Bill Text: HI HCR8 | 2010 | Regular Session | Introduced

Hawaii House Concurrent Resolution 8 (Prior Session Legislation)

NOTE: There are more recent revisions of this legislation. Read Latest Draft

Bill Title: OHA; State Government Buildings; Remove Provisional Govt. Officials Portraits

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2010-02-17 - (H) Report adopted; referred to the committee(s) on FIN with Representative(s) Ching voting no and Representative(s) M. Oshiro excused. [HCR8 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2010-HCR8-Introduced.html

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.C.R. NO.	8
TWENTY-FIFTH LEGISLATURE, 2010
STATE OF HAWAII

HOUSE CONCURRENT

RESOLUTION

URGING THAT PORTRAITS OF OFFICIALS OF THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF HAWAI`I BE REMOVED FROM DISPLAY IN POSITIONS OF HONOR IN STATE GOVERNMENT BUILDINGS.

WHEREAS, the Provisional Government of Hawai`i was established illegally, immorally, and unjustly in 1893 following the illegal, immoral, and unjust overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawai`i; and

WHEREAS, the Provisional Government ruled Hawai`i during the period between the overthrow in 1893 and the establishment in 1894 of the Republic of Hawai`i; and

WHEREAS, the officials of the Provisional Government, by accepting and remaining in office, perpetuated the great wrong visited upon Native Hawaiians by the overthrow; and

WHEREAS, President Grover Cleveland called the acts leading up to the overthrow an "act of war" and acknowledged that the government of the Kingdom of Hawai`i, a peaceful and friendly people, had been overthrown; and

WHEREAS, the Provisional Government protested President Cleveland's December 18, 1893 message to Congress calling for the restoration of the monarchy and instead continued to hold power and pursue Hawai`i's annexation to the United States; and

WHEREAS, the Provisional Government strategically lobbied the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations to conduct a new investigation into the events surrounding the overthrow of the monarchy in order to challenge the Blount Report that previously had concluded that United States diplomatic and military representatives had abused their authority and were responsible for the change in government in Hawai`i; and

WHEREAS, the policies of the Provisional Government were more restrictive than those of the Kingdom of Hawai`i, including denying citizenship to Chinese immigrants; and

WHEREAS, the Provisional Government restricted voting to approximately four thousand people, down from the approximately fourteen thousand people eligible to vote under the Bayonet Constitution, prompting the observation in the Blount Report that, "The testimony of leading annexationists is that if the question of annexation was submitted to a popular vote . . . that annexation would be defeated"; and

WHEREAS, the Provisional Government declared itself to be the Republic of Hawai`i on July 4, 1894; and

WHEREAS, the Republic of Hawai`i imprisoned Queen Lili`uokalani in 1895 and under duress she signed a document formally abdicating her throne in the hopes of sparing her followers from probable death; and

WHEREAS, after the overthrow of the government of the Kingdom of Hawai`i, Lili`uokalani continued to believe that justice would prevail and she never wavered in her diplomatic efforts with the United States government or in her faith that her rightful position as the sovereign of Hawai`i would be restored; and

WHEREAS, portraits of certain officials of the Provisional Government are prominently displayed in positions of honor in Ali`iolani Hale, the headquarters of the State's judiciary branch; specifically, the rotunda area contains large, elegantly framed portraits of a chief justice and an associate justice of the Provisional Government's supreme court; and

WHEREAS, displaying portraits of the officials offends Native Hawaiians and many others by appearing to lend legitimacy and official approval to the 1893 overthrow, to the Provisional Government, to the Republic; and to the resulting serious harm to Native Hawaiian culture and to Native Hawaiian self-determination; and

WHEREAS, other state buildings may also be prominently displaying portraits of Provisional Government officials; now, therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Twenty-fifth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2010, the Senate concurring, that officials of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of Hawai`i state government are urged to remove all portraits of officials of the Provisional Government from display in positions of honor in Hawai`i's state government buildings; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that this Concurrent Resolution is not intended to bring about the removal of portraits that are an integral element of exhibits, such as those in public museums or schools, that are intended to educate the public about the history of Hawai`i as opposed to honoring or appearing to honor certain persons for their role in that history; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Governor, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Hawai`i, and the Chairperson of the Board of Trustees of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs.