New at Reason

Matt Welch contemplates saying bye to HI.

Comments

Scott Ferguson | August 22, 2005, 3:26pm | #

Maybe we could trade Hawaii for Puerto Rico. There aren't any indigenous people left in that commonwealth, so there wouldn't be any soverignty claims based on genetics.

Hawaiians never had any meaningful political rights prior to 1840. Do they want to return to a monarchy?

R C Dean | August 22, 2005, 3:32pm | #

Matt's post glides past the most difficult part of this whole issue - the fact that the new "government" will be race-based, with definitions of the race who gets to exert sovereignty over their former fellow citizens very difficult to come by.

In my mind, this approach is so offensive that it completely overwhelms the post-colonial guilt that Matt refers to as justification for this project.

Kami Toishi | August 22, 2005, 3:45pm | #

...with definitions of the race who gets to exert sovereignty over their former fellow citizens very difficult to come by

For some reason, I immediately think of the Wannsee Protocol, with the mischlinge classifications. Power over others is determined by arbitrary degrees of genetic composition.

Matt Welch | August 22, 2005, 3:46pm | #

"Glides over"?

Akaka's proposed law would create a new nine-member governing council for Hawaii, initially appointed by the federal government but eventually elected by "the roll" of those judged to be "Native Hawaiians" (via a presumably genetic definition to be determined at a later date by...Native Hawaiians). Within a few years, this new body would become a "native governing entity that would have a government-to-government relationship with the United States," according to the Committee report.

Washington and this new race-based body would then be set to haggle over [blah blah blah] .... The actual state government of Hawaii -- the one elected by all its adult citizens, and not just those with enough native blood -- would self-evidently lose power.

K. Toishi | August 22, 2005, 3:46pm | #

...with definitions of the race who gets to exert sovereignty over their former fellow citizens very difficult to come by

For some reason, I immediately think of the Wannsee Protocol, with the mischlinge classifications. Power over others is determined by arbitrary degrees of genetic composition.

The Wine Commonsewer | August 22, 2005, 3:53pm | #

RC, any race based government is an affront to morality and should be resisted on those grounds alone. For the US to sanction or participate in the creation of such a government dwarfs whatever evils that may have transpired a hundred years ago by tenfold.

Matt, great article, but I tend to disagree with the importance of Hawaii not having anything in common with the American southwest. I would say that the American southwest has more in common with Hawaii than it does with the the dead culture of factory and mine in the rust belt states, or for that matter NYC. Those immersed in the car culture of Californicate can no more relate to those living on the 60th floor of a high rise in Manhattan than native Hawaiians can relate to sitting in rush hour traffic on the 134 for two hours (Although five o'clock on the highway from Captain Cook to Kona sucks just as bad--just doesn't last as long).

Made this point before but it bears repeating (at least for me) the Kingdom of Hawaii that existed before the US annexation has no greater legitimacy than the current arrangement, which was created with a hell of a lot less bloodshed. So why not go the whole nine yards and make each island independent of one another and the US?

Give Maui back to the Mauians Regards, TWC

Geoff Nathan | August 22, 2005, 4:01pm | #

There's a few complications here. First, Hawai`i was annexed to the US not fifty years ago but over 100 (1897 if I remember correctly). It became a state in 1957, but Hawaiians of all races have been citizens since 1897. And there are a lot of non-Hawaiian Hawaiians--roughly 40% Japanese ancestry, 30% Caucasian, bunches of Chinese, Koreans, Puerto Ricans, Filipinos etc. Many of them are kama'ainas (i.e. they were born and raised in Hawaii). It will be interesting if they are disenfranchised.
When I lived in Hawaii (admittedly twenty years ago) the independence movement was a miniscule bunch of loonies (leftist loonies, of course). I suspect the movement has grown a little, but their interest in independence is not towards building a Galt's Gulch, I assure you.

bill | August 22, 2005, 4:01pm | #

Since everyone's picking at the same bit, over Kevin Kelly's cool tools, he's discussing at home DNA Testing

I'm your basic German/Irish mix and my wife's father is native Hawaiian with genetic links back to at least the Phillipines and Portugal. I'm really curious what my daughter's genetic family tree would look like.

R C Dean | August 22, 2005, 4:09pm | #

Well, Matt, I know you mentioned it, but you didn't really dwell on it in your insighful yet acidic way.

You spent as much time talking about how bad the haole should feel for even being there as you did talking about the incredible racist mess that we are apparently on the verge of creating in Hawaii.

Don Mynack | August 22, 2005, 4:24pm | #

They really need to go all the way with this and bring back one of their old-timey native traditions - cannibalism!* You know, for the tourists and all.

*Note that they ate parts of Captain Cook after they killed him. Also note that Capt. Cook may or may not have deserved it, depending upon whom you read.

The Wine Commonsewer | August 22, 2005, 4:41pm | #

cannabilism

Mark Twain's letters from Hawai'i are worth a read. Fascinating, amusing, insightful, contemporaneous stuff from a guy who loved Hawai'i yet once he left he never returned again.

Available online here and in book form from Amazon.

Matt Welch | August 22, 2005, 4:49pm | #

RC -- There's a bunch of different things to emphasize here. I wanted the column to be as much a link-fest, pointing people toward interesting conundra, as anything else. Also, I truly do believe we're wasting breath by *not* asking Hawaiians point blank whether they want to stay in the Union, before signing off on some crazy long-term arrangement.

