Ka Leo o ka Lahui, Volume II, Number 310, 27 October 1891 — Page 4

KA LEO O KA LAHUI.

"E Mau ke Ea o ka Aina i ka Pono."

 

KA LEO O KA LAHUI.

John E. Bush.

Luna Hooponopono a me Puuku.

TUESDAY, OCT. 27, 1891.

Eld. Geo. B. Starr of the “Central Bible School” Chicago, will conduct a series of Bible studies on the epistle of Paul to the Romans; at the Y. M. C. A. Hall, beginning Monday evening, at 7:30. These meeting will be strictly undenominational in character. The great theme of the epistle “justification and righteousness by faith” being the theme of study. All are invited to come and to bring Bibles with them.

 

Who are Supported by the Sugar Industry?

            Under the above title the P. C. Advertiser publishes an editorial taking the position, that the whole country is interested in the production of sugar, while the impression among a certain class is that only a few are interested. The P. C. A. may be right, as far as they look upon the few plantation owners and those immediately interested with them in the sugar industry of these island, as being the whole country.

            We know, that the P. C. Advertiser have argued and endeavored to maintain that the sugar-barons, and those immediately interested with them, represent the whole country. Heretofore, they have used the government and the people, not as a party interested with them, but as a means only to serve them and their interests in the sugar industry, ignoring the rights and interests that the government and people have in them and in the sugar industry, by avoiding the just payment of their taxes to the government and a fair percentage of wages to the wage earner. The opinion or impression of a certain class is correct that, when compared with the entire population, only a few are really interested. We know for certain, that if the sugar industry was to cease to-morrow, that on the whole the Hawaiian people, the largest portion of our permanent population, would be better off than they are at present, @@@@ showing practically the extent of their interests in sugar and how little they are affected by its downfall. The Hawaiian population and many others earn only a meagre pittance from the sugar industry. They work and toil, for the sugar baron’s interest, and to that extent they are interested in sugar. The laborer can do the same in any other industry, and in some, with decidedly more advantage to himself.

            The manner in which the sugar industry is prosecuted here is between two classes – the one who invests in it as a business and the man, or machine, which he employs to work for him. The one has an interest as owner and is entirely different from the others, whose interest, if interest it may be called. is that of a laborer for wages, just as an animal is a worker for the same master. This interest of the rich and poor, of the master and servant, which ought to be identical and equitable is not the same interest that is claimed by the P. C. Advertiser.

            The doleful picture held up to view by our contemporary only applies directly and vitally to a few moneyed people, principally made up of men interested in sugar as owner not as laborers. The voters of the country are the ones that will be the sufferers, if the sugar-barons and those interested with him, are no placed in a position to be fairer in the division of the profits of this industry. The one who is the really interested in the sugar industry, before the McKinley tariff bill struck it like a tornado, were the one who supplanted all the white laborer with the Asiatic peon labor. This system toward boths foreign white and Hawaiian laborer has always been the policy of those who controlled and owned the sugar industry of the country. It was the same, when the owner was receiving his five hundred to a thousand dollars a day profit, it would have been the same, irrespective of the operation of the McKinley bill; it will always be the same with the owner, -in the sugar or any other industry.

            “Vitally” the same division of interests can be traced throughout the entire connection between the owner and the employed in the sugar business. 1. Those engaged in the transportation, &c., are sugar stock owners, and his hired man; 2. Those engaged in furnishing plantation supplies, and who furnish goods, &c., are the sugar owners and his hired peons. 3. Those who draw the dividends and who go abroad to spend it, except for what they are actually obliged to git here, are the sugar owners, without his laborer in this instance.

            All through, the one engages in sugar and supplies everything for himself, and even for his laborer; the other simply slaves for the master and receives his wages, and that is often deducted for one cause or another, until the laborer has nothing to receive.

            This gives a general idea of the interests that the people in this country are supposed to have in the sugar interest – it is divided, like everything else in this world at the present time between the classes, who hold all and desire more and the masses who have nothing and are to get less.

 

A Split.

            From the arbitrary and irregular coursed pursued by the self appointed President of the Hui Kalaiaina, it is not unlikely that there will be the secession of principal leading Hawaiians from the Association. This course is due to some underhanded influence, which is endeavoring to split the Hawaiian and the Workingmen. It is an easy matter to do so, as the Hawaiian as well as the Mechanics’ Union are showing a spirit of disunit, the smaller number endeavoring to corral the larger, as was done last election, by which means the Hawaiian Party were made useful to others and useless for themselves. This cause and result has decided the leading Hawaiians to brood no dictation or compromises in its efforts in the coming election campaign. They desire, in proportion to their numbers and influence, to do right and to be treated right, and will not tolerate any underhanded influence to be palmed off on them. They do not propose to be any more a bridge to carry over a lot of carpet-baggers into the Legislature, and have then use their influence and forn combinations to work against their party and to forswear their promises.

