Home: The Annexation Of Hawaii: A Collection Of Document
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HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. 595 declared: "We need your vote to overcome that of our own native subjects. Take the oath to support the Hawaiian Government, with a distinct reservation of allegiance to your own." Two-thirds of the Europeans and Americans now voting were thus induced to vote in a strange country with the pledge that such act did not affect their citizenship to their native country. The purport and form of this affidavit appear in the citations from the constitution of 1887 and the form of oath of a foreign voter. See page 12. The list of registered voters of American and European origin, including Portuguese, discloses 3,715; 2,091 of this number are Portuguese. Only eight of these imported Portuguese have ever been naturalized in these islands. To this should be added 106 persons, mostly negroes, from the Cape Verde Islands, who came here voluntarily several years prior to the period of state importation of laborers. The commander of the military forces of the Provisional Government on the day of the dethroning of the Queen and up to this hour has never given up his American citizenship, but expressly reserved the same in the form of oath already disclosed and by a continuous assertion of the same. The advisory council of the Provisional Government, as established by the proclamation, consisted of John Emmeluth, an American, not naturalized; Andrew Brown, a Scotchman, not naturalized; C. Bolte, naturalized; James P. Morgan, naturalized; Henry Waterhouse, naturalized; S. M. Damon, native; W. G. Ashley, an American, not naturalized; E. D. Tenney, an American, not naturalized; P. W. McChesney, an American, not naturalized; W. C. Wilder, naturalized; J. A. McCandless, an American, not naturalized; W. E. Castle, a native; Lorrina A. Thurston, a native; F. J. Wilhelm, an American, not naturalized, One-half of this body, then, was made up of persons owing allegiance to the United States and Great Britain. The annexation mass meeting of the 16th of January was made up in this same manner. On the 25th of February, 1843, under pressure of British naval forces, the King ceded the country to Lord George Paulet, " subject to the decision of the British Government after full information." That Government restored their independence. It made a deep impression on the native mind. This national experience was recalled by Judge Widemann, a German of character and wealth, to the Queen to satisfy her that the establishment of the Provisional Government, through the action of Capt. Wiltse and Mr. Stevens, would be repudiated by the United States Government, and that she could appeal to it. Mr. Damon urged upon her that she would be entitled to such a hearing. He was the representative of the Provisional Government, and accepted her protest and turned it over to President Dole. This was followed by large expenditures from her private purse to present her cause and to invoke her restoration. That a deep wrong has been done the Queen and the native race by American officials pervades the native mind and that of the Queen, as well as a hope for redress from the United States, there can be no doubt. In this connection it is important to note the inability of the Hawaiian people to cope with any great powers, and their recognition of it by never offering resistance to their encroachments. The suddenness of the landing of the United States troops, the reading of the proclamation of the Provisional Government almost in their