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in his own district. If a difficulty arise between a land agent and a tenant the tax officer shall investigate it, and if the tenant is in fault the tax officer and land agent shall execute the law upon him; but if the land agent is in fault in the judgment of the tax officer the latter shall call the other tax officers of the island, and, if they agree with him, judgment against the land agent is confirmed, and the governor shall execute the law on him; but if any believe the tax officer to have erred the governor may be apprised and try the case over again, and if he is believed to have erred the case may be made known to the supreme judges, and they shall try the case anew.
"OF THE JUDGES.
"The governor of each island shall choose judges for the island according to his own mind, two or more, at his own discretion, and give them a written commission. When they receive this they shall not be removed without trial, but the law may limit their term of office.
"In this manner shall they proceed: The court days shall be declared beforehand, and when the appointed day arrives they shall proceed with trials according to law. To them shall be given jurisdiction in respect to all the laws except those connected with taxation, and to the difficulties between land agents, landlords, and tenants. The governor shall sustain them and execute their judgment. But if their judgment is thought to be unjust he who thinks so may complain or appeal to the supreme judges.
"OF THE SUPREME JUDGES.
"The elected representatives shall choose four judges to assist the King and premier, and these six shall be the supreme judges of the Kingdom. This shall be their business: Cases of difficulty not well adjusted by the tax officers or island judges they shall try again according to law; the court days shall be declared beforehand, that those who are in difficulty may apply, and the decision of this court shall stand. There is thereafter no appeal. Life and death, to bind and release, to fine and not to fine, are at their disposal, and with them the end of controversy.
"OF CHANGES IN THE CONSTITUTION.
"This constitution shall not be considered as fully established until the people generally shall have heard it, and certain persons as herein mentioned shall be chosen and shall assent to it, then firmly established is this constitution.
"And thereafter, if it be designed to alter it, the people shall be first apprised of the nature of the amendment intended to be introduced, and the next year, at the meeting of the nobles and representatives, if they agree to insert a passage or to annul a passage, they may do it lawfully.
"This constitution, above stated, has been agreed to by the nobles, and our names are set to it this eighth day of October, in the year of our Lord 1840, at Honolulu, Oahu.
(Signed),
"Kamehameha III,
"Kekauluohi."
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"The house of nobles, or hereditary lords and ladies, consisted of the King himself, a female premier, four governors of islands, four women of rank, and five chiefs of the third rank. The people were allowed to choose by districts annually seven men to be members of the national Legislature for a year: two from Hawaii, two from Maui and adjacent islands, two from Oahu, and one from Kauai, the Government bearing their expenses. The proposition was also distinctly made to increase the number after a time. The right of suffrage, so far as to vote for one or two men to act in making laws and appointing supreme assistant judges, was extended to all, but guarded with peculiar care."
XIV. Also the following from the remarks of mr. draper, of massachusetts, made in the house of representatives, and published in the congressional record of february 4, 1894.
I believe that the true policy of this Government is to negotiate a suitable treaty with the de facto Government in Hawaii, and annex the islands.
After this (or before if necessary), if Liliuokalani is supposed to have any rights, purchase them (since she is willing to sell), but on no account ought we to neglect this opportunity of securing this naval and coaling station, so important to us, both from the point of view of commerce and of coast defense.
I will first point out briefly its advantages to us from a commercial point of view. Situated at the intersection of the trade route between North America and Australasia, with the rich commercial stream which will flow between the China Seas and the Atlantic as soon as the Isthmus canal (whether it be through Nicaragua or Panama) is opened, the position of Hawaii is ideal for controlling both lines of commerce; and, for a nation which expects to maintain trade routes in the Paciiic, its possession is a necessity.
All the great commercial powers recognize the fact that our trade must be guarded; that convenient stations, as near as possible to the well-defined trade routes, must be established; and that supplies and facilities for refitting may be available at distances not too widely separated.
Until 1886 Hawaii was nearer to the territory of the United States than to that of any other power, the distance to San Francisco being but 2,100 miles, while the British fortified port of Victoria, with its neighboring dockyard of Esquimault, and coal mines of Nanaimo, was 2,300 miles distant. The next nearest British port was Leonka, in the Fiji group, 2,700 miles distant in an opposite direction.
French territory was 2,380 miles distant at Tahiti; Germany held the Admiralty Islands, distant 3,400 miles; and Spain the Caroline Islands, 2,000 miles distant, and the Ladrones, about 2,900 miles distant.
