Racial Separatism in the Aloha State: The Bishop Estate Trust and Hawaii’s Kamehameha Schools

Capital Research Center ^ | May 2008 | Phil Brand, James Dellinger, and Karl Crow

[vadum]

Summary: The Bishop Estate, Hawaii’s largest private landowner, operates the racially separatist Kamehameha Schools, the wealthiest secondary educational institution in the U.S. The 121-year history of the Estate and Schools is a story of race, politics and ultimately, the corrupting nature of power in Hawaii. But issues concerning Hawaiian identity and culture have now reached the mainland. The school system is backing a bill inspired by one of Hawaii’s Democratic senators, Daniel Akaka, that would grant special privileges based on race. The bill, which would give Native Hawaiians the right to create their own government, is now pending in the U.S. Senate.

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On October 24, 2007, the House of Representatives passed the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act of 2007 (H.R. 505). A Senate version of the bill (S. 310), known as the Akaka bill after its sponsor, U.S. Senator Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii), may be voted on in the coming weeks. Senator Akaka is an alumnus of the Kamehameha Schools. If the bill passes and becomes law, it will grant Native Hawaiians a legal status comparable to that enjoyed by Native American Indian tribes, and allow them to create their own separate government based merely on their racial ancestry.

It will exempt government offices and policies affecting Native Hawaiians from the equal protection provisions of the U.S. Constitution. And it will give Native Hawaiians the sort of sovereign immunities enjoyed by Indian tribes that are exempted from the full authority of our founding document. The Akaka bill does not lay out in detail what form the new governmental entity will take, nor does it require that the new entity be subject to the same taxes, health, safety, environmental, and homeland security regulations and laws that apply to other citizens of the United States.

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[investigateworld]

I suspect this is simply to set precedent for the southwest USA and Texas .... so they can go to back to Mexico.

[HappyinAZ]

what a bunch of nonsense.........

[econjack]

This article makes it sound like special treatment according to race is something new. Clearly, it’s not. Look at the favored treatment given to native Americans with respect to gambling casinos. Look at the entire minority business favors, from loans to minority bidding for gov’t contracts. Congress has been buying votes with this crap for decades.

[elcid1970]

Pineapple Racism, anyone?

Got to stick it to the haoles, you know.

[Americanexpat]

So Hawaii is going to be one big reservation huh?

[tbw2]

That’s a cool phrase for it.

[fish hawk]

Wise up, the Indians having Casinos is just a wee different than Hawaiians becoming a sovereign state. Have you ever heard of the difference between apples and oranges?

[onedoug]

democrats: it’s all about race

[buck jarret]

The Bishop estate is the estate of Bernice Pauahi Bishop, the last descendent of Kamehameha I, who conquered all the islands of Hawaii. She died in 1884. At that time, there were only about 44,000 surviving native Hawaiians, after they died off en masse. She left her wealth for their benefit. That is why Kamehameha Schools are for native Hawaiians. There is no reason to go against her wishes now.

[CitizenM]

I am not in agreement with this. But, with our current problem with illegal immigrants coming into our country, one might be able to understand their concern. We want to keep illegal immigrants out. So did they. After all...our ancestors were immigrants to Hawaii, and took it over, illegally according to Hawaiians who really didn't want us there. Christian missionaries and the Dole pineapple company brought "civilization" to them. The U.S. Government wanted it as a buffer against mainland invasion and to keep our enemies from claiming it and getting too close to our coastline. The Hawaiians have tolerated this, but most natives have never been happy about it. Same with the whole of the U.S. when we took this country from the Indians. We called it progress and building a nation. They considered it an invasion. We felt we had the right to steal their land, round them up, and put them on reservations. They felt as we do now about foreign people coming here and expecting to be allowed to take what we wanted. Just as we feel the illegal immigrants now expect taxpayers to support them, give them health care, and feed them.

Now, history is history...and change had to happen...but the underlying cause of the Hawaiian dissatisfaction should be understood, even if as the 50th state they are more protected and safe from being over-run by other countries, they still feel we stole their islands, their culture, and their rights from them. I hope this is worked out amicably for everyone.

[hawkboy]

Would they have been happier if we had allowed Imperial Japan to take it over?

Given the experiences of the Filipinos with Japanese rule I doubt it although if the Japs had taken over Hawaii and we had liberated the Islands again maybe there would not be so much anti-American attitude in Hawaii today.

Hawaii is riddled with communist sympathisers The ILWU and a large part of the University are leftist controlled.

Perhaps they would be happier being ruled by Communist China?

[econjack]

I didn't say they were the same. I simply said the gov’t has a long history of passing out favors if it thinks it can buy votes.

[bboop]

Happier with no tourism or much of any industry ...