Response to Twigg-Smith - Thurston and "Republic" = anti-democratic

Thurston Twigg-Smith tries to argue that the residents of Hawaii accepted the so-called republic (Maui News Letters, Dec. 13).

That must be why, according to the United States' official apology for its role in the events of 1893, "without the active support and intervention by the United States diplomatic and military representatives, the insurrection ... would have failed for lack of popular support and insufficient arms."

That must be why in President Cleveland's address to Congress on Dec. 18, 1893, he stated that: "The provisional government has not assumed a republican or other constitutional form, but has remained a mere executive council or oligarchy, set up without the assent of the people. It has not sought to find a permanent basis of popular support and has given no evidence of an intention to do so. Indeed, the representatives of that government assert that the people of Hawaii are unfit for popular government and frankly avow that they can be best ruled by arbitrary or despotic power."

That must be why the provision government, in forming itself into a so-called republic, with Twigg-Smith's grandfather Lorin Thurston playing a key role, never submitted their constitution to ratification by popular vote, and severely restricted the franchise of Native Hawaiians. And why Thurston himself wrote at the time: "I hope that those who are drafting the constitution will not allow the fine theories of free government to predominate over the necessities of the present situation," and "I do not think under the existing conditions we are safe in leaving election of the President to a popular vote." (Nation Within, Tom Coffman, p. 155)

Finally, that must be why in 1897 over 21,000 names were gathered on a petition opposing annexation by the United States (along with a second petition with over 17,000 names supporting restoration of Hawaii's constitutional monarchy) resulting in the U.S. Senate's failure to ever pass a treaty to annex Hawaii.

No, the truth is clear regardless of Twigg-Smith's revisionism to obscure the misdeeds and strongly anti-democratic sentiments of his kupuna. The truth is that the provisional government, the so-called republic, and the U.S. occupation were forced upon the people of Hawaii against their will and without their consent.

Posted: Fri - December 21, 2007 at 06:38 AM

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Response to Twigg-Smith - Thurston and "Republic" = anti-democratic

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