Since that time Germany has moved up to a distance of 2,098 miles, by annexing the Marshall Islands and placing herself in a flanking position on both the South Pacific and transpacific trade routes. France, by the acquisition of the Low Archipelago and the Marquesas Islands, is 2,050 miles distant from Hawaii, on the South Pacific route. Great Britain has advanced from Fiji toward the intersecting point on clearly defined lines, annexing group after group and detached islands when they were on the line of approach, even though uninhabited or without harbors and of no commercial value, until in 1891 her flag was
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planted on Johnston Island, 6OO miles from Hawaii, and the nearest point she can approach to her American territory, unless the next move be the occupation of Hawaii itself.
In one year, 1888, British cruisers took possession of the Savage, Suwarrow, and Phoenix groups and Christmas and Fanning islands, and in 1892 the occupation of the Gilbert and Ellice groups and Gardner and Danger islands completed the covering of the South Pacific trade from Johnston Island to Australia. The only unannexed group on that line remaining is the Samoan Islands, and they are closely surrounded by British and French possessions.
It has not been a blind grab for territory which has been going on in the South Pacific for six years past, but a working out of strategical schemes with definite ends in view; and the United States is the only great power interested in the Pacific trade which has not had the wisdom to acquire territory in localities where the great trade of the future will need guarding and supplying.
Samoa and Hawaii have been ripe to our hands for years. They are most advantageously situated for our needs, as bases from which our cruisers could work in time of war to protect our own trade and break up that of an enemy. The moral force of the United States is all that has kept European hands off these two groups to the present time, but should a strategic necessity for their occupation by either of those powers arise moral force would lose its power and we would have to be prepared to then fight for them or to retire at once from the absurd dog-in-the-manger position we have so long occupied.
To appreciate fully the question of ocean trade it is well to observe the policy which Great Britain has consistently and successfully followed for generations in developing and supporting her commerce. Trade with India was established, then the route was guarded. When the Suez Canal was cut a different disposition was needed; and they now have the complete chain of guard stations formed by Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus, Egypt, and Aden, the chain being continued to China by Ceylon, Penang, Singapore, and Hongkong. The route around the Cape of Good Hope and to Australia is covered by Sierra Leone, Ascension, St. Helena, Cape Town, Natal, Zanzibar, and Mauritius. To America the route is guarded by St. Johns, Halifax, Bermuda, Jamaica, St. Lucia, Barbados, Nassau, Balize, and Demerara.
The Falkland Islands at the southern extremity of America form a guard station for the trade passing around Cape Horn, and up to this point it is well to note that no station is farther than 3,000 miles from the next on the trade route it is designed to protect; and cruisers patrolling the routes, as well as merchant vessels traversing them, need never be farther removed than 1,500 miles from a base where supplies of coal and facilities for refitting are available. The foresighted statesmen of Great Britain have had a full understanding of the fact that the preservation intact of the circulation of British ships in the great arteries of trade is an absolute requisite to the well-being and even life of the British Empire, and this it is which has guided them in the establishing around the world a complete chain of guarded stations, from which her commerce can be supplied and succored, whether peace or war prevail. Until very recent times British trade in the Pacific has not been essential so far as the welfare of the Empire was concerned, and the guarding stations at the Falkland Islands, Fiji, and Victoria, British Columbia, may have been supposed to be sufficient for all needs; but it is worthy of note that as long ago as 1877 an essayist of acknowledged ability (Vice-Admiral Colomb, of the British navy) asserted, "I
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hold it futile to attempt the defense of the Pacific trade route by any sort of vessels which must rest on the bases of Vancouver, Fiji, and the Falkland Islands." It is also worthy of note that contemporaneously with the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railroad, and the establishment from its Pacific terminus of regular steamer lines to China and to Australasia, the British bases began to be moved closer together; and when the probability of the building of the Nicaragua Canal was established, the movement toward the trade center at Hawaii became a very rapid one.
At present, instead of the wide gaps in the British system of 3,000-mile stations, which existed when the Falkland Island station was 7,900 miles from that at Vancouver and 6,700 miles from that at Fiji, which in turn was 4,800 miles from Vancouver, they have established the flag of the Empire at Easter Island, 2,400 miles from the Falkland group, which is in turn 600 miles from newly acquired Ducie Island, from where Pitcairn Island is 300, and the Cook group still farther, 1,800 miles, on a line toward Fiji. On the line from Fiji to Vancouver the gap has been shortened to 2,900 miles from Johnston Island to Vancouver, and all the intermediate territory from Johnston Island to Fiji is under the British flag.
Other stations are still needed, and British strategists make no secret of the assertion that on the outbreak of war with a maritime power, a necessary first move, unless the Pacific trade were to be abandoned, would be the occupation and retention of Hawaii, Guadalupe Island, off the coast of Lower California, and one of the islands in the Bay of Panama, with a reliance on the friendship or fears of the South American States for depots at Callao and Valparaiso. As a matter of fact, they have such a depot at present in the harbor of Callao.
