The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1873-02-22

What do these mean, and which is best for the
lehOie people of this land, Hawaiians and all others?
The last means to continue to be ruled by native SOW
ereigns with judges and ministers of their appoint
ment, chiefly of foreign birth, from necessity, with
laws made by a legislature chosen by themselves and
officers of their own appointment. 1t means, judging
from the past as well ss the present, a very good
government administered by very good men, so far
as the laws are concerned and those who execute
them, and those upon whom they are executed. In
no country better, as far as sovereign and subject
are concerned; but it means too u continued struggle
for separate national life and prosperity. because our
great staple products are SO heavily taxed in cur
only reliable market that they will hardly pay for
the raising in the best of times; but in less favorable
times the struggle is SO severe as to threaten ruin to
our whole commercial, Industrial and political system,
our productions, our labor, our mechanics, our car
rying trade, our merchandising, our importing, our
revenue. If sugar will not pay, where is the Iaborer
TO find employment, where those who cultivate the
earth to find him q market, where the carrier his
freight, where the merchant a sale for his goods,
where the mechanic his employment, and where the
government its revenue? These classes will all
remain, but without means or money. Some will
leave the country, and the Hawaiian must return to
his scanty dress of primitive times. Forty years ago,
the inhabitants numbered 3 0,000, and even then
they had begun to be clad in the cottons Of other
lands, for large numbers of whalers resorted here for
supplies ana lett their money, ana much too was re-
.ceived for sandal wood, and with these the native
could, to a considerable extent, clotbe himself in
cottons. But these sources of supply are nearly ex-
tinct. And ut that time whatever they earned was all
expended by HaWaiians of every class for the first
wants of civilization for whilst there was no revenue,
neither was there a salary to pay in the land; but
now the case is different. We have increased produc-
ton, We have created exports, and exchanged them
for imports from other lands, and by their taxation
have created a revenue from which a well organized
but expensive government is sustained-whilst of the
Hawaiian race there are but 10000 left.
Independence then means possible and even proba-
BILE retrogressiOn, ruin 10 our labOriously and well
built national structure, which all good men, both
native and foreign, would mourn to see.
But what does annexation mean? 1t means the
lifting of the great tax from our country's products,
so that We shall be paid for and encouraged in our
industry. 1t means the stimulus of industry to the
Hawaiian, which will save him from extinction, If
anything can. 1t means his independence by has 0wa
chosen legislature and laWS in alt local matters as
real as at present. 1t means prosperity to schools,
from the wise expenditure of funds granted by the
L. 5. Government. 1t means a reasonable pension
or subsidy to those chiefs who have magnaninously
given up certain political rights for the prosperity
and good of all their people, and to save them from
extinction, if anything will save them. It means
union to one of the greatest aud freest nations of the
globe upon equal terms, of which we might well be
proud. 1t means national prosperity instead Of adj
versity. 1t means vigorous life OF the people, instead
of gradual decay and death. Which is best, and
which must every lover of the Hawaiian race and Of
his own choose 1t seems as tnOugh there cOuId De
but one answer from Hawaiians, Americans, Britons,
Germans, or any one else; and as though no one
could be found to choose continued separate indie
pendence with all its discourag ements and struggles,
and real decadence to an independence as real and
full of encouragement and hope even of saving the
race, in connection with the great and free and
prosperous American Union. 1t is the conviction OF
thoughtful Hawaiians, Britons, Americans aud Ger
mans, that this will come about some time, why not
now? 1 do not believe that the large-hearted King
and intelligent chiefs think so much of their preced-
ent political rights that they will not cheerfully yield
them for the greater real good Of their country and
people. and especially as they would not be called
upon to make pecuniary sacrifices; for in this they
would undoubtedly receive a full compensation for
all that they would relinquish, (by treaty of annex
atom as well as ample provision for the education
Of their people and full guaranty Of selfgovernment