HAWAII. 



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HAWAII, a country, organized under n - -n- 

 stitutional government, in Polynesia, occupying 

 the volcanic group in the niiddlc of tin- northern 

 Pacific formerly known us the Sandwich Islands, 

 but now commonly as the Hawaiian lsland>. 



(For area and population, and a map of the 



Hawaiian Islands, st Annual Cyclopa-dia" 



for isii-j, ,,,,. :;:;::. :;:J4.) 



When the English, under Capt. James Cook, 

 discovered the islands they were occupied by a 

 mmrter of a million barbarians of a higher type 

 than most savage races. There were four dis- 

 tinct kingdoms, the people forming three classes 

 chiefs, priests, and serfs. There was no middle 

 class of freemen, as on other islands of the Pa- 

 cific. A chief's position was partly political and 

 partly religious. He was descended from the 

 gods, his life was charmed, and he was wor- 

 shiped after death. The priests used sorcery as 

 well as drugs, and held sway over both chiefs 

 and serfs. The latter had no rights that the 

 others were bound to respect, and more than one 

 third of the avails of their labor went to support 

 the chiefs. They were united under Kamehame- 

 ha I, who conquered the other three chieftains ; 

 but the wars that brought about this result swept 

 off a large number of the people. In 1792, 1796. 

 and 1801 English writers speak with sorrow of 

 the vices and diseases that, brought by the 

 rougher element of foreigners, were decimating 

 the islands and bringing misery to those who 

 remained. In 1805 cholera swept off half the 

 inhabitants of Oahu. 



Kamehameha I died in 1819, and so much in- 

 fluence had the better class of Europeans exerted, 

 that when Liholiho came to the throne the ta- 

 boos were abolished, the idols burned, and their 

 temples destroyed. At that happy moment, in 

 1820, the American missionaries arrived, and the 

 people readily accepted Christianity. Morality 

 and intelligence took the place of vice and 

 heathenism so rapidly, that in 1825 Kapiolani, a 

 chieftainess whom Tennyson makes the heroine 

 of a poem, walked fifty miles to Mauna Lon, and 

 there refused to sacrifice to Pele, the goddess of 

 the volcano, and thus broke up the worship that 

 had demanded constant sacrifice of human life. 

 The serfs were freed, made landowners in fee 

 simple, and given the right of suffrage. A form 

 of constitutional government was established, 

 composed of mixed native and Anglo-Saxon ele- 

 ments. When British and French naval officers 

 seized the islands the Government of the United 

 States protested vigorously, and, after the pro- 

 mulgation of a constitution by Kamehameha 

 III in 1840, the 3 powers agreed, in 1844, to re- 

 spect and guarantee the independence of the na- 

 tive Government. The form of government es- 

 tablished by that instrument and remodeled in 

 the amended Constitution of 1852, and the new 

 one proclaimed by Kamehameha V in 1864, was 

 a constitutional monarchy of the British pattern. 

 The King had a Cabinet of ministers and a Privy 

 Council, and the Legislature consisted of 20 No"- 

 bles appointed for life by the King, and 88 Rep- 

 resentatives elected by all male citizens able to 

 read and write and receiving an income of $75 

 a year. Americans and sons of American mis- 

 sionaries were commonly chosen to the chief 

 offices of state and took a prominent part in 

 legislative proceedings, framing laws that were 



modeled on those of the United States. When 

 private property in the soil wa- introduced in 

 INJ.'J tlie luilk o'f the land was allotted to the 

 chiefs, and great tracts were reserved for the 

 Crown and the stale, leaving only 27,880 acres 

 to be distributed among the common people, 

 who gradually were evicted from the lands of 

 their chiefs when these passed into the posses- 

 sion of foreigners, who introduced new cultures. 

 The Constitution of 1864 curtailed the royal 

 prerogative, but still left ex tensive- jowers to the 

 King, who had the right to make treaties not 

 involving changes in the tariff or the law, was 

 commander in chief of the military forces, pos- 

 ses-ed the veto power, could appoint and remove 

 Cabinet officers and privy councilors, and in de- 

 fault of an heir could appoint his succe ..r. 

 Kamehameha V died in 1873 without heirs and 

 without naming a successor. A popular election 

 was taken, and Prince Lunalilo was chosen King. 

 He died in the following year, and David Kala- 

 kaua was elected bv the people, obtaining a large 

 majority over the dowager Queen Emma. 



In 1875 a reciprocity treaty was negotiated 

 with the United States, under which sugar 

 grown in the Hawaiian Islands was admitted 

 into that country free of duty. This stimulated 

 the production of sugar enormously, until the 

 amount of the duty remitted on Hawaiian sugar 

 reached $5,000,000 a year. American capital 

 flowed into the country, and all the lands suit- 

 able for growing the sugar-cane passed into the 

 hands of foreigners. The Kanakas, or native 

 Hawaiians, though more vigorous, intelligent, 

 and industrious than other Polynesians, were 

 not employed by the new owners, who intro- 

 duced the system of contract labor, and, being 

 unable to supply themselves from the Polynesian 

 islands, imported Chinese coolies and Japanese 

 under treaties with their governments, and also 

 Portuguese from the Azores and Madeira. The 

 early planters employed the Kanakas as laborers 

 and lived among them on their estates, which 

 earned but moderate and precarious profits. 

 After reciprocity the estates were converted into 

 joint-stock companies, and influences were 

 brought to bear on the King and the Legisla- 

 ture to remove the restrictions on Chinese im- 

 migration and introduce the kind of semislavery 

 known as the contract-labor system. Between 

 1876 and 1887 the immigration was 35,926, in- 

 cluding 23,268 Chinese, 2.777 Japanese, and 10,- 

 216 Portuguese. The missionaries, whose saga- 

 cious and unselfish counsels gave an enlightened 

 political system to the country and fostered 

 civilized arts and customs, industry, commerce, 

 education, religion, and justice, were succeeded 

 by more selfish and ambitious statesmen, mostly 

 their children, accomplished men of affairs, who 

 now reaped rich benefits from the tide of pros- 

 perity that flooded the country. The king had 

 shown a determination to return to despotism, 

 revived sorcery, removed the ban from the sale 

 of liquor, and so instigated race hatred that dis- 

 trust of the leaders permeated native society, and 

 became acute when the Kanakas found them- 

 selves left comparatively destitute amid the sud- 

 den expansion of national wealth, of which the 

 thrifty among the Portuguese and the Chinese 

 and Japanese settlers obtained a share, while 

 they alone were excluded. From this cause a 