Now, Mr. Speaker, sentiment has not hoisted the British flag over these isolated ports, which, to maintain in a state of efficiency, are a source of great expense without any apparent return. Their coal depots, storehouses, repairing facilities, and at salient points batteries and garrisons, are provided by a business instinct purely, which recognizes that the trade which is the lifeblood of the empire must be efficiently guarded; and centuries of experience have taught them the proper means to employ.
If there is a gap in the guard stations of the Pacific trade at present, or a salient point which should be possessed, and Hawaii is such a point, sentiment, which does not trouble our British friends, will not prevent their cruisers, under the direction of far-seeing statesmen, whose aim is to secure any and every advantage for British trade, from seizing and holding, when the time to them seems propitious, just what is thought necessary to strengthen the weak places in their trade-route patrol.
War ships to patrol a trade route efficiently, to guard their own commerce and damage that of an enemy, require bases from which to operate with the certainty of finding their necessities supplied at any one of them. Merchant vessels in time of war require them as points of rendezvous and refuge, and, as we have seen, Great Britain has foreseen the necessities and provided such bases at convenient points. No other nation has this immense advantage, although France and Germany are making great efforts, the former in Africa, Asia, and Australasia, and the latter, so far, in Africa and Australasia only, where coal depots and bases for naval operations have been established.
The United States has the right to establish coal depots in Samoa and Hawaii, and at present small supplies exist at both places; but
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unprotected they are of no value, and Germany has equal rights in the former.
The concession in 1887 of Pearl River, in Hawaii, to the United States for use as naval station, with exclusive privilege of establishing a dry dock, storehouses, and repair shops, is a valuable one, but has never been utilized. The situation is admirable, and the estimated cost of necessary fortifications and harbor works is moderate in view of the great advantage to our nation.
Our position with regard to dry docks in the Pacific is peculiarly weak. Modern war vessels require docking at intervals, and a fleet to maintain command of the sea must have dry docks in which to make repairs and maintain the ship in a state of full efficiency as to speed. We have not one dock outside the mainland of our country which would be available for our ships in time of war; and on the entire Pacific coast have at present but one large and one small dock, at the Mare Island navy-yard, and one building in Puget Sound, and our vessels in the Pacific would have to return to them whenever docking was requisite.
Great Britain, on the contrary, has made ample provisions in this respect. Bordering on the Pacific she has Government dry docks at Esquimault, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, and Hongkong, while many private docks are available in the ports of Australia, New Zealand, Hongkong, Singapore, Penang, and India.
France has Government dry docks in New Caledonia and Saigon, Cochin China. Holland has governmental dry docks, which would probably be available for Germany, in Sourabaya and Batavia; and Russia has two large ones in the southeast corner of Siberia, at Vladivostock. We must have additional docking facilities if we are to maintain either naval power or trade in the Pacific waters it time of war.
Coming now to the strategic advantages from coast defense point of view.
No naval force can operate on a hostile coast without a friendly base within easy distance. Our Atlantic coast is faced by a line of foreign bases. England has strongly fortified Halifax on our Northeast border, and built Government dry docks both there and at St. Johns. Six hundred and ninety miles from New York, and less than 6OO from the Carolina coast, she has at great expense fortified Bermuda, furnished it with the largest floating dry dock in the world, and supplied it with great stores of coal and shops for repair work, and all for the sole purpose of maintaining a base from which British naval forces could operate against the Atlantic coast of the United States in time of war. Jamaica and St. Lucia perform the same duty with regard to our Gulf coasts and the isthmus transit; and it is a notable fact that the defenses of all these places have been extensively augmented since an isthmus canal became a possibility of the near future.
France has St. Pierre and Miquelon on our Northeast borders, with Guadeloupe, Martinique, and Cayenne on the South coast. Spain has her bases in Cuba and Porto Rico; the Dutch in Curacoa, and the Danes in St. Thomas; and it is not improbable that either of the two latter may be available for a German base should occasion arise.
Any power which has not such a naval base off our coast can not make successful war upon the United States, a fact which was quickly appreciated by Italy during a late diplomatic incident; and an early move of the United States in a war with either of the European powers possessing these bases would have to be their capture and retention, if
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possible. If the United States held all the bases named it would be practically free from attack on its Atlantic coast.
In the Pacific we now have the opportunity to secure our Western coast by accepting possession of Hawaii as our most rational form of coast defense. With adequate fortifications on these islands, and a suitable naval force in the Pacific, our coast would be far more secure in time of war than it could be made by any expenditure for harbor defenses on the mainland alone.
Further, if our commercial interests are to predominate in the future in those waters our fleet must predominate there also, and a properly proportionate fleet would be a sufficient guaranty that serious attack would not be made on this most important naval base.