            In to-day’s issue a call in Hawaiian is made by Hons. R. W. Wilcox, J. Nawahi and J. E. Bush, to the native people to meet them at a meeting of the International League. This course, we know, is regretted by the parties who are making this call, but they disclaim any other motives for doing so than that of preserving the fundamental principles of the National Hawaiian Party – freedom and equality, and that they are impelled to this course through the intrigues of others.

            That the aim is, and has been, to which this rupture, cause has been painfully evident lately. Those who have bartered by their votes, principles, pledges, and their party, are at work and are the real authors of this division. Having succeeded in making themselves unworthy of the confidence of the voters, by their past record, they yet hope to manipulate the dozen or two men, representing the Executive Comitties of the Hui Kalaiaina and the Mechanics’ Union, to conforn to their views and accept nominations from the for future representatives and nobles.

            With this object evidently in view, the Mechanics Union Executive Committee have proposed to the Hui Kalaiaina Executive Committee that they should meet without a statement of the purpose of the meeting. To facilitate matters the Hons. Wilcox, Nawahi, Bush and another member of the Hui Kalaiaina Executive Committee have been asked to stay to one side for a time, by the unauthorized will of the President of the Hui Kalaiaina, and by the same will Judge Hopkins, of the Police Court, is put in as Committee, thus making matters quite easy and pleasant for the wire pullers. This addition to the Committee, who never was a member of the Hui Kalaiaina, so that his selection and appointment is due to the same system that existed and was the cause of the martyr age. We have been living in expectation of the sitting up of such a system and a brief reinstatement of that same power and a modified repetition of what transpired under its authority, but we did not anticipate so sudden an appearance among us.

            As freemen, and firmly believing in the equality of the human family, we protest against any and all underhanded work that strikes at our liberty and just rights, and we who have signed a call, for the meeting of the Hawaiians, aforementioned, are satisfied that the natives at least are with us in their hearts.

 

ON DIT.

            That we are more or less dependent upon Sugar, “Only” almost the rights of working men and we are with you. When sugar was at top notch, -Hawaiian laborers and others were fined out of their wages, and kicked and beaten in the field. That the luna does the dirty work while the pios stockholder occupied a carpeted pew in a fashionable church and echoes – Amen, amen!

 

            That the long and short of Creation left by the Monowai, last Sunday for the Antipodes.

 

            That Sell’s Circus will make a grand hit in Australia. The Colonials like the American cousins, when they com sober.

 

            That it is awful nice to be a father, if your daughters can all become Queen’s.

 

            That the Dukes, Marquises and church dignitaries will be represented at the Planters Annual Session, and that the password for admittance to its meetings will be – Let us prey!

 

            That the National Liberal League will meet at the usual time and place, Tuesday.

 

            That the new Model Lunch Rooms has closed its doors for the fifth time this year. Liver and beacon all gone; fish no more.

 

            That chefa and pakapio have each found its admirers, so now the game like opium, can go on unmolested. Hawaii is a great country for expediency, though the means to accomplish it may be immoral and rotten.

 

Platform of Principle

OF THE

HAWAIIAN NATIONAL LIBERAL PARTY.

PRINCIPLE OF GOVERNMENT AND CONSTITUTION.

1. We deem that all Government should be founded on the principles of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity; we hold that all men are born free and equal before the law and are endowed with inalienable rights to life, to liberty, to propertp, to the pursuit of happiness and to self-protection against arbitrary concentration of power, irresponsible wealth, and unfair competition. We believe that just government exists only by the consent of the People, and that, when it becomes necessary for the public welfare, they may abolish existing forms and establish more advantageous and equitable system; and, as the present Constitution of the Hawaiian Kingdom never has had the approval of the People, but was established by intimidation and fraud for the benefit of a certain class, therefore we favor the adoption of a new and more liberal Constitution, to truly secure a Government of the People, by the People and for the People.

INDEPENDENCE OF THE COUNTRY

            2. Out of consideration for the inherent rights and present opinions of the native population, we dersire to retain the independence of the Country and defend its autonomy, under a liberal and popular form of government; but our Treaties with Foreign Powers, and especially with the United States of America, should be revised, so as to better meet present necessities and to obtain more equitable advantages in exchange of those granted by us.

