The Daily bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Hawaii]) 1882-1895, 1888-09-25
A LETTER FROM A CHlAAMAN.
HoNoLuLu, Sept. %, 1SS

mate with all the leading men among
my countrymen in Honolulu and
knowing that they have not offered
any bribes to members of the Legis
ture to control their votes, l was
very much surprised when | saw the
Report of the Committee on the !
cases of Mr.. Kauhi and others the
following statements :-"money was
provided by certain Chinese TO be |
used in defeating the proposed con-
stitutional amendment relating TO
Chinese, and to reward certain mem
bers of the Legislature who should
vote to defeat the same" What is
there in the evidence which the com
mittee took to warrant this slander?
Evidently these gentlemen went to the
enquiry with preconceived notion,
the truth or falsehood of which they
took no pains to ascertain. / have
carefully read all the published evil
dence which fills so many columns
of the newspapers, and find only the
unsupported statements of Kalaukoa
to connect the money received by
Kamauoha and others from Kauhi
with the Chinese. The tale he told,
while trying to get his countrymen
into trouble, was fatty contradicted
by every other witness, but it ap-
pears to have suited the committee
to believe his unsupported word
against all the others. The public
perhaps when they weigh the evil
depce will value Kalaukoa's in the
light of his behavior throughout the
whole of this affair, and will not be
ready to put too much faith in the
word of such man. On behalf of
all the leading Chinese citizens of
Honolulu l emphatically deny the
truth of the Committees statement,
and / defy them to show that it is,
as their report says, ,substantiated by
the evidence. If the principal mem
bers of the Chinese community had no
hand in the matter, is it to be sup
posed that any outsider would put
his hand in his pocket to supply Ka-
uhi with dollars to make presents to
his fellow legislators?
1t will be asked-if the Chinese
did not supply this money who
would find it worth while to do so?
l answer that there are many haoles
in this town who are just as deeply
interested in the prosperity of the
Chinese who are here, as we our
selves are, men who have interests at
stake and dependent on the well-be
ing of the Chinese larger than those
of any individual Chinaman among
us. These men belong to set who
are well accustomed to putting up
campaign funds" when they think
any political point is to be gained,
and have for years past found the
sinews of war for election contests
and last year for the League. Few
of them appear actively in politics,
but they can be relied on for the
funds when they are needed. Who
more likely than these gentle
men to have given Mr.. Kauhi
the means to make a few pal
try presents to members who by
standing up for the Cinnamon in the
Legislature helped to protect the in
terests of all haoles who have deal
ing with my countrymen? Nor are
the haole landowners, capitalists
and importers the only people who
will be hurt by anything that Injuries
the Cinnamon. There are numbers
of Hawaiian ladies and gentlemen
who are living in comfort on the
rents paid to them by Chinese ten.
ants. Disaster to the Chinese
would mean grievous deprivation tc
most of these people, and is well
known to great many of them.
can very we'll understand that i
was very well worth the while o
these natives to do all they could tt
prevent their tenants from being in
| jured.
0 Sir, the Chinese are very unjustly
] treated by considerable section o
the haole population here and thos
whose policy, or honest sentiment
n it is to show us favor seem, with
: few honorable exceptions, to b
O afraid to speak out. But our out
. spoken enemies we can meet an,
y deal with. The Chnaman is an i'm
0 portant factor in the population o
: these islands and it will yet be foun
e that he is not TO be trifled with i
9 impunity by any one. tits those VIII
take underhand means to injure II
: that make me most angry. Last yea
:. when there was mass meeting of na
f tives, people belonging to the mis-
: sionary party came round to us,ver
+ anxious we should not to join. "Oh,
they said, "the native has no sense
do not have anything to do wit
him and then bye and bye if yo
Y make petition we will give you tn
; vote" This sort of thing was tol,
TO all the Chinese merchants becaus
then these people we're uneasy. The
y knew they had done wrong thin
u taking away so much of his politi
o cal rights from the native and leav
e ing their industrious and law-abid
ing Chinese fellow citizens withou
> any. They had provoked retalia
Is tion and they feared it was coming