Liliʻuokalani sibling Likelike
Her family were of the aliʻi class of the Hawaiian nobility and were collateral relations of the reigning House of Kamehameha, sharing common descent from the 18th-century aliʻi nui (supreme monarch) Keaweʻīkekahialiʻiokamoku. From her biological parents, she descended from Keaweaheulu and Kameʻeiamoku, two of the five royal counselors of Kamehameha I during his conquest of the Hawaiian Kingdom. Kameʻeiamoku, the grandfather of both her mother and father, was depicted, along with his royal twin Kamanawa, on the Hawaiian coat of arms. Liliʻuokalani referred to her family line as the "Keawe-a-Heulu line" after her mother's line. The third surviving child of a large family, her biological siblings included: James Kaliokalani, David Kalākaua, Anna Kaʻiulani, Kaʻiminaʻauao, Miriam Likelike and William Pitt Leleiohoku II. She and her siblings were hānai (informally adopted) to other family members. The Hawaiian custom of hānai is an informal form of adoption between extended families practiced by Hawaiian royals and commoners alike. She was given at birth to Abner Pākī and his wife Laura Kōnia and raised with their daughter Bernice Pauahi.In 1842, at the age of four, she began her education at the Chiefs' Children's School (later known as the Royal School). She, along with her classmates, had been formally proclaimed by Kamehameha III as eligible for the throne of the Hawaiian Kingdom. Liliʻuokalani later noted that these "pupils were exclusively persons whose claims to the throne were acknowledged." She, along with her two older brothers James Kaliokalani and David Kalākaua, as well as her thirteen royal cousins, were taught in English by American missionaries Amos Starr Cooke and his wife, Juliette Montague Cooke. The children were taught reading, spelling, penmanship, arithmetic, geometry, algebra, physics, geography, history, bookkeeping, music and English composition by the missionary couple who had to maintain the moral and sexual development of their charges. Liliʻuokalani was placed with the youngest pupils of the class along with Princess Victoria Kamāmalu, Mary Polly Paʻaʻāina, and John William Pitt Kīnaʻu. In later life, Liliʻuokalani would look back unfavorably on her early education remembering being "sent hungry to bed" and the 1848 measles epidemic that claimed the life of a classmate Moses Kekūāiwa and her younger sister Kaʻiminaʻauao. The boarding school run by the Cookes was discontinued around 1850, so she, along with her former classmate Victoria, was sent to the relocated day school (also called Royal School) run by Reverend Edward G. Beckwith. On May 5, 1853, she finished third in her final class exams behind Victoria and Nancy Sumner. In 1865, after her marriage, she informally attended Oʻahu College (modern day Punahou School) and received instruction under Susan Tolman Mills, who later cofounded Mills College in California.Heir apparent and regency
Elections of 1874
When Kamehameha V died in 1872 with no heir, the 1864 Constitution of the Hawaiian Kingdom called for the legislature to elect the next monarch. Following a non-binding referendum and subsequent unanimous vote in the legislature, Lunalilo became the first elected king of Hawaii. Lunalilo died without an heir in 1874. In the election that followed, Liliʻuokalani's brother, David Kalākaua, ran against Emma, the dowager queen of Kamehameha IV. The choice of Kalākaua by the legislature, and the subsequent announcement, caused a riot at the courthouse. US and British troops were landed, and some of Emma's supporters were arrested. The results of the election strained the relationship between Emma and the Kalākaua family.After his accession, Kalākaua gave royal titles and styles to his surviving siblings, his sisters, Princess Lydia Kamakaʻeha Dominis and Princess Miriam Likelike Cleghorn, as well as his brother William Pitt Leleiohoku, whom he named heir to the Hawaiian throne as Kalākaua and Queen Kapiʻolani had no children of their own. Leleiohoku died without an heir in 1877. Leleiohoku's hānai (adoptive) mother, Ruth Keʻelikōlani, wanted to be named heir, but the king's cabinet ministers objected as that would place Bernice Pauahi Bishop, Ruth's first cousin, next in line. This would put the Kamehamehas back in succession to the throne again, which Kalākaua did not wish. On top of that, Kalākaua's court genealogists had already cast doubt on Ruth's direct lineage, and in doing so placed doubt on Bernice's. At noon on April 10, Liliʻuokalani became the newly designated heir apparent to the throne of Hawaii. It was at this time that Kalākaua had her name changed to Liliʻuokalani (the "smarting of the royal ones"), replacing her given name of Liliʻu and her baptismal name of Lydia. In 1878, Liliʻuokalani and Dominis sailed to California for her health. They stayed in San Francisco and Sacramento where she visited the Crocker Art Museum.Reign
On January 29, 1891, in the presence of the cabinet ministers and the supreme court justices, Liliʻuokalani took the oath of office to uphold the constitution, and became the first and only female monarch of the Hawaiian Kingdom. The first few weeks of her reign were obscured by the funeral of her brother. After the end of the period of mourning, one of her first acts was to request the formal resignation of the holdover cabinet from her brother's reign. These ministers refused, and asked for a ruling by the Hawaii Supreme Court. All the justices but one ruled in favor of the Queen's decision, and the ministers resigned.  Liliʻuokalani appointed Samuel Parker, Hermann A. Widemann, and William A. Whiting, and reappointed Charles N. Spencer (from the hold-over cabinet), as her new cabinet ministers. On March 9, with the approval of the House of Nobles, as required by the Hawaiian constitution, she named as successor her niece Kaʻiulani, the only daughter of Archibald Scott Cleghorn and her sister Princess Likelike, who had died in 1887.  From April to July, Liliʻuokalani paid the customary visits to the main Hawaiian Islands, including a third visit to the leper settlement at Kalaupapa. Historian Ralph Simpson Kuykendall noted, "Everywhere she was accorded the homage traditionally paid by the Hawaiian people to their alii."
brother or sister kin