The same is equally true of our entire Pacific coast, as with such a fleet, with bases at San Francisco, Hawaii, and the entrance to the Nicaragua Canal, not only would our Pacific trade be secure and that of any other power untenable, but our coast line would be equally secure, and American control of the canal, so far as the Pacific end of it is concerned, would be assured.
Excepting Hawaii the only base for possible extensive naval operations against the Pacific States is the British station at Esquimault, which is susceptible of capture by a land expedition.
It must be distinctly understood that Hawaii can not remain independent supported only by moral force. It is of too great strategic value and will assuredly meet the fate of all islands and isolated points of like value at the hands of either Great Britain, France, or Germany, each of the two former having already once seized them (once in 1843 and once in 1849). Even if the United States were by moral force to preserve Hawaiian independence during time of peace the islands would undoubtedly be seized by the first naval power with whom we went to war, and held by all the force it could muster, as a base from which to attack our Western coast and gain control of the prospective canal.
For the United States to expend great sums on the local defense of San Francisco in the shape of forts and harbor defenses, and leave Hawaii to become a base for operations against them, is a short-sighted and extravagant policy.
As Bermuda is a standing menace in front of our Atlantic coast, so will Hawaii become a similar one to our Pacific coast, if we do not hold it as an essential part of our coast defense.
COAL.
To make the advantage of Hawaii to this country from a naval standpoint clearer I will devote a little time to some details of the question of coal and coaling stations. The possession of unlimited coal is a great advantage to a nation, but in order to convert it into naval advantage it must be placed on board of a ship of war. This is a simple thing with us so long as our naval vessels are in home ports, or so long as we are at peace, wherever the ships may be. It is in time of war that the difficulties of making our naval strength felt away from our own coasts will become apparent. Neutral ports will then be closed to our cruisers so far as supplying their coal necessities is concerned, for coal will be contraband of war as much as is other ammunition. Coaling in the open sea from supply ships is, up to the present time, an unsolved problem, and even if satisfactory mechanical arrangements be devised the supply vessels must run the gauntlet of hostile cruisers for great distances. A certainty of finding
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the collier in specified localities on definite dates, which is almost impossible without naval stations, must also be established, as a failure to meet would result in leaving the cruiser helpless. Wind is no longer a motive power for ships of war, and the days when a cruiser could keep the sea and do the work she was designed for, so long as her provisions and water held out, are gone. Coal is now the prime necessity, and unless our cruisers have points provided for them to which they can go with a certainty of finding a supply, they will on the outbreak of war have to be brought home to operate off our own coasts from the home bases of supply, or else be left powerless in neutral harbors until the close of the war.
The only other solution is to build cruisers of such size that they can carry their own coal and remain at sea for long periods independent of coal depots or supply vessels.
According to the published performances of our cruisers the very best that has yet been done by one of them is the late voyage of the Philadelphia, steaming from Callao to Honolulu, a distance of 5,200 miles, burning 703 tons of coal in eighteen days, at the rate of 12 knots an hour, and 39 tons of coal a day, which gives a distance of 7.3 knots per ton of coal burned.
As this ship and all the others of her class (and we have a number of them) can carry only about 1,000 tons of coal, in some cases less, she would have been powerless to reach any other port from Honolulu had she not been able to replenish her supply upon arrival.
It is not known that the cruisers of any foreign power have done so well; and it is a fact that, class for class, our cruisers carry more coal and steam better than do those of other nations; but it is also a fact that we need much greater coal-carrying capacity than we have at present, or else we must follow foreign example and establish coal depots.
It is published that we have two commerce-destroyers, with light batteries, substantially completed, each to carry 2,200 tons of coal, which at the Philadelphia's rate of 7.3 knots per ton of coal, would enable them to cover at slow speed about 16,000 miles; but if they are to destroy commerce they will have to occasionally steam at much greater speed than 10 to 12 knots, and it is safe to say that in time of war they could not cover a greater distance than 12,000 miles without replenishing their supply. This would mean an immediate return after a cruise of 6,000 miles, as we have now no place to which they could go away from our mainland, with a certainty of getting the coal that is absolutely necessary to their usefulness.
England does not need a coal capacity in any of her vessels greater than will enable them to traverse 4,000 or 5,000 miles, as we have seen that her coal depots are planted along the trade routes at distances of about 3,000 miles.
France, where she has important commercial interests, has similar depots; so have Germany, Holland, and Spain.
Russia is nearly as badly off as is the United States, but she has the fortified depot of Vladivostock in Asiatic waters and has lately acquired the use of French ports wherever she may need them. Even with these advantages she is furnishing herself with crusiers of great size, carrying over 3,000 tons of coal.