But I think boiling Akaka down to "racism wins!" is misleading. We have (if I'm not mistaken) similarly race-based determination about Indian tribes, but the key diff is that they're generally on self-contained reservations (right?). I don't know how you maintain ongoing policies of redress or restitution or whatever without taking race into account, unless you just drop the whole thing.

But like I said, there's tons to chew on here; good for the brain.

Eddy | August 22, 2005, 4:56pm | #

It strikes me that the whole race based thing is beside the point, a mob is a mob is a mob. Why does it matter how the ruling mob is chosen? Instead of majority mob, they would be ruled by a mob selected by genetics. Sounds like an old fashioned republic to me. If you're worried about being disadvantaged consider that your local mob can take your property, regularly takes a substantial portion of your earnings and tightly controls what you can or can't do under penalty of confinement. If done right, it might be better than it is now.

The Wine Commonsewer | August 22, 2005, 5:15pm | #

We have (if I'm not mistaken) similarly race-based determination about Indian tribes, but the key diff is that they're generally on self-contained reservations (right?). I don't know how you maintain ongoing policies of redress or restitution or whatever without taking race into account, unless you just drop the whole thing.

Yes, and the tribal thing is what the Akaka people are hanging their collective hat on. So, let's, as you suggest, just drop the whole thing.

Sell off the Indian tribal holdings, divvy up the profits amongst all the Indians (for the last race based allocation to ever happen in the US) and move on.

The whole thing is absurd anyway when you consider that by official racial definition my blond-haired, blue-eyed kids have more than enough native blood to qualify as tribal members.

fluffy | August 22, 2005, 6:45pm | #

Are the separatists expecting that all non-native Hawaiians who are currently residents of Hawaii will simply leave if they don't like the new race-based government of the theoretical independent Hawaiian state? Just get on a plane and go back to California?

Frankly, I'd hope that at least SOME of them would immediately launch an insurrection. If this new government is truly sovereign, I certainly hope that US military personnel won't be hanging around to enforce its sovereignty, Baghdad-style.

Without the US military, taking out the Hawaiian state government would take, what, 200 guys tops?

Don | August 22, 2005, 8:47pm | #

Without the US military, taking out the Hawaiian state government would take, what, 200 guys tops?

We could fly in as tourists, take the place over, and create "Libertopia".

zeroentitlement | August 22, 2005, 9:21pm | #

This reminds me somewhat unpleasantly of all that extremist Latino rhetoric about "reclaiming" California and/or Texas for Mexico, or for "the Mestizo brotherhood," or whatever. Yeehaw! Let's turn Cali into the same corrupt third-world sewer that Mexico is!

If you look at where native Hawaiians are in the food chain, despite having both government and private (such as Pauahi-Bishop endowments) opportunities handed to them on platters for the last 50 years (government-guaranteed land plots, Kamehameha schools, government and UH-sponsored healthcare programs, etc.), you'll see that they're doing piss-poor compared to other kama'aina (Japanese, Chinese and Vietnamese immigrants in particular). Compare the run-down shacks in Nanakuli, basically a Hawaiian ghetto, to the manicured Buddhahead paradises of Aiea or Hawai'i Kai.

Just as with California, the whole reason that land's worth anything at all is that outsiders have come in, worked it, developed it, and made it profitable and wildly desirable. And so now that it's worth something, now that it practically mints tourism profits and is a major international transportation hub (compared to, let's say, the Marquesas or Tonga), now they want to discuss the "transfer of assets." Ohh, OK! Riiight!

And just as with California, I give those f*ckers five years of "sovereignty" max. I'll go back, and discover I can't drink the water, a gallon of milk's going for $30 on the black market, and anybody who looks suspiciously non-Hawaiian gets pulled over by the cops and extorted. Yeah, the tourists are gonna love that.

You wonder why they don't ever ask themselves, if native sovereignty's such a hot idea, why are most Indian reservations worthless and depressing sh*tholes? Maybe they can just turn one of the islands into a giant casino.

I don't suppose "taxation without representation" means anything to the more strident Hawaii for Hawaiians crusader.

Rick Barton | August 23, 2005, 3:01am | #

Gosh, I sure hope Hawaii splits. Maybe it will put pressure on our idiot federal government to clean up its filthy act and keep its nose and other appendages out of the states' business. Or maybe Hawaiian succession could start a trend of saying "bye" to Uncle Sham.

Xboy | August 23, 2005, 10:40pm | #

zeroentitlement:
Hawaiians aren't suddenly demanding sovereignty because outsiders made the land desirable. Hawaii has always been a fine place to live, and Hawaiians have been complaining ever since the monarchy was overthrown in 1893 by a group of American businessmen and the US Marines.
As for the "government-guaranteed land-plots" you mention, the Hawaiian Homelands Commission has been making promises since it was formed in the 1920s, and people who filed a claim 80 years ago are still waiting for that land to be distributed (or rather, their grandchildren are). Meanwhile the Commissioners have been leasing the land at below-market rates to their political cronies.
Same with the Kam Schools and the Bishop Estate. Positions on their Boards of Trustees are political plums that go to those who maintain the status quo, and handing out opportunities to poor Hawaiians is not on the agenda.
Maybe if these institutions had done their jobs, and if the US government hadn't been so blatantly racist during the Territorial days, then there wouldn't be so many Hawaiians yearning for this pipe dream of independence.