The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1864-08-27
THE PACIFIC
Commercial Advertiser.
AUGUST 81.

AeREEABLY with the announcement in our last
paper, the new Constitution was made public on
Saturday afternoon last. In its main features,
it resembles the draft prepared by the Cabinet,
and laid before the Convention in July, and
abridges very materially the rights of the people,
against which changes q majority of the Dele
gates of the people stood so firmly and debated
so fearlessly, as to excite the admiration of the
whole country.
We do not propose here to discuss this docu-
ment. Those who wish to examine it, can do so
at their leisure. So long as the Ministry sit
supreme, trampling on law and right, SO long
it must be acknowledged as the law of the land
Enacted by force, and not by the cooperate will
of the three Estates, whose joint act alone can
make legal statutes, it can only exist by the ex-
ercise of the same force which created it, and
therefore it rests on an unconstitutiona if not an
uncertain basis. The Hawaiian nation has now
returned TO the regime that existed from $500 TO
1910. She stands now a political anomaly-be-
yond the pale of free and independent ~constitu-
tional government.
And who have placed her there? \ ministe-
rial cabinet of four, who, in violating and sub
verting the highest law of the land, have shown
themselves devoid of that high moral principle,
which should possess statesmen and control their
acts. No apologies can clear them of the high
and heinous sin, Of which they stand charged
before the nation. The Constitution of 1852
may have been imperfect, an eyil-nay, it was.
But two wrongs can never make one right. Its
abrOgation, except by the lawful and peaceable
mode prescribed by law, or established by prece-
dent, is a wrong, and to the latest generation
can only be viewed as such.
1t is this ministerial cabinet of four who are,
before the nation, solely responsible for it and
their names must stand out in glaring characters
on the pages of Hawaiian history, as conspira-
tors against the liberties of the people whom they
aspired to serve. Most conspicuous among them
will be read the name of r. &. Wyllie,--a name
that might have gone down to p~osterity crowned
with Z halo of glory, and been revered by the
people as q friend of Hawaii, but for this last
shameful act-trampling on the Constitution of
the Kingdom, and teaching men to 60 and do
likewise. Who but he, would have dared to go
from one end of the group to the other, denounc-
ing the Constitution of the country as unworthy
to exist? Who but he, would compass sea and
land to revile and denounce as traitors those who
dared to stand up in behalf of law and order
and who, when foreseeing the result of his teach
AHESS fAOSldAAucO ! ~ II hciIu. d!iu UiSCiOStu
the principal actor. Who, but he, would have
cast the frebrand of political enmity among a
people till now enjoying peace and security, which
must henceforth create discord and jealousies?
Who but he, would have dared to distort facts.
and charge Americans with seeking TO ALLEVIATE
the sovereignty of this group, when as a body
they opposed it, and when the project was first
proposed by him to ALLEVIATE it to England?
Facts are stubborn, and some day the facts will
be made public, and his signatures, as a party to
the acts, will be proof positive, that it was 4
Scotchman who advised the King of Hawaii to
ALLEVIATE his sovereignty. History will bring
these facts to light. Y
Next in prominence stands the name Of G. C..
name that must go down to posterity
coupled with its predecessor, and embalmed with
the same odium. An American by birth, he has
proved recreant to the land that bore him, and
ID the principles that have made it so glorious.
If it is his ambition to have his name emblazoned
on the pages of Hawaiian history, as an actor in
the drama that is not yet completed, his aspira-
tons will be fully realized. Traitors as we'll as
patriots have their names there. Arnold and
Burr are as conspicuous as Washington and
y dishonorable fame is always more
easily acquired than its opposite. His counsels
have kept the car of state rolling over the
track, instead of turning it off, as has
been done, into the swampy morasses, where diff
fculties must be encountered at every turn, dis
trust and alarm created on every side, threaten
ing results of which no man can foresee the end.
The other members of the Cabinet have not
played 20 prominent a part. Mr.. Hopkins has,
We have been informed, been opposed to the
mode OF changing the Constitution in the way
has been done, OF in any other way than
legal one. The same is understood to be the
with Mr.. Varigny. who has strongly argued
or alterations in the Constitution, but has been
adverse to the mode adopted to effect them. But
" consenting TO hold Office under this strange
of affairs, they both become principals, and
IS such are looked upon as responsible particip-
in the acts.
One thing the Ministry have found-that they
annot CoERCE the people. They may defy the
aw-they may trample them under foot, as the
Constitution has been trampled on-but the peo-
lie are yet firm, loyal and determined TO abide
rho 1ayrs