We have neither the depots nor the cruisers of great coal endurance; and the most rational mode of strengthening this very apparent weakness would seem to be to obtain coal depots, as the English do, and to begin by accepting the most valuable one of Hawaii.
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As an example on this point, no foreign armored ships have a greater coal endurance than those of Italy, yet not one of these immense ships can steam over 7,000 miles without replenishing its supply, and some of them can not do so well.
As the distance from Italy to the coast of the United States is practically about 5,000 miles, they would have a very brief period of usefulness after arrival on our coasts, in the absence of the bases possessed by other European powers, and would have to rely on supply cruisers over a long line of communication, which could be cut off by cruisers, in the absence of the most efficient patrol.
The same is quite true of the United States or any other power which undertakes a naval expedition without a base, as no number of batteries or battalions stationed on the mainland can secure the safety of the needed supplies while in transit, or the usefulness of a naval force at any distance from a home port.
The development of foreign commerce is one, perhaps the principal, argument advanced for the free-trade policy of the Democratic party. While not agreeing with this policy, I am willing to agree that ocean trade is an important source of prosperity to any nation. That of the Pacific is just opening on an era of activity which will be vastly augmented on the completion of an isthmus canal, and this trade belongs to the United States, if we are wise enough to secure it.
But trade, to establish itself on a sound basis, must feel assured of protection at all times, and know that it will not have to be abandoned on the outbreak of every little war which may turn loose upon it a pack of destroyers of insignificant strength, compelling it to lie idle with all the capital involved until peace prevails again.
If the United States aim at commercial supremacy in the Pacific, its trade must have such assurances, and a first necessity is the acquisition of bases for the protectors. Not only Hawaii is needed, but Somoa (distant 2,200 miles); a station at the mouth of the canal (say, 4,200 miles from Honolulu and 3,000 from San Francisco); and another at the Straits of Magellan (distant 4,000 miles from the isthmus and 5,000 from Somoa). With these bases, a properly organized fleet of sufficient size to keep the communications open between them, will hold the Pacific as an American ocean, dominated by American commercial enterprise for all time.
Now, the value of these islands to the United States for the reasons I have stated has long been appreciated by American statesmen.
Minister Stevens, whatever attacks may be made upon him, is certainly an able, farsighted, and loyal American, and his letter of November 20,1892, to Secretary Foster, on this subject, is well worthy of perusal.
Minister McCook wrote in 1866 to Secretary Seward in regard to the Sandwich Islands, in part, as follows:
"They are the resting place, supply depot, and reshipping point of all our American whaling fleet. The greater part of the agricultural, commercial, and moneyed interests of the islands are in the hands of American citizens. All vessels from our Pacific coast to China pass close to these shores.
"Geographically these islands occupy the same important relative position toward the Pacific that the Bermudas do toward the Atlantic coast of the United States, a position which makes them important to the English, convenient to the French, and, in the event of war with either of those powers, absolutely necessary to the United States."
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Minister Pierce, in 1871, wrote the following to Secretary Fish:
"Impressed with the importance of the subject now presented for consideration, I beg leave to suggest the inquiry whether the period has not arrived making it proper, wise, and sagacious for the United States Government to again consider the project of annexing the Hawaiian Islands to the territory of the Republic. That such is to be the political destiny of this archipelago seems a foregone conclusion in the opinion of all who have given attention to the subject in this country, the United States, England, France, and Germany.
"A majority of the aborigines, creoles, and naturalized foreigners of this country, as I am credibly informed, are favorable, even anxious for the consummation of the measure named.
"The native population is fast disappearing. The number existing is now estimated at 45,000, having decreased about 15,000 since the census of 1860. The number of foreigners in addition is between 5,000 and 6,000, two-thirds of whom are from the United States, and they own more than that proportion of foreign capital, as represented in the agriculture, commerce, navigation, and whale fisheries of the Kingdom.
"I now proceed to state some points of a more general character which should influence the United States Government in their decision of the policy of acquiring possession of this archipelago, their geographical position, occupying, as it does, an important central strategical point in the North Pacific Ocean, valuable, perhaps necessary, to the United States for a naval depot and coaling station, and to shelter and protect our commerce and navigation, which in this hemisphere is destined to increase enormously from our intercourse with the 500,000,000 population of China, Japan, and Australia. Humboldt predicted that the commerce on the Pacific would in time rival that of the Atlantic. A future generation, no doubt, will see the prophecy fulfilled.
"The immense injury inflicted on American navigation and commerce by Great Britain in the war of 1812-1814 through her possession of Bermuda and other West India Islands, as also that suffered by the English from French privateers from the Isle of France during the wars between those two nations, are instances in proof of the necessity of anticipating and preventing, if we can, similar evils that may issue from these islands if held by other powers.
