APPENDIX A

MESSAGE

FROM THE

PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES,

TRANSMITTING

A Treaty for the Annexation of the Republic of Hawaii to the United States, Signed at Washington by the Plenipotentiaries of the Parties, June 16, 1897.

To the Senate of the United States:

I transmit herewith to the Senate, in order that, after due consideration, the constitutional function of advice and consent may be exercised by that body, a treaty for the annexation of the republic of Hawaii to the United States, signed in this capital by the plenipotentiaries of the parties on the 16th of June instant.

For the better understanding of the subject, I transmit, in addition, a report of the Secretary of State, briefly reviewing the negotiation which has led to this important result.

The incorporation of the Hawaiian Islands into the body politic of the United States is the necessary and fitting sequel to the chain of events which from a very early period of our history has controlled the intercourse and prescribed the association of the United States and the Hawaiian Islands. The predominance of American interests in that neighboring territory was first asserted in 1820 by sending to the islands a representative agent of the United States. It found further expression by the signature of a treaty of friendship, com

merce, and navigation with the king in 1826-the first international compact negotiated by Hawaii. It was signally announced in 1843, when the intervention of the United States caused the British Government to disavow the seizure of the Sandwich Islands by a British naval commander, and to recognize them by treaty, as an independent State, renouncing forever any purpose of annexing the islands or exerting a protectorate over them. In 1851 the cession of the Hawaiian kingdom to the United States was formally offered, and altho not then accepted, this Government proclaimed its duty to preserve alike the honor and dignity of the United States and the safety of the Government of the Hawaiian Islands. From this time until the outbreak of the war in 1861 the policy of the United States toward Hawaii and of the Hawaiian sovereign toward the United States was exemplified by continued negotiations for annexation or for a reserved commercial union. The latter alternative was at length accomplished by the reciprocity treaty of 1875, the provisions of which were renewed and expanded by the convention of 1884, embracing the perpetual cession to the United States of the harbor of Pearl River in the Island of Oahu. In 1888 a proposal for the joint guaranty of the neutrality of the Hawaiian Islands by the United States, Germany, and Great Britain was declined on the announced ground that the relation of the United States to the islands was sufficient for the end in view. In brief, from 1820 to 1893 the course of the United States toward the Hawaiian Islands has consistently favored their autonomous welfare with the exclusion of all foreign influence save our own, to the extent of upholding eventual annexation as the necessary outcome of that policy.

Not only is the union of the Hawaiian territory to the United States no new scheme, but it is the inevitable consequence of the relation stedfastly maintained with that midPacific domain for three quarters of a century. Its accomplishment, despite successive denials and postponements, has been merely a question of time. While its failure in 1893 may not be a cause of congratulation, it is certainly a proof of the disinterestedness of the United States, the delay of four

years having abundantly sufficed to establish the right and the ability of the republic of Hawaii to enter, as a sovereign contractant, upon a conventional union with the United States, thus realizing a purpose held by the Hawaiian people and proclaimed by successive Hawaiian governments through some seventy years of their virtual dependence upon the benevolent protection of the United States. Under such circumstances, annexation is not a change; it is a consummation.

The report for the Secretary of State exhibits the character and course of the recent negotiation and the features of the treaty itself. The organic and administrative details of incorporation are necessarily left to the wisdom of the Congress, and I can not doubt, when the function of the constitutional treaty-making power shall have been accomplished, the duty of the national legislature in the case will be performed with the largest regard for the interests of this rich insular domain and for the welfare of the inhabitants thereof.

EXECUTIVE MANSION,

Washington, June 16, 1897.

THE PRESIDENT:

WILLIAM MCKINLEY.

The undersigned, Secretary of State, has the honor to lay before the President, for submission to the Senate, should it be deemed for the public interest so to do, a treaty signed in the city of Washington on the 16th instant by the undersigned and by the fully empowered representative of the republic of Hawaii, whereby the islands constituting the said republic and all their dependencies are fully and absolutely ceded to the United States of America forever.

It does not seem necessary to the present purpose of the undersigned to review the incident of 1893, when a similar treaty of cession was signed on February 14 and submitted to the Senate, being subsequently withdrawn by the President on the 9th of March following. The negotiation which has culminated in the treaty now submitted has not been a mere resumption of the negotiation of 1893, but was initiated and

has been conducted upon independent lines. Then an abrupt revolutionary movement had brought about the dethronement of the late queen and set up instead of the theretofore titular monarchy a provisional government for the control and management of public affairs and the protection of the public peace, such government to exist only until terms of union with the United States should have been negotiated and agreed upon. Thus self-constituted, its promoters claimed for it only a de-facto existence until the purpose of annexation in which it took rise should be accomplished. As time passed and the plan of union with the United States became an uncertain contingency, the organization of the Hawaiian commonwealth underwent necessary changes, the temporary character of its first Government gave place to a permanent scheme under a constitution framed by the representatives of the electors of the islands, administration by an executive council not chosen by suffrage, but self-appointed, was succeeded by an elective and parliamentary régime, and the ability of the new Government to hold as the republic of Hawaii—an independent place in the family of sovereign states, preserving order at home and fulfilling international obligations abroad, has been put to the proof. Recognized

by the powers of the earth, sending and receiving envoys, enforcing respect for the law, and maintaining peace within its island borders, Hawaii sends to the United States, not a commission representing a successful revolution, but the accredited plenipotentiary of a constituted and firmly established sovereign state. However sufficient may have been the authority of the commissioners with whom the United States Government treated in 1893, and however satisfied the President may then have been of their power to offer the domain of the Hawaiian Islands to the United States, the fact remains that what they then tendered was a territory rather than an established Government, a country whose administration had been cast down by a bloodless but complete revolution and a community in a state of political transition.

Now, however, the republic of Hawaii approaches the United States as an equal, and points for its authority to that

provision of Article 32 of the constitution, promulgated July 24, 1894, whereby

The President, with the approval of the cabinet, is hereby expressly authorized and empowered to make a treaty of political or commercial union between the republic of Hawaii and the United States of America, subject to the ratification of the Senate.

The present negotiation is, therefore, as has been said, not a mere renewal of the tender of Hawaiian territory made in 1893, but has responded to the purpose declared in the Hawaiian constitution, and the conferences of the plenipotentiaries have been directed to weighing the advantages of the political and the commercial union alternatively proposed, and relatively considering the scope and extent thereof. It soon appeared to the negotiators that a purely commercial union on the lines of the German Zollverein could not satisfy the problems of administration in Hawaii and of the political association between the islands and the United States. Such a commercial union would on the one hand deprive the Hawaiian Government of its chief source of revenue from customs duties by placing its territory in a relation of free exchange with the territory of the United States, its main market of purchase and supply; while on the other hand it would entail upon Hawaii the maintenance of an internalrevenue system on a par with that of the United States, or else involve the organization of a corresponding branch of our revenue service within a foreign jurisdiction. had with Hawaii since 1875 a treaty of commercial union, which practically assimilates the two territories with regard to many of their most important productions, and excludes other nations from enjoyment of its privileges, yet, altho that treaty has outlived other less favored reciprocity schemes, its permanency has at times been gravely imperiled. Under such circumstances, to enter upon the radical experiment of a complete commercial union between Hawaii and the United States as independently sovereign, without assurance of permanency and with perpetual subjection to the vicissitudes of public sentiment in the two countries, was not to be thought of.

We have