Waterbury evening Democrat., 1893-11-14
WAS IT AN ACT OF WARP
That Is Minister Hastings View
 of the Hawaiian Attitude.
IF so, CONGRESS MUST REVIEW IT.
The Administration Still Keeping Its Pol icy Secret and Withholding the Last Dis patch From HonoluIu-EnsIand Sends a warshIp to the Islands.

Warship to the Islands.
 WASHINGTON, Nov. 1.-The state de, partInent has received a communication from Honolulu telegraphed from San Francisco. It arrived by the steamer China
 and was written in the navy department cipher. Experts set at work upon the dis patch and labored over it for several hours. After securing the substance of this of fcial communication Secretary Gresham took a copy of it out to Woodley for a con ference over the matter with President Cleveland. Nothing was given out from the state department as to the substance of the dispatch.
 F. P. Hastings, secretary of the Hawaiian legation, was shown the dispatch from San Francisco containing the news of Minister Willis arrival in Honolulu and his ap pointment to present his credentials to President Dole.
 This news was obviously a great relief to the minds of members of the legation. They declined to talk about the matter as usual, but the satisfaction expressed at the presentation by Minister Willis of his credentials to President Dole suggested that they might have feared that the min ister would be found to have been accred- ited to the queen.
 The plan of the Hawaiian representa- tives evidently is to stand rigidly on the rights they have acquired by the recogni- tion of their government. Minister Thurs ton touched the marrow of their hopes when he said that any attempt to over turn the present government by foreign power would be an act of war.
 Congress Will Interfere.
 An act of war requires the consent or declaration of congress. Congress will un- doubtedly take up the subject of Hawaii in some way immediately upon assembling in December. The fight it is said, will be made on the administration policy on this line-that it has declared war without the consent of congress and has therein done an unlawful act
 What effect it would have on this pro
 posed policy if the present government should peacefully yield to the persuasions of the American minister is also discussed.
 The question involved is whether so peace
 able proceeding could be regarded as an
 act of war. It is argued that it would be
 an act of aggression on sovereign power none the less because the power peacefully yielded to the threat of so overwhelmingly superior a force.
 It still remains an unanswerable problem
 to those of diplomatic experience how the
 American minister accredited to the Ha- waiian government can, immediately upon
 presenting his credentials, set about to de-
 stroy that government.
 There is a shrewd surmise in Washing l ton that the restoration of Queen Liliuo-
 kalani to the throne may not be followed by the entire withdrawal of the influence
 of the United States, but that with the
 work of the last administration once un- done a protectorate may be established ! over the monarch
 One clear and certain result of the present ! incident would seem to be that annexation
 will never be prOffered to the United States ! by the Hawaiians again. If there is ever to be annexation, the movement will orig ! mate in this country