HAWAII. 



363 



ministration. The external debt of 1895, bearing 

 interest at 4 per cent., was estimated in 1898 to 

 amount to 1,482,800, or $18,443,600, reckoning 

 the premium on gold at 150. The total liabili- 

 ties of the Government were figured by the Eng- 

 lish council of foreign bondholders to amount to 

 3,215,000, or $40,185,424 in currency, while the 

 -assets of the Government in railroads and other 

 property were only $17,383,513. About 10 per 

 cent, of the Government's expenses are for the 

 maintenance of the army, which numbered in 

 1896 about 7,000 men of all ranks. All Guate- 

 malans are liable to military service in time of 

 war, and the number of effective men below the 

 age of thirty is about 56,900, with a reserve of 

 30,000 above that age. 



Commerce and Production. The soil of 

 Ouatemala is very rich in most parts of the coun- 

 try. The main crop is coffee, of which 824,756 

 quintals were exported in 1897. The export duty 

 of $1.50 in gold per quintal was reduced in 1898 

 to $1 in currency. The yield of tobacco in 1897 

 w r as 9,900 quintals. Next to coffee, the chief crop 

 for export is bananas. Cacao is also grown, and 

 Indian corn is produced in abundance for do- 

 mestic consumption. Cattle and horses are pas- 

 tured in the elevated table-lands. Gold mining is 

 a recent enterprise, and there are silver mines 

 in operation. Salt is mined successfully, but the 

 deposits of lead, tin, and copper ore have been 

 neglected. The imports into Guatemala were val- 

 ued in 1897 at $8,584,821, or $21,462,053 in cur- 

 rency; exports, $19,775,800 in currency. The gold 

 value of the imports of cotton goods was $1,716,- 

 *984; of wine, beer, and spirits, $667,176; of cereals, 

 $659,832; of canned goods, $350,444; of woolen 

 .goods, $312,475; of iron manufactures, $246,961; 



of railroad and telegraph materials, $227,267. 

 The value in currency of the exports of coffee was 

 $18,875,700; of silver coin, $473,000; of hides, 

 $205,965; of bananas, $77,548. Of the exports of 

 coffee 543,807 quintals were shipped to Germany, 

 137,055 quintals to the United States, and 123,277 

 quintals to England. The number of vessels en- 

 tered at the ports of Guatemala in 1897 was 614, 

 of 782,076 tons, mostly from the United States. 



Railroads, Posts, and Telegraphs. The 

 railroads in operation at the end of 1898 had a 

 length of 336 miles, and 100 miles were under 

 construction. An American company completed 

 133 miles in tfrat year, receiving a subsidy from 

 the Government of $480,000 a year for operating 

 the line. The telegraph lines in 1897 had a total 

 length of 3,093 miles. The number of messages 

 sent during the year was 664,169. The receipts 

 were $293,563; expenses, $418,394. The number 

 of pieces of mail matter sent in 1897 was 4,038,- 

 966; the number received, 5,674,100. 



Proposed Repudiation. In consequence of its 

 financial embarrassments the Guatemalan Gov- 

 ernment proposed to place the foreign debt on 

 the same footing as the internal bonds, which 

 were worth in the market only 25 per cent, of 

 their nominal value. Various foreign govern- 

 ments protested, Germany most vigorously, and 

 in July a threat was made to send a German 

 naval force to compel the fulfillment of obliga- 

 tions. The Government of Guatemala at first 

 refused all redress, but assumed a more concili- 

 atory attitude later, and postponed the applica- 

 tion of the law. The United States Government 

 did not consent to take joint action with Germany 

 and Great Britain to bring pressure on the dis- 

 turbed and embarrassed republic. 



H 



HAWAII, a Territory of the United States, 

 formerly an independent kingdom, the integrity 

 of which was recognized by the United States, 

 Great Britain, and France in the reign of Kame- 

 harneha III after he had proclaimed a constitu- 

 tion in 1840. In January, 1893, Queen Liliuo- 

 kalani was forced to abdicate by the menace of 

 United States marines, who were landed, osten- 

 sibly to protect American lives and property, at 

 the request of Minister Stevens, and the leaders 

 of the revolutionary party, most of them sons 

 of American missionaries and advocates of an- 

 nexation to the United States, proclaimed a pro- 

 visional Government, which was succeeded on 

 July 4, 1894, by a republic, in which native Ha- 

 waiians and whites who could read and write 

 either the English or the Hawaiian language had 

 the right to vote indirectly for Senators and 

 members of the House of Representatives. On 

 June 16, 1897, a treaty was signed at Washing- 

 ton by Secretary of State John Sherman and 

 envoys of the Hawaiian Republic providing for 

 the annexation of the islands to the United States 

 as the Territory of Hawaii. The treaty stipulated 

 that the existing land laws of the United States 

 relative to public lands shall not apply in the 

 Hawaiian Islands, but that Congress shall enact 

 laws to secure all revenue from or proceeds of 

 the public lands of Hawaii for the benefit of the 

 inhabitants of the islands for educational or other 

 purposes. Until Congress shall provide for the 

 government of the islands all the civil, judicial, 

 and military powers exercised by the officers of 

 the existing Government were to be vested in such 

 persons and exercised in such manner as the 



President of the United States shall direct, and 

 power was conferred on him to remove officers 

 and fill the vacancies so occasioned. The United 

 States assumed all lawful debts of the Hawaiian 

 Government, not to exceed $4,000,000, but so long 

 as existing customs relations of the Hawaiian 

 Government with the United States and other 

 countries remain unchanged and the existing 

 Government is continued. The municipal legis- 

 lation of the Hawaiian Islands remains in force 

 until Congress shall determine otherwise, so far 

 as it is not inconsistent with the treaty or con- 

 trary to the Constitution of the United States, 

 except such as has been enacted for the fulfillment 

 of treaties with foreign nations, all of which 

 forthwith cease and determine. There shall be 

 no further immigration of Chinese into the Ha- 

 waiian Islands, except upon the conditions al- 

 lowed by the laws of the United States, and no 

 Chinese shall be allowed to enter the United 

 States from the Hawaiian Islands by reason of 

 their annexation to the United States. The 

 United States Congress finally ratified the treaty 

 on July 7, 1898, and on Aug. 12, 1898, the sover- 

 eignty over the islands was formally transferred 

 to the United States. Five commissioners were 

 appointed to recommend such legislation for the 

 Hawaiian Islands as they deem necessary and 

 proper. In accordance with their recommenda- 

 tions, all whites, including Portuguese, all per- 

 sons of African descent, and all descendants of 

 the Hawaiian race, either on the paternal or the 

 maternal side, who were Hawaiian citizens prior 

 to annexation, were declared citizens of the United 

 States. The number of electors on the rolls in 



