Hawaii Annexation Debate

Hawaii Annexation Debate

Hawaii was not yet part of the US and Queen Liliuokalani had no plans of joining the States. In Liliuokalani’s letter to President McKinley in 1897, she defended her stance by asserting that treaties declaring Hawaii as a territory of the US were signed without any of the citizens or her consent. She also stated that the treaties were an open offense to Hawaiian people and their chiefs. In addition, Liliuokalani saw the treaty as a violation of international rights toward, not only the people of Hawaii, but to the other countries who had made treaties with them in the past. She also revealed that she only signed the treaty under the guise that her people would be able on the matter as well. Liliuokalani signed under threat of a war between Hawaii and US to save her people.

Critics of the treaty debate that Queen Liliuokalani had actually assumed power over the territory of Hawaii, and as the representative had acted against the people of Hawaii, in that she had legally signed the treaty. Furthermore, the treaty did not contain any mention of the people having the right to vote on the ratification. However, contrary to this counterargument Liliuokalani asserted that the US government could have allowed the citizens of Hawaii to vote, but deceitfully the US chose to rely only on the committee of public safety, a committee containing mostly people claiming American citizenship without a single Hawaiian as a member of the committee. Hawaiians were not just left out of the committee, they weren't included in any activities leading to the treaty’s existence.

In contrast, the defenders of annexation, like Indian Senator Albert Beveridge, boasted that it was God’s will that the US annex lands like Hawaii. God “wanted” the US to continue their “march toward commercial supremacy of the world.” He argued that America not only had the right to annex Hawaii, but an obligation to God to do so. He continued to say that the Hawaiians, like the Natives, were barbaric and