Why Is The Hawaiian Kingdom Unjust?

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The overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom was unjust, and everyone involved knew it. Even the president of the United States recognized this, and and called for his country to “restore its honor and sense of justice” by restoring the Hawaiian Monarchy. The Hawaiian Kingdom was independent for a very long time, and its people did not agree to annexation by the United States of America. Queen Liliuokalani fought annexation. According to the findings of an American commision led by James Blount, the overthrow was brought about by a group of American citizens, who posed as a legitimate political party, but secretly sought to annex Hawaii with the improper help of the American military. It was a change in leadership in the United States and other political …show more content…

Queen Liliuokalani opposed annexation, first by trying to restore power lost by the Hawaiian Monarchy through the Bayonet Constitution, which was forced on Hawaii by the same annexationists and took away most of the Hawaiian monarch’s power. Queen Liliuokalani also fought the annexation by not supporting renewal of the Reciprocity Treaty, which gave away too much to American interests. This put her at odds with annexationists, but she continued and made an unsuccessful attempt to make her own constitution that gave the Hawaiian monarch’s most of their power back, including the Hawaiians’ right to vote (National Archives). The Queen surrendered power to avoid bloodshed, but appealed to the American president for help. President Grover Cleveland responded by having James Blount launch an investigation, which found Americans abusing U.S. power. The investigation deemed the annexation unjust. However, the Queen was hesitant to give amnesty to the annexationists. Ultimately, the Queen’s legitimate claims as established in the Blount Report were not enough to stop Hawaii from being annexed, since a new president, William McKinley, replaced Cleveland. Unfortunately, McKinley was in support of the annexation, and cooperated with other self-interested annexationists to annex Hawaii for their own …show more content…

The political group in Hawaii that lead the overthrow called themselves the Committee of Public Safety, and claimed to be interested in the well being of Hawaii. However, the committee secretly worked against the interests of the Hawaiian government and plotted its overthrow. To gain the trust of the Hawaiian government, the Committee of Public Safety lied to them and claimed to be against annexation. The committee was made up mostly of Americans who could gain financially by controlling Hawaii. They appealed to United States Government Minister, John L. Stevens, to provide military support to supposedly protect them. Stevens did this in spite of the fact that they clearly wanted to use the soldiers to help them carry out the

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