Ka Leo o ka Lahui, Volume II, Number 191, 12 May 1891 — THE ASIATIC QUESTION SINCE THE LAST ELECTION. [ARTICLE]

THE ASIATIC QUESTION SINCE THE LAST ELECTION.

One of the principal planks of j the National Principles, and in fact also of the pseudo Reform plat-! form, was thedesirefor exclusion ofj Asiatics from this country. As a sequence and consequence ofthis | ūnanimous feeling, the Legislature | made a good deal «f fuss about a | bill that was to rad*cally cure the evil, but of whieh the true friends , of the people said that it would | only be a mole-hill instead ©f a mountain. Now, to-day, eighteen menths after the elections whieh were carried through the anti-Asiatic feeling of the c©mmunity, how de we stand in the matter, as considered under its two aspects of rent immigration and of permanent eettlement ? The immigratien from China has been temporarily stopped,— it is true, —and the only Chinese allowed te land have been under the return passport law; but it is juBt now announced that ere long the citizens of the Flowery Empire will again flood the country, only they will be coming in sailing Tessels, not in steamers, and no longer frora flong Keng,—but from •ome other port not subject to British authority,—so as to evade eome of the late protective regulations. Whatever may happen however, —as a cempensatien f#r past stoppage ©f Chinamen, —the immigration from Japan has been resumed to the frightful extent of over 3000 in a few months, and many more thousands are yet expected in the next few months, whereby laborers of all other nationalities will be crowded out, even if the law is faithfully carried out, —viz! —that all the new immigrants will have to go away at the expiration of th«ir centracts, — whieh is extremely doubtful. Outside of tbe immigrations questien. and as regards the number of Asiatics gettling in the country, even if it be true, as rumered, that the number of Ohina- j men residing here apart frem the oontract laborers, has slightly diminished, yet it is a notorious j fact they are |crowding out all the ether nationalities as store-keeperB all over the Islands, and in Honolulu, Ohinauen are on the increase in all branchos of trade and Wueinesi, supplanting natives and f»reigners alike, se that it ean be already anticipated when even all oar hack-drivers will be oele6tials; and all lhis because our Minister •f Interior, in epite of his boasted !ove and promiies for the p%*r Hawaiiana* never refusee a lieenae to a celestial; and it muat be said in deferenceto ex-minister Thurston with all hi« bad traila, that he uever «acrificed Uie uitereetB of •ther nationalitpea to the aggraudisement of Joh* whieh on the eootnu7 t 1» kept dnwn aa maeh aa po«dble. Bat, what is »ore, if tbe voters, in the next «l«otk>QB, do pit a stop to

Charlie*s doings, in the near future even our elections will e.TentuaUy be controled by celestials, for they are now groing in forthe right to vote, and Minister Spencer has had the hon©r of naturalizing nearly a hundred of them Bince the beginniug of his incnmbency, and we have every reason to believe that this number will be greatly increased by the time of the uext elections, as the educated celestials are growing to' understand thevalue of p«litical rights, even if it be only for the puri>ose ef making eoin out of them. Therefore we do not yet despair of seeing qur friend Spencer wearing a queue as representing I our new citizens. And this is how the Asiatic question stands ainee the clearly manifested yerdict of the people, that the plague must be stopped and the Asiatics must go!! In the mean time, the devil.... and the planters rub their hands; ... the planters are getting their eheap labor; what do they care about the white and native laborers being crowded to starvation ? However the cause is net yet desperate, and the next elections, —if th«y carefully blackball all ! candidates of the plMters' reform, —may still bring a remedy to the poor man, to the meehanie .... If not, communism and petreleum will be rampant, oh ! «entlemen of the gilver bag!