretary General together with the text of the Congressional Act admitting Hawai'i into the U.S. as a state, a Presidential Proclamation, and the text of Hawai'i's State Constitution. The exercise of self-determination allows a non-self-governing people to choose: (a) complete independence from any other state; (b) free association with another state; and (c) complete integration into another state. In the late twentieth century, advocates of independence for Hawai'i assert that the 1959 plebiscite cannot be considered an adequate exercise in self-determination for the habitual residents of Hawai'i. For a plebiscite to be considered free and fair it must meet the criteria of (1) neutrality of the plebiscite area (2) freedom from foreign occupation; and (3) control of the administration of the plebiscite by a neutral authority. The statehood plebiscite failed to afford the people of Hawai'i the range of choices from integration within the U.S.A. to reemergence as an independent nation. The question, "Should Hawai'i be a free and independent nation?" should have been but was never asked. Additional factors which are considered to make the 1959 plebiscite fraudulent were that the United States stated the question to be asked; supervised the plebiscite process; and counted the votes. The United States military maintained a strong presence in the territory when the plebiscite was conducted. Many in the U.S. military also participated in the plebiscite. The United States failed to carry out or to see that others carried out an educational program on the right to independence. In fact, the United States caused fear within the society by promoting a communist scare and a nuclear arms race scare which later proved, on both fronts, to have been fabrications of the government of the day. The United States did not inform the people of their right to self-determination or of the responsibility of the United States to the people regarding decolonization as called for under Chapter XI. Article 73 of the U.N. Charter. Independence advocates assert that the people of Hawai'i were never allowed to exercise their right of self-determination. Moreover, they challenge the legality of the original process through which the United States of America claims to have annexed the Hawaiian Islands. They assert that the Newlands Joint Resolution of Annexation, a domestic law of the United States, was not a legal means of annexing Hawai'i, Only a Treaty of Annexation, which was never ratified due to Native Hawaiian resistance, could have effected the annexation of Hawai'i under international law. Thus, Hawai'i continues to be occupied by the United States and claimed as one of its incorporated states during the postcolonial era despite organized opposition and legal challenges to this political status. Recognition of Indigenous Native Hawaiians Within Hawai'i, the Native Hawaiian people have a unique and distinct status as an indigenous people with the right of self-governance. They also have the right to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territory, and their cultural identity in accordance with their own spiritual and traditional beliefs, customs, practices, language, and social institutions. Despite statehood status, the consciousness, pride in, and practice of Native Hawaiian cultural and spiritual customs and beliefs heightened into a modern renaissance. In rallying around protection of the island of Kaho'olawe, the traditional practice of aloha 'aina gained prominence and rural Hawaiian communities, strongholds of traditional Hawaiian subsistence lifestyles, gained a new significance. Traditional navigational arts and skills were revived with the transpacific voyages of the Polynesian Voyaging Society on the Hokule'a, the Hawai'i Loa, and the Makali'i. Halau hula, the schools which teach traditional Hawaiian dance and chant, increased and flourished. La'au Lapa'u, traditional herbal and spiritual healing practices were recognized as valid holistic medicinal practices. Hawaiian studies from the elementary to university level was established as part of the regular curricula. Hawaiian music evolved into new forms of expression and gained greater popularity. Native Hawaiians took the initiative to dismantle the structures of American colonization. In 1976, Hawaiians organized to stop the bombing of the island of Kaho'olawe and protested the overall role of the military in Hawai'i. They demanded that the island be returned to the people of Hawai'i in a condition safe to restore and use its natural and cultural resources. After years of persistent protests, occupations, arrests, litigation, negotiation, rededication of cultural sites, and re-establishment of religious ceremonies the bombing was stopped in 1990. In 1993, the Hawai'i State Legislature passed a law which provides that Kaho'olawe and two miles of ocean around it will be reserved for Hawaiian cultural customs and practices. The island was transferred to the State of Hawai'i from the U.S. Navy in May 1994. A ten year clean up of ordnance on the island by the U.S. Navy allows sections of the island to be revegetated and enjoyed for cultural practices. State law bans commercial uses of the island and its surrounding ocean and provides that the island be held in trust for eventual transfer to a sovereign Hawaiian entity. Major strides in the recognition of Native Hawaiian language, culture and entitlements were made in the 1978 Hawai'i State Constitutional Convention. The Hawaiian language was recognized, with English, as one of the two official languages of the state. State schools were mandated to teach Hawaiian culture by hiring community resource persons. Native Hawaiians were recognized, together with the general public to be one of the two beneficiaries of the remaining Hawaiian Crown and Government Lands of the Kingdom of Hawai'i that are managed by the state as the Ceded Public Lands Trust. The Office of Hawaiian Affairs was established to receive revenues from the Ceded Public Lands Trust to better the conditions of Native Hawaiians. Native Hawaiian access rights over public and private lands for subsistence, cultural, and religious purposes were reaffirmed. By 1987 there were only 2,000 native speakers of Hawaiian. Most were in their 60's and 70's. Only 30 were under 5 years old. Extinction of the language because of America's colonial policy was imminent. However, Hawaiian language professors and students at the University of Hawai'i visited Aotearoa (New Zealand) and were inspired with the efforts of the Maori people to rescue their language through Maori immersion preschools. They began Punana Leo Hawaiian language immersion preschools in Hawai'i and went on to establish Hawaiian language immersion classes in state schools throughout the islands. By 1998 there were over 800 new native speakers of Hawaiian ranging from pre-school to juniors in high school. Through the dedicated efforts of the professors, teachers, parents and kupuna (elders) on every island, the Hawaiian language has been revived and is beginning to flourish again. When the last sugar plantation in leeward O'ahu shut down in the 1990's, taro farmers on windward O'ahu petitioned the Hawai'i State Water Commission to stop diverting the waters of the Wai'ahole and Waikane streams. Only half of the water continued to be diverted, and the other half was allowed to flow into the Wai'ahole stream. Native streamlife returned, marine life in Kane'ohe Bay became more abundant, and farmers opened taro terraces which had lay dry and overgrown with brush for decades. A new generation of Hawaiian and local windward youth are planning to pursue livelihoods involving the cultivation of taro, as their grandparents had done. On August 31, 1995, the Hawai'i State Supreme Court expanded upon two earlier rulings dealing with Hawaiian access rights on public and private lands in a sixty-one page opinion in Public Access Shoreline Hawai'i v. Hawaii County Planning Commission PASH Decision 79 Haw. at 442 (1995) "Cert Denied" 517 U.S. 1163 (1996). In this ruling, the court placed an obligation upon state agencies to "protect customary and traditional rights to the extent feasible under the Hawai'i Constitution and relevant statutes." Moreover, the court ruled that the state does not have the "unfettered discretion to regulate the rights of ahupua'a tenants out of existence." In essence, the Supreme Court brought the interpretation of the law in line with the ongoing customs of Hawaiian 'ohana as they have continued to be actually practiced from one generation to the next up to the present. More significantly, the Supreme Court ruling acknowledged that the system of private land ownership in Hawai'i is unique and distinct from the Western system of private property. Under the Hawaiian system of private land ownership, landowners do not have the right of exclusion because practitioners of Hawaiian subsistence, cultural and religious customs and practices are allowed access. Continuing Challenges Despite the accomplishments cited above, Native Hawaiians still lack sovereign control over national lands and resources. In 1997 and 1998, the Hawai'i State Legislature attempted to limit the access rights enjoyed by Native Hawaiians by unsuccessfully trying to require registration of these rights and withdrawing selected classes of private lands subject to these rights. The 1998 legislature initiated a series of measures which severely limit revenues from the Hawaiian national lands annually transferred to the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. The U.S. Supreme Court, in the Rice v. Cayetano case, ruled on February 23, 2000 that elections for the trustees of the State of Hawai'i Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA), in which only Native Hawaiians were allowed to vote, used unconstitutional race-based qualifications.[4] The majority of the members of the court ruled that the Native Hawaiian OHA election violated the 15th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution which states that the right to vote cannot be denied on account of race or color.[5] Subsequently, in the November 2000 election for the trustees of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, all registered voters, regardless of Native Hawaiian ancestry, were allowed to cast votes and to run for these offices. In the ruling, a majority of the Supreme Court justices also raised, but did not resolve, four fundamental questions regarding the status of Native Hawaiians. May Congress treat the Native Hawaiians as it does the Indian tribes? Has Congress in fact determined that Native Hawaiians have a status like that of Indians in organized tribes? May Congress delegate to the State of Hawai'i the authority to preserve that status? Has Congress delegated to the State of Hawai'i the authority to preserve that status?[6] A negative answer to any of these questions could result in a determination that Native Hawaiians do not qualify under U.S. law for the rights and protection afforded other indigenous peoples within the 50 states. The majority of the Supreme Court Justices also seemed to open the door to future legal challenges on the status of Native Hawaiians when it stated,
Suddenly, the status, rights and entitlements which Native Hawaiians had enjoyed throughout the 20th century could be legally challenged out of existence. Moreover, the Supreme Court ruling seemed to contradict the policy of the U.S. Congress toward Native Hawaiians. After 1959, Congress enacted over 100 pieces of legislation which addressed the special needs of Native Hawaiians ranging from healthcare and education, to economic development and cultural and natural resource preservation. Some examples of these include the Native Hawaiian Study Commission Act, Pub.L.No. 98-139, 97 Stat. 871 (1983); Native Hawaiian Health Care Act of 1988, Pub. L. No. 100-579, 102 Stat. 4181; and the Native Hawaiian Education Act, Pub. L. No. 103-382, 108 Stat. 3518 (1994).[7] These laws culminated with the Apology Resolution of November 23, 1993 which directly acknowledged the inherent sovereignty of Native Hawaiians at the time of the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawai'i. The Apology Resolution also acknowledged the vested rights of the Native Hawaiian people in the crown and government lands of the Kingdom of Hawai'i, and that Native Hawaiians continue to be a distinct people determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territory, and their cultural identity in accordance with their own spiritual and traditional beliefs, customs, practices, language, and social institutions.