Hawai'ian Sovereignty Movement

The Hawai'ian sovereignty movement (1893–present) is best understood by looking at a series of historical events that began in 1893 and became the foundation for today's movement. The reign of Queen Lili'uokalani was cut short by a U.S. military–backed coup on January 16, 1893, that resulted in what scholars, legal experts, and laypeople refer to as the illegal overthrow of the Hawai'ian Kingdom. The overthrow is regarded as illegal because the Hawai'ian Kingdom was, and to many still is, internationally recognized as an independent country, a moniker that resulted from treaties signed in 1843.

In an effort to prevent foreign encroachment, King Kamehameha III dispatched a delegation in 1843 for the purposes of securing recognition from the Western powers, who by this time were colonizing vast parts of the globe. Great Britain and France signed a formal agreement of recognition on November 28, 1843, [Page 676]known as La Ku'oko'a, a date still commemorated by Hawai'ians as independence day. The United States had formally recognized the Hawai'ian Kingdom as an independent nation in 1826 and extended the kingdom full diplomatic rights at that time. The United States entered into treaties and conventions with the kingdom in 1826, 1842, 1849, 1875, and 1887, and honored those treaties until the U.S. military invasion of 1893. Some of the illegalities of that event and the United States' role are outlined in a congressional resolution called the “Apology Bill,” signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1993.

The Hawai'ian sovereignty movement that we see today is rooted in the events of January 17, 1893, the day after soldiers from the SS Boston were ordered by U.S. Minister John L. Stevens to surround the 'Iolani Palace and government buildings in Honolulu. Stevens, who was in collusion with the Committee of Safety, a group of white men made up of sugar planters, descendants of missionaries, and bankers, used the U.S. military forces to threaten Queen Lili'uokalani into surrendering her throne on January 17. In her statement on that day, the queen said,

The Committee of Safety then dubbed itself the Provisional Government, and later the Republic of Hawai'i, and made two unsuccessful attempts to annex the Hawai'ian Kingdom to the United States. In 1893, the first treaty of annexation was removed from the senate before the vote by President Cleveland, who reviewed the facts of the overthrow and called the U.S. military involvement an act of war done without the authority of the U.S. Congress. Cleveland also agreed to undo the harm done to the Hawai'ian Kingdom and reinstate the queen.

By the time of the 1897 attempt to annex the Hawai'ian Kingdom, Cleveland had lost the presidency to William McKinley, and the Hawai'ian struggle for sovereignty had been under way for 4 years. It was not known at that time and is still referred to today by many not as a sovereignty struggle, but rather as a struggle for reinstatement. The queen and her supporters attempted to restore her as the nation's leader through both diplomacy and a failed armed revolt; in 1895, Queen Lili'uokalani was imprisoned, tried, found guilty of treason, threatened with execution, and forced to formally abdicate her throne to the self-proclaimed republic.

...