New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1894-01-10
NO MORE UNBELIEF POSSIBLE.

NO MORE UNBELIEF POSSIBLE.
But though the leading officials of the Admin
istration still struggle desperately to deny and
discredit the unwelcome news Of Minister Will
ls's amazing blunders the antics Of Mr. Cleve-
lands Royalist agent In Honolulu have made
an intense political sensation here. Even
Cuckoo Congressman now accept, beyond
question, all the damaging facts reported from
Victoria, and the sole end and aim OF the panic
stricken Administration following is now to put
some sort OF a face on Minister Wilis's unwar-
ranted acts of usurpation or, failing in this, to
find some acceptable scapegoat with whom to
burden all the sins of the Administration s
amazing and dscreditable diplomacy
IT is not too much to say that the demand now
found TO have been made in President Cleve-
lands name the Hawaiian Provisional Gov
ernment is that can be defended neither in
Congress nor before the bar Of public sentiment
and there is but opinion among public
men, that the Administration has now fallen
definitely into political snare from which 1t can
extrcate itself only at the cost Of great personal
humiliation and lasting political dscredt.
GOOD LUCK AND GOOD SENSE BOTH GONE
Mr. Clevelands intense political egotism has.
IN fact, led him at last into situation in which
both good luck and good sense have utterly de-
serted him. His management Of the Hawaiian
question has been, Of course, an egreg1ous series
of blunders from the very beginning Actuated
mainly by an intense desire to reverse and over
turn the policy Of his predecessor, he adopted
olndly at the outset a programme Of secret
and irnplacable hostility TO the Provisional Gov
eminent. and of fatuous and Quxotic friendship
Tor the Justly deposed Queen
Influenced, perhaps. by the misleading dis
- l.
readily accepted the unfounded and purely senti-
mental theory which formed the basis Of his
whole subsequent acuvity-namely, that ne had
been constituted legally the arbiter of a supposed
dispute between the Queen and the Provisional
Government, with inherent power to enforce his
decision as TO which constituted