[8] While the operational policy of the U.S. Congress has been to exercise a trust responsibility with Native Hawaiians similar to Native Americans, none of the laws passed extended an explicit and formal recognition that Native Hawaiians are a sovereign people, with the right of self-governance and self-determination. Without such an explicit law, Native Hawaiians stand to lose the special benefits, entitlements, and protection which the U.S. Congress has been extending to them. In light of the ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, Hawai'i's congressional delegation, led by Senators Daniel Akaka and Daniel Inouye, drafted and introduced legislation (called The Akaka Bill) to explicitly and unambiguously clarify the trust relationship between Native Hawaiians and the United States. When passed, the bill would formally and directly extend the federal policy of self-determination and self-governance to Native Hawaiians, as Hawai'i's indigenous native people. The legislation provides a process for the recognition by the United States, under the Secretary of the Department of Interior, of a Native Hawaiian governing entity. [9] The Akaka Bill introduced by Hawai'i's congressional delegation would provide an avenue for both the people of Hawai'i and the U.S. Congress to correct the historic injustices they have suffered collectively as a people, and enable them to exercise self-determination through self-governance to heal as a people. While federal recognition would represent a culmination of a century-old trust relationship between Native Hawaiians and the U.S. Congress, it would really constitute a small first step in the re-establishment of an indigenous Native Hawaiian government since the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy in 1893. [1] Website of the Peabody Essex Museum [2] Charles Wilkes, U.S.N., Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition. During the Years 1838, 1839, 1840, 1841, 1842, Vol. I, p. xxvii-xxix, Republished in 1970 by The Gregg Press, Upper Saddle River. [3] Message from the President of the United States, December 21, 1842, 27th Congress, 3d Session, Doc. No. 35, House of Representatives, Executive. [4] In the Apology Resolution, Native Hawaiian (both words capitalized) is defined as "any individual who is a descendant of the aboriginal people who, prior to 1778, occupied and exercised sovereignty in the area that now constitutes the State of Hawai'i." The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act and the Admission Act use the term native Hawaiian (lower case n, capital H) to mean "Any descendant of not less than one-half part of the blood of the races inhabiting the Hawaiian Islands previous to 1778. The term "Kanaka Maoli" is promoted as the indigenous name for Native Hawaiians. However, "Kanaka Maoli" simply means native or indigenous, while "Kanaka Maoli Hawai'i" means native or indigenous Hawaiian. In the 1859 Civil Code of the Kingdom of Hawai'i, Chapter VIII, "kanaka Hawaii" is used to translate "native of the Hawaiian Islands" and "ke kanaka maoli" is used to translate "native." In the 1878 Census of the Kingdom of Hawai'i, "He kane kanaka maoli (Hawaii)" was used for "Native Male" and "He wahine kanaka maoli (Hawaii)" was used for "Native Female." However, this must have referred to pure Hawaiians only, as there was a category for "Half-Caste Male"—"He hapahaole kane"—and "Half-Cast Female"—"He hapahaole wahine." In this article, I will use "Native Hawaiian" to refer anyone who has Hawaiian ancestry, i.e. who is descended from a "Kanaka Maoli Hawai'i" ancestor and "native Hawaiian" to refer to those who are of half or more Hawaiian ancestry. Under the law, thus far, only "native Hawaiians" are the beneficiaries of the Hawaiian Home Lands and the ceded public lands trusts, as discussed below. [5] No. 98-818, February 23, 2000. Kennedy, J. delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehnquist, C.J., O'Connor, Scalia, Thomas, J.J. joined. Breyer,J. filed an opinion concurring in the result, in which Souter, J. joined. Stevens,J. filed a dissenting opinion in which Ginsburg, J. joined as to Part II. Ginsburg, J. filed a dissenting opinion. [6] These questions were raised in the following statement: "If Hawaii's restriction were to be sustained under Mancari we would be required to accept some beginning premises not yet established in our case law. Among other postulates, it would be necessary to conclude that Congress, in reciting the purposes for the transfer of lands to the State—and in other enactments such as the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act and the Joint Resolution of 1993—has determined that native Hawaiians have a status like that of Indians in organized tribes, and that it may, and has, delegated to the State a broad authority to preserve that status. These propositions would raise questions of considerable moment and difficulty. [7] Department of Interior and Department of Justice, "From Mauka to Makai: The River of Justice Must Flow Freely, Report on the Reconciliation Process Between the Federal Government and Native Hawaians," Washington D.C., October 23, 2000, p. 56–57. [8] Apology Resolution, Public Law 103-150. These include the Older Americans Act, the Developmental Disabilities Assistance and Bill of Rights Act Amendments of 1987, the Veterans' Benefits and Services Act of 1988, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended in 1988, the Native Hawaiian Health Care Act of 1988, the Health Professions Reauthorization Act of 1988, the Nursing Shortage Reduction and Education Extension Act of 1988, the Handicapped Programs Technical Amendments Act of 1988, the Indian Health Care Amendments of 1988, and the Disadvantaged Minority Health Improvement Act of 1990. [9] Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions – April 6, 2001 ( Senate – April 06, 2001) By Mr. AKAKA ( for himself and Mr. INOUYE). |
