"As They Deal With Me"We still have Liliuokalani's noble sentiments, recorded for posterity. We can read her desperate plea for Hawaiian freedom and independence. The words still carry the clarion call of liberty from an eloquent defender of national liberty. By the following words, she appears to have failed to realize much about the great American society whith which she was so impressed. The United States, and indeed most of the large and powerful countries founded by migrant Europeans, expanded and grew through violence. These states gloried in conquest, enslavement and the spilling of rivers of blood. The white, anglo population of "America" until very recently thought nothing of depriving other nations of basic rights, occupying their land and stealing the work of their labour. Resentment against this history in the Caribbean, Latin America and Asia is still fierce, and American (or British, or French) political agents are treated with very justified suspicion, from the Americas to North and Sub-Saharan Africa to Asia and the Pacific. That Hawaiians lost their freedom to a supposedly democratic people actually says little about the American people specifically. They weren't always to blame. Rather, it says much more about how little respect for democratic principles the American ruling class really has, historically or even currently. In no society have the rich and influential been interested in creating or maintaining a healthy and vibrant democracy. The petty "American-Hawaiian" oligarchy found ardent supporters in the movers and shakers of corrupted Washington democracy. It may be too late to restore Hawaii to Hawaiians, but in Liliuokalani's cry for freedom perhaps we can hear something of the present. Maybe we can learn more about the threats our besieged democracies face all over the world. We can hear the basic cries of all people, everywhere, in all times-- whether European, Africa, Asian or North American. We should listen. Many of these men are anything but ideal citizens for a democracy... It would remain necessary for them to rule in Hawaii, even if the American flag floated over them. And if they found they could be successfully opposed, would they seek no remedy? Where would men, already proved capable of outwitting the conservatism of the United States and defeating its strongest (democratic) traditions, capable of changing its colonial and foreign policy at a single coup, stop in their schemes?Perhaps I may even venture here upon a final word respecting the American advocates of this annexation of Hawaii... Is the American Republic of States to degenerate, and become a colonizer and land-grabber? And is this prospect satisfactory to a people who rely upon self-government for their liberties, and whose guarantee of liberty and autonomy to the whole western hemisphere, the grand Monroe doctrine, appealing to the respect and the sense of justice of the masses of every nation on earth, has made any attack upon it practically impossible to the statesmen and rulers of armed empires? There is little question that the United States could become a successful rival of the European nations in the race for conquest, and could create a vast military and naval power, if such is its ambition. But is such an ambition laudable? Is such a departure from its established principles patriotic or politic? ...For the Hawaiian people, for the forty thousand of my own race and blood, descendants of those who welcomed the devoted and pious missionaries of seventy years ago,-- for them has this mission of mine accomplished anything? Oh, honest Americans, as Christians hear me for my down-trodden people!... Quite as warmly as you love your country, they love theirs. With all your goodly posessions, covering a territory so immense that there yet remain parts unexplored, posessing islands that, although near at hand, had to be neutral ground in time of war, do not covet the little vineyard... so far from your shores, lest the punishment of Ahab fall upon you, if not in your day, in that of your children, for "be not deceived, God is not mocked." ... He will keep His promise, and will listen to the voices of His Hawaiian children lamenting for their homes. It is for the American people and their representatives in Congress to
answer these questions. As they deal with me and my people, kindly,
generously, and justly, so may the Great Ruler of all nations deal
with the grand and glorious nation of the United States of
America." Sources and Reading"Hawaii's Story: By Hawaii's Queen", by Liliuokalani. First published 1898 by Lothrop, Lee and Shepard Co., Boston. Reprinted by Charles E. Tuttle Company, Inc., Vermont, 1977. "The Legends and Myths of Hawaii", by His Hawaiian Majesty, Kalakaua. First published 1888. Reprinted by Mutual Publishing, Honolulu, 1990 . |