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INTRODUCTION.

THRO

'HROUGHOUT the year 1892 rumours of discontent and unrest in Honolulu were rife in the United States. King Kalakaua, who succeeded Lunalilo, was not descended from the hereditary ruling line, but was elected by the Legislature in February, 1874. His reign was turbulent and corrupt, the political abuses becoming so unbearable in 1887 that the demand for reform finally culminated in revolution. Others of less significance had preceded this, originating in the intrigues of corrupt adventurers who surrounded the King, taking advantage of his weakness and his financial embarrassments, and plunging the country into difficult and dangerous political complications. While without a single exception these men brought about their own undoing from time to time, the direct effect of their downfall was not so important and decisive as the resistance which was made against their encroachments in 1887.

The old ruling line, "the old Kamehamehas," as they are called by the Hawaiians, while frequently

possessing grave faults of character, had the wisdom to choose as their advisers the ablest and most public-spirited of the European and American residents in the Islands. From these were chosen the chief members of their Ministry and the Justices of the Supreme Court, but one native having served in the latter capacity from the adoption of the first constitution in 1840.

King Kalakaua became imbued with jealousy of the growing wealth and influence of the white men in the Islands, and gradually alienated all who might have counselled him wisely and unselfishly. He chose for his associates instead, so far as he was able, those who flattered his vanity and intensified his race prejudices, they securing from him in return large sums of money and immense tracts of the best Crown lands. He showed more and more a disposition to encroach upon the rights and privileges which the whites had enjoyed under his abler predecessors, and which it is only just to state they had never abused. Whatever estates they acquired had been purchased at equitable rates, and in several instances where they had been gifts they had been returned to the people and set apart for educational purposes. This, in brief, was the situation in 1887.

In this year a secret league was formed which was prepared to resist further demoralisation, and to demand speedy and radical reforms. Arms were secured, and in the guise of militia some five hun

ence.

THE CRISIS OF 1887.

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dred men were equipped and drilled, ready to act when the proper time arrived. Memorials had been sent to their respective governments by the American, English, and German residents, setting forth the existing state of affairs and asking for interferIn the interim the Rifles, as the military organisation was called, had planned a sudden attack upon the Palace; but it was abandoned, and more peaceable means of securing justice agreed upon. A public mass meeting was held, at which the grievances of the people were set forth, and at which specific demands for their relief were made of the King.

In his report to the Hon. J. H. Blount, who was sent out to the Islands by President Cleveland in 1893, Professor W. D. Alexander says of this crisis: "On the afternoon of the 30th of June, 1887, all business in Honolulu was suspended, and an immense meeting was held in the Armoury, on Beretania Street, composed of all classes, creeds, and nationalities, but united in sentiment as never before or since. The meeting was guarded by a battalion of Rifles, fully armed. A set of resolutions were passed, unanimously declaring that the Government had 'ceased through incompetence and corruption to perform the functions and afford the protection to personal and property rights for which all governments exist,' and demanding of the King the dismissal of his Cabinet, the restitution of the $71,000

received as a bribe from Aki (a Chinaman negotiating the unrestricted sale of opium in the Islands), the dismissal of one Junius Kaae from the Land Office, and a pledge that the King would no longer interfere in politics."

The Cabinet was one of the most corrupt that had ever existed in the Islands. It was composed of W. M. Gibson (a Mormon emigrant sent out from Utah as a missionary), Minister of Foreign Affairs; L. Aholo, Minister of Interior; P. P. Kanoa, Minister of Finance; Antone Rosa, Attorney-General, the last three natives. They were implicated in Customs Revenue frauds, the illegal sale of Crown lands, and other misdemeanours.

Kaae, it should also be explained, was one of the most dissolute of many conscienceless hangers-on at the Palace, and acted as intermediary between the luckless Aki and the King, receiving his share of the large sum that was demanded for the opium licence above mentioned. The result of this movement on the part of the people was that a committee was "sent to wait upon the King with these demands," as Professor Alexander's report goes on to state. "Kalakaua's troops had mostly deserted him, and the native populace seemed quite indifferent to his fate." The King, thus abandoned by his guard and his people, called together the representatives of the United States, Great Britain, France, and Portugal, all of whom were largely represented

THE GIBSON CABINET DISMISSED.

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by citizens or subjects in the population, and offered to relinquish the Crown if they would agree among themselves as to some form of protectorate. This was naturally declined, as it was hardly probable that their respective governments would have consented to any such compact; and as they were certainly not personally or officially empowered to accept so grave a responsibility, nothing came of the proposition. There was no cable communication between the Islands and the United States, and many weeks must have elapsed before the action of either of the Powers mentioned could have been ascertained. The people had borne the gradual abasement of the Government as long as they were able to endure it, and they were in no frame of mind to tolerate either delay or evasion on the part of the King and his creatures. He was helped to a speedy decision also by those to whom he had sought to relegate his authority, and who very wisely advised him to accede to the demands of the committee, and that without delay.

The obnoxious Cabinet was therefore dismissed, Gibson the Mormon being ordered to return to San Francisco, narrowly escaping violence at the hands of the people, who very rightly regarded him as responsible for much of the trouble and loss which the Government had sustained; and the others. speedily sank into obscurity.

The new Cabinet consisted of Godfrey Brown, an

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