JUDICIARY REFORMS

            3. Our Judiciary system and Code of Procedure must be submitted to a thorough revision, so as to secure a cheap and prompt administration of justice, free of all sectarian or patisan spirit, and to render the Judges more directly responsible to the People; and we are in favor of a more liberal interpretation of Constitutional guarantees of the freedom of speech and the press.

TAXATION

            4. A more just and perfect system of Taxation must be inaugurated, to abolish the present inequalities, by which the property of the poor is excessively taxed, while much of the rich man’s goods are under-valued for assessment or entirely escape taxation; we shall therefore demand the passage of laws that will more effectually subject the property of corporations and rich citizens to their just proportion of public burdens, while granting more liberal exemptions to the poor; and as a means of discouraging the locking up of large tracts of uncultivated lands, a differential tax should be levied in addition to the usual assessment on valuation which should be in proportion to the fertility of the soil We shall also favor the establishment of a graduated income tax and thus expect to obtain ample funding for conducting the government and attending to all necessary public improvements without any further calls on the masses.

MONOPOLIES

            5. We shall use our efforts to obtain laws by which all favoritism in the government and all monopolies, trusts and privileges to special classes shall be rendered impossible, by full, definite and mandatory statutes.

            6. Better laws should regulate the Civil Service. The principle of the election of officers of the government by the people should be established, and no man should be allowed to hold more than one office of profit, whilst salaries should be adaquate compensation for the sarvices rendered. All excessive salaries should be reduced and all sinecures or superfluous offices abolished.

PROTECTION TO HOME INDUSTRIES

            7. We are in favor of encouraging all home agriculture and industries, andall our native products, like rice, coffee, wool, tobacco, etc. should be protected and fostered by proper tariff regulation; and also it must be the duty of the Govment, in its contracts and other operations, to give preference to national products over imported ones.

PUBLIC SERVANTS.

LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT

8. We desire a more liberal policy towards the different Islands of the Kingdom, outside of Oahu; they should receive a fairer proportion of the public moneys for the development of their resources and the satisfactirn of their wants. In fact, the principle of local Self-government should be extended, whereby giving localities may choose the most important of their local executive officers, and levy taxes for the purpose local improvements of a public nature.

PROTECTION TO THE LABOURING CLASSES

            9. We shall endorse all measure tending to improve the condition of the working classes, and consequently, without injuring any vested rights, we will advocate laws to prevent all further importation or employment of contract labor of any kind, upon conditions which will bring it into a ruinous and degrading competition with free Hawaiian or white labor. We shall also, in the interest of the better protection of the poor, ask for more liberal exemptions of their property from forced sale on execution, and from seizure in bankruptcy proceedings.

SMALL FARMING AND HOMESTEADS.

            10. The wealthy fraction of our population have hiterto prevented the development of an independent class of citizens; the public lands have been acquired and have been tied up in a few hands or parcelled to suit faavorites, and small farmers and planters have been driven out by corporations or combinations of capitalists: but as small farming is conducive to the stability of the State, it should be encouraged by a new and more liberal Homestead act, by whch the ownership of small tracts of land and the settlement thereon of families of our present population, -and especialily of the native Hawaiians who have been left almost homeless in there country, -should be rendered possible. To that end, the Government and Crown lands, (in so far as can be done without invading vested rights) should be devoted as soon as possible to homesteads and conferred upon bona-fide settlers free of taxes for a limited period.

            It should be the further aim of government to, at once, so far improve the means of transportation, -local, national and international, -as to provide, in all the districts, cheap means of conveying the product of the soil to market.

ELECTORAL RIGHT.

            11. We hold that upright and honest manhood, and not the possession of wealth, arbitrarily fixed, should constithe right to vote for nobles as well as representatives, and no more power should be accorded to the ballot of the rich man than to the ballot of the poor man. The discrimination in favor of wealth now made in our Constitution is contrary to all the eternal principles of right and justice, and must be abolished. To this end, we will favor a leveling of the present distinction of wealth and classes which blemish our laws with respect of the right to vote for nobles, thereby restoring to the native Hawaiians privileges which pertain to them in their own country, and of which they have been unjustly deprived.

INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS

            12 We favor the expenditure of sufficient sums to secure a number of needed public improvements on Oahu and other Islands: school, railroads and harbors and wharves, public light, and also a thorough system of reservoirs and water-works, not only for Honolulu, but through-out the other Islands.