"Their proximity to the Pacific States of the Union, fine climate and soil, and tropical productions of sugar, coffee, rice, fruits, hides, goatskins, salt, cotton, fine wool, etc., required in the West, in exchange for flour, grain, lumber, shooks, and manufactures of cotton, wool, iron, and other articles, are evidence of the commercial value of one to the other region. Is it probable that any European power who may hereafter be at war with the United States will refrain from taking possession of this weak Kingdom in view of the great injury that could be done to our commerce through their acquisition to them?"
Secretary Fish, in a letter of instruction of March, 1873, used the following language:
"The position of the Sandwich Islands as an outpost, fronting and commanding the whole of our possessions on the Pacific Ocean, gives to the future of those islands a peculiar interest to the Government and people of the United States. It is very clear that this Government can not be expected to assent to their transfer from their present control to that of any powerful maritime or commercial nation. Such transfer to a maritime power would threaten a military surveillance in the Pacific similar to that which Bermuda has afforded in the Atlantic. The latter
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has been submitted to from necessity, inasmuch as it was congenital with our Government, but we desire no additional similar outposts in the hands of those who may at some future time use them to our disadvantage."
Gen. Schofield, in May, 1873, under confidential instructions from the Secretary of War, made a full report upon the value of Pearl Harbor as a coaling and repair station, recommending its acquisition, and later he appeared before a committee of the House of Representatives to urge the importance of some measure looking to the control of the Sandwich Islands by the United States.
Now, the desired and desirable opportunity has arrived. The Provisional Goverment proposes a treaty of annexation, and the so-called Queen is ready to part with such rights as she has for a comparatively small sum.
The whites of the island desire earnestly to join us, and the natives certainly are not violently opposed.
This is shown by the fact that when the American flag was lowered in Hawaii, by order of Commissioner Blount, although it created some excitement in this country, it caused no rejoicing there, according to Mr. Blount's report.
He says:
"Inspired with such feelings, and confident no disorder would ensue, I directed the removal of the flag of the United States from the Government building, and the return of the American troops to their vessels. This was accomplished without any demonstration of joy or grief on the part of the populace."
Capt. Hooper says:
"There were no demonstrations of any kind as the American flag came down, and not a single cheer greeted the Hawaiian flag as it was raised aloft. The native men stood around in groups, or singly, smoking and chatting and nodding familiarly to passing friends, or leaning idly against the trees and fences, while the women and children, which formed a large proportion of the assemblage, were talking and laughing good-naturedly. As the hour for hauling down the American flag approached, many people, men, women, and children could be seen approaching the Government square in a most leisurely manner, and showing more interest in the gala-day appearance of the crowd than in the restoration of their national flag. The air of good-natured indifference and idle curiosity with which the native men regarded the proceedings, and the presence of the women and children in their white or bright-colored dresses was more suggestive of a country "fair" or horse race than the sequel of a 'revolution.'"
Even the presence of the "armed forces" of the Provisional Government, numbering, perhaps, 200, parading the corridors of the Government house, failed to elicit any sign of a feeling of anger or resentment.
Mr. John F. Colburn, one of the Queen's cabinet, in describing the revolution, says:
"The next day (Monday) the proclamation dictated by these gentlemen was printed and posted and distributed all over town. Later on in the day two mass meetings were held, one by the native element and the other by the foreign element. At the former the natives accepted the proclamation, though it was directly contrary to what they wanted (a new constitution), and the latter denounced the Queen and left everything in the hands of the committee of safety spoken about."
S. Doc. 231, pt 6----32
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Colburn's remark that the natives accepted the proclamation, although
it was directly contrary to what they wanted, is delicious.
There is no reason against annexation in the dissimilarity of laws, as an official document issued by our War Department in February of this year contains the following statement:
"The laws are modeled on those of the United States. There is a supreme court of justice, and, in addition, circuit judges and justices of the peace."
On the authority of this book I also state that 91 per cent of the trade of these islands is with the United States.
The former policy of our Government toward Hawaii and the anticipation of their eventual annexation is detailed in the report of Secretary Foster, of February 15, 1893, from which I will read briefly.
[Senate Ex. Doc. No. 77, Fifty-second Congress, second session.]
"The policy of the United States has been consistently and constantly declared against any foreign aggression in the Kingdom of Hawaii inimical to the necessarily paramount rights and interests of the American people there and the uniform contemplation of their annexation as a contingent necessity. But beyond that it is shown that annexation has been on more than one occasion avowed as a policy and attempted as a fact. Such a solution was admitted as early as 1850 by so farsighted a statesman as Lord Palmerston when he recommended to a visiting Hawaiian commission the contingency of a protectorate under the United States, or of becoming an integral part of this nation in fulfillment of a destiny due to close neighborhood and commercial dependence upon the Pacific States.
"Early in 1851 a contingent deed of cession of the Kingdom was drawn and signed by the King and placed sealed in the hands of the commissioner of the United States, who was to open it and act upon its provisions at the first hostile shot fired by France in subversion of Hawaiian independence.
"In 1854 Mr. Marcy advocated annexation, and a draft of a treaty was actually agreed upon with the Hawaiian ministry, but its completion was delayed by the successful exercise of foreign influence upon the heir to the throne, and finally defeated by the death of the King, Kamehameha III.
"In 1867 Mr. Seward, having become advised of a strong annexation sentiment in the islands, instructed our minister at Honolulu favorably to receive any native overtures for annexation. And on the 12th of September, 1867, he wrote to Mr. McCook that 'if the policy of annexation should conflict with the policy of reciprocity, annexation is in every case to be preferred.'
"President Johnson in his annual message of December 9, 1868, regarded reciprocity with Hawaii as desirable 'until the people of the island shall of themselves, at no distant day, voluntarily apply for admission into the Union.'
"In 1871, on the 5th of April, President Grant, in a special message, significantly solicited some expression of the views of the Senate respecting the advisability of annexation.
"In an instruction of March 25, 1873, Mr. Fish considered the necessity of annexing the islands in accordance with the wise foresight of those who see a future that must extend the jurisdiction and the limits of this nation, and that will require a resting spot in midocean
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between the Pacific coast and the vast domains of Asia, which are now opening to commerce and Christian civilization.' And he directed our minister not to discourage the feeling which may exist in favor of annexation to the United States, but to seek and even invite information touching the terms and conditions upon which that object might be effected.
"Since the conclusion of the reciprocity treaty of 1875 it has been the obvious policy of the succeeding administrations to assert and defend against other powers the exclusive commercial rights of the United States and to fortify the maintenance of the existing Hawaiian Government through the direct support of the United States so long as that Government shall prove able to protect our paramount rights and interests.
"On December 1, 1881, Mr. Blaine, in an instruction to the American minister at Honolulu, wrote:
"'It (this Government) firmly believes that the position of the Hawaiian Islands, as the key to the dominion of the American Pacific, demands their benevolent neutrality, to which end it will earnestly cooperate with the native Government. And if through any cause the maintenance of such a position of benevolent neutrality should be found by Hawaii to be impracticable, this Government would then unhesitatingly meet the altered situation by seeking an avowedly American solution of the grave issues presented.'"
Now, a word as to the objections to annexation and I will close. I know that a new line of thought has been developed among us, which I can not better characterize than by calling it a system of national self-abnegation.
If any policy can be shown to be for the special advantage of the United States gentlemen holding these views oppose it.
If Hawaii is valuable to us there will be so much the more generosity in presenting it to England.
If our business has been more prosperous, and our labor better paid than elsewhere, they think this is not fair to the rest of the world, and advocate a reduction of the tariff to equalize conditions.
I do not address myself to gentlemen holding such views, as I can not understand their position nor they mine.
From my own standpoint I have heard only one objection to the policy of annexation that seemed to me to have substantial weight. It is that the population of the Sandwich Islands are in great part unfit for American citizenship. This may be true, but in that case we can annex it as a part of one of our present States, or maintain a territorial government until they are fitted, as we are doing in the case of Alaska, and as we have done heretofore with other annexations.
The fear of annexing these small islands, which we so much need, on grounds of opposition to territorial expansion, seems peculiar, almost absurd, in a country more than three-quarters of whose territory comes from annexations by purchase or otherwise.
| Square miles. | |
|---|---|
| In 1783 our territory amounted to | 827,844 |
| The Louisiana purchase added | 1,179,931 |
| Florida added | 59,268 |
| Texas added | 376,133 |
| The Mexican cession, California, etc | 545,783 |
| The Gadsden purchase | 45,535 |
| The Alaska purchase | 577,390 |
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| |
| Making a total of | 3,603,884 |
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After assimilating all this territory we ought not to be afraid of 6,000 square miles more.
To summarize: These islands will not only be valuable to us, but their possession is a commercial and naval necessity. They are offered to us by both of the parties who claim to be entitled to their control. If we do not accept, their incorporation by one of the European powers is likely, and they will be a menace to our Pacific coast from that time forward.
As Americans, actuated by the desire to advance our country's interests, we shall never have a greater opportunity than the present one, and I sincerely hope we shall take advantage of it.
XV. Also the following extract from an article, published in harper's magazine for september, 1883, prepared by mr. marshall, a special envoy of kamehameha iii to the united states and england, to arrange for the revocation of the acts of lord george paulet in occupying hawaii as territory of great britain.
AN UNPUBLISHED CHAPTER OF HAWAIIAN HISTORY.
"From 1838 till 1843 the Hawaiian Islands were a bone of contention. Intrigues were constantly set on foot by agents and subjects of France and England, having for their object the subversion of the native Government and the seizure of the islands. In 1839 the French compelled the King, Kamehameha III, to comply with certain unwarrantable demands, and as a security for future good behavior to deposit $20,000. It was thought that the demand was made in expectation that the King would be unable to comply, and that thus the French would have an excuse to seize the groups. The American merchants came forward and raised the sum, and the peril was for a time averted.
"But the plots continued, and in 1842 the British consul, Richard Charleton, a coarse and illiterate man, incited by an ambitious adventurer, one Alexander Simpson, endeavored to involve the native Government in difficulties that would result in hoisting the British flag over the group. In the same year Sir George Simpson, governor of the Hudson Bay Company's territories, visited the islands. An English gentleman of liberal views, he would not lend himself to the intrigues of his countrymen, albeit one of them was his nephew, and by his advice the King, harassed on all sides, decided to send commissioners to the United States, England, and France to try to obtain, if possible, a definite acknowledgment of his Kingdom and sovereignty.
"To this important embassy were appointed Rev. William Richards, formerly one of the American missionaries, but who had been for some time acting as adviser to the King, and Haalileo, a native chief. They quietly embarked in a small schooner for Mazatlan, and crossed Mexico to Vera Cruz. As soon as it was known that they had left the islands on this mission the British consul, Charleton, also secretly embarked for London, via Mexico, to lay his complaints before the British Government, leaving Simpson as deputy to carry out their joint designs, whom, however, the Hawaiian Government declined to recognize.
"On the Mexican coast Charleton fell in with Lord George Paulet, commanding Her British Majesty's frigate, the Carysfort, and made his lordship, as his course afterward showed, a convert to his schemes, and, by his formal and plausable complaints against the King, induced
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Rear-Admiral Thomas, commanding the British squadron on that station, to order the Carysfort to Honolulu for the purpose of investigating the alleged grievances.
"On his arrival Lord Paulet, a hot-headed young nobleman, readily lent himself to the designs of Simpson, without inquiring into the merits of the case, dazzled by the idea of so early in his career making a brilliant stroke for his country, and extending her drumbeat round the world by one more station. Making outrageous demands upon the King, at the cannon's mouth, compliance with which he knew would be impossible, he required, as an alternative, the immediate cession of the Kingdom to England, or he would open fire upon the city and declare war in the name of Great Britain.
"In this terrible crisis the proclamation issued by this native King to his people is so touching and so king-like that I will quote it here:
" 'Where are you, chiefs, people, and commons from my ancestors, and people from foreign lands?
" ' Hear ye! I make known to you that I am in perplexity by reason of difficulties into which I have been brought without cause, therefore I have given away the life of our land. Hear ye! but my rule over you, my people, and your privileges will continue, for I have hope that the life of the land will be restored when my conduct is justified.
" ' Done at Honolulu, Oahu, this 25th day of February, 1843.
" 'Kamehameha III.
" 'Kekauluohi.'
"Lord Paulet took formal possession of the islands, installing himself as governor of Her Majesty's new dominion, destroyed every Hawaiian flag he could get hold of, and placed an embargo on every native vessel, so that no one could go out and carry the news.
"An American man-of-war, the Boston, Capt. Long, had come in a few days before the cession. Capt. Quackenbush, late of Norfolk, Va., was then a midshipman on board of her. The Americans were very indignant. They had their guns double-shotted in hopes of an opportunity to interfere, but, being on a cruise, could not go out of their way to carry the news, and could only remain neutral.
"Lord Paulet would thus have cruelly prevented the King from communicating with his ambassadors, who were abroad successfully working for the acknowledgment of his independence, hoping to commit the home Government to an acceptance of this 'voluntary' cession at the cannon's mouth before the other side of the story could be presented to it. His young lordship and Simpson chuckled over the success of the stroke by which they had, as they supposed, closed every avenue of egress for Hawaiian vessels, and secured the arrival of their own dispatches in England in advance of every other version of the story. Yankee shrewdness was, however, too much for his lordship's plans.
"It happened that the King had chartered his own yacht, Hoikaika (Swift Runner), previously to the cession, to an American house for a voyage to Mazatlan and back. Lord Paulet, anxious to get possession of the only creditable craft at the islands, in order to send Simpson as his bearer of dispatches to England by the speediest way, and being prevented, by its charter, from seizing the vessel without the consent of the American house, offered, in case they would relinquish their charter, to allow them to send an agent on the ship to attend to their business on the coast, and to bring down any freight on the return trip, thereby saving them the whole expense of the charter.
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