| Elections in Hawaii |
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Legislative elections were held in the Hawaiian Kingdom in 1886 to determine the composition of the 28-member House of Representatives. During the elections the National Party and Independent Party bitterly campaigned for control of the House of Representatives. Despite their efforts, the Independents once again lost to Premier Walter M. Gibson's National Party. [1]
In 1882 the popular member of the Hawaiian House of Representatives Walter M. Gibson was appointed Premier of the Hawaiian Kingdom by King Kalākaua. [2] . Walter Murray Gibson quickly became Kalākaua's "Minister of Everything" and set much of Hawai'i's domestic and foreign policy until 1887. Much of the Gibson's administration's agenda was based around keeping the Hawaiian government in control of indigenous Hawaiians and setting up a united Polynesian confederation with Hawai'i at its center. [3] Supporters of the King and Premier Gibson rallied behind the National Party. [4]
However, since the elections of 1884 opposition to Gibson's administration existed in the form of the Independent Party, led by wealthy American planters like Lorrin A. Thurston, Sanford B. Dole, and William R. Castle, with a few Native Hawaiian politicians who also opposed Gibson. [4] In 1885, leaders of the Independents would meet in Honolulu, where they unanimously voted to run for election in 1886. This was the first meeting of the infamous Committee of 13 that would come to dominate Hawaiian politics. [5]
National Party and Independent candidates fought hard and toured the islands of Maui, Moloka'i, and Hawai'i. National Party candidates painted the Independents and disgruntled foreign businessmen who planned to take over the Kingdom while Independents accused Government candidates of corruption, voting fraud, and handing over the kingdom to wealthy California capitalists. [1]
Despite the heavy campaigning, the Independents ended up loosing seats overall from the 1884. Kuykendall attributes the victory to dubious voting practices on the hands of the King [1] while Moblo points out that fear rose from the Native Hawaiian community that the Independents wanted to undermine Hawaiian control of government and the King, especially from the Committee of Thirteen, making in Hawaiians hesitant to vote Independent [4] .
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|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Seats | +/– | |
| National Party | 18 | +3 | |
| Independent (Kuokoa) Party | 10 | –3 | |
| Total | 28 | 0 | |
| Source: Kuykendall | |||
The Gibson and Kalākaua administration took the results of the election as a popular affirmation to their administration. In 1887 the Gibson administration purchased the tradership Kaimiloa and sent representatives to Samoa to convince negotiate a possible confederation between the two states, angering many Independent representatives and planters who saw the whole endeavor as a waste of resources. [6] After their electoral defeat and the Samoa mission, the Committee of Thirteen would plot the illegal seizure of the King's government. In 1887 with the armed support of the Honolulu Rifles, they would present themselves to the King as his "Reform Cabinet", arrested Gibson and other Government Party ministers, and forced him to sign the Constitution of 1887 [4] , also known as the Bayonet Constitution because they held the King at gun point in order for him to sign it [7] . The new constitution disenfranchised Asian subjects, empowered wealthy White foreigners, limited Native Hawaiian voting rights, and striped the King of much of his power. In fact, there was even plans to overthrow the monarchy entirely and establish a Hawaiian Republic with the intent to get annexed by the United States in L. A. Thurston's files, but these did not yet come to fruition. [8]
Kalākaua, sometimes called The Merrie Monarch, was the last king and penultimate monarch of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, reigning from February 12, 1874, until his death in 1891. Succeeding Lunalilo, he was elected to the vacant throne of Hawaiʻi against Queen Emma. Kalākaua had a convivial personality and enjoyed entertaining guests with his singing and ukulele playing. At his coronation and his birthday jubilee, the hula, which had hitherto been banned in public in the kingdom, became a celebration of Hawaiian culture.
Lorrin Andrews Thurston was an American-Hawaiian lawyer, politician, and businessman. Thurston played a prominent role in the revolution that caused the Overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom that replaced Queen Liliʻuokalani with the Republic of Hawaii, guided by American ideas. He published the Pacific Commercial Advertiser, and owned other enterprises. From 1906 to 1916, he and his network lobbied with national politicians to create a national park to preserve the Hawaiian volcanoes.
The Wilcox Rebellions were an armed rebellion in 1888, a revolt in 1889, and a counter-revolution in 1895, led by Robert William Wilcox against the promulgation of the Bayonet Constitution in 1888 and 1889, and against the overthrow of the monarchy in 1895. He was considered a royalist and dedicated to the monarchy of the Kingdom of Hawaii. Wilcox's revolts were part of the Hawaiian Rebellions.
The proposed 1893 Constitution of the Hawaiian Kingdom would have been a replacement of the Constitution of 1887, primarily based on the Constitution of 1864 put forth by Queen Liliʻuokalani. While it never became anything more than a draft, the constitution had a profound impact on Hawaiʻi's history: it set off a chain of events that eventually resulted in the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom.
The 1887 Constitution of the Hawaiian Kingdom was a legal document prepared by anti-monarchists to strip the absolute Hawaiian monarchy of much of its authority, initiating a transfer of power to a coalition of American, European and native Hawaiian people. It became known as the Bayonet Constitution for the rising by the armed militia which forced King Kalākaua to sign it or be deposed.
The overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom was a coup d'état against Queen Liliʻuokalani, which took place on January 17, 1893, on the island of Oʻahu and led by the Committee of Safety, composed of seven foreign residents and six Hawaiian Kingdom subjects of American descent in Honolulu. The Committee prevailed upon American minister John L. Stevens to call in the U.S. Marines to protect the national interest of the United States of America. The insurgents established the Republic of Hawaii, but their ultimate goal was the annexation of the islands to the United States, which occurred in 1898.
Walter Murray Gibson was an American adventurer and a government minister in the Kingdom of Hawaii prior to the kingdom's 1887 constitution.
The Hawaiian Kingdom, also known as Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, was a sovereign state located in the Hawaiian Islands which existed from 1795 to 1893. It was established during the late 18th century when Hawaiian chief Kamehameha I, from the island of Hawaiʻi, conquered the islands of Oʻahu, Maui, Molokaʻi, and Lānaʻi, and unified them under one government. In 1810, the Hawaiian Islands were fully unified when the islands of Kauaʻi and Niʻihau voluntarily joined the Hawaiian Kingdom. Two major dynastic families ruled the kingdom, the House of Kamehameha and the House of Kalākaua.
The Hawaiian National Party also known as the Young Hawaiian Party, King's Party or Government Party was a political party in Hawaii under King David Kalākaua, formed to support him in the event of a second election held after the death of Lunalilo.
John Edward Bush, also known as John Edwin Bush, was a politician and newspaper publisher in the Kingdom of Hawaii.
Luther Aholo was a politician who served many political posts in the Kingdom of Hawaii. He served multiple terms as a legislator from Maui and Minister of the Interior from 1886 to 1887. Considered one of the leading Hawaiian politicians of his generation, his skills as an orator were compared to those of the Ancient Greek statesman Solon.
The 1892 Session of the Legislature of the Hawaiian Kingdom, also known as the Longest Legislature, was a period from May 28, 1892, to January 14, 1893, in which the legislative assembly of the Hawaiian Kingdom met for its traditional bi-annual session. This unicameral body was composed of the upper House of Nobles and the lower House of Representatives. This would be the first session during the reign of Queen Liliʻuokalani and the last meeting of the legislative assembly during the Hawaiian monarchy. Three days after the prorogation of the assembly, many of the political tension developed during the legislative debates and the queen's attempt to promulgate a new constitution while her legislators were not in session led to the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom on January 17, 1893.
William Henry Daniels was a Hawaiian judge, lawyer, and businessman of Wailuku, Maui during the Kingdom of Hawaii. He was declined reappointment to his office as district magistrate for refusing to take an oath to the Provisional Government of Hawaii and was arrested by the Republic of Hawaii for suspected involvement in the 1895 Counter-Revolution in Hawaii.
Tong Kee, also known as T. Aki, was a Chinese immigrant and businessman who settled in the Kingdom of Hawaii. In 1886–87, he was embroiled in the Aki opium scandal,, a bribery corruption scandal involving King Kalākaua and Junius Kaʻae reneging on a bribe Aki made to secure the sale of an opium license.
Kalākaua was the last king and penultimate monarch of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi. The inherited position of the kingdom's monarch became a legislatively elected office with Lunalilo. Upon Lunalilo's death, Kalākaua won election over his political opponent Queen Emma. He reigned from February 12, 1874, until his death in San Francisco, California, on January 20, 1891.
Jonathan Austin was a veteran of the American Civil War, president of Paukaa Sugar Company, and Minister of Foreign Affairs for the Kingdom of Hawaii during the reign of Kalākaua.
When King Kalākaua began his reign on February 12, 1874, the monarch was constitutionally empowered to appoint and remove the Kingdom of Hawaii cabinet ministers. The four cabinet positions were Attorney General, Ministrer of Finance, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of the Interior. The royal cabinet ministers were also ex-officio members of the House of Nobles in the legislature and the Privy Council of State, a larger body of advisors.
Charles Nichols Spencer was the Minister of Finance for the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi. He was one of Kalākaua's Cabinet Ministers at the time of the king's January 20, 1891 death, and the longest hold-over into Liliʻuokalani's Cabinet Ministers, serving June 17, 1890 – Sept 12, 1892.
The Cabinet of the Hawaiian Kingdom was a body of the top executive officials appointed to advise the sovereign of the Hawaiian Kingdom from 1845 to 1893. The subsequent regimes of the Provisional Government and the Republic of Hawaii retained the structure of the cabinet and minister positions under the presidency of Sanford B. Dole from 1893 until 1898.
Legislative elections were held in the Hawaiian Kingdom on 6 February 1884 to determine the composition of the 28 member Hawaiian House of Representatives. The elections saw the emergence of the Independent (Kuokoa) Party that opposed the policies of the administration of King Kalākaua and Premier Walter M. Gibson. Despite the growing opposition, Gibson's National Party was able to maintain a majority in the House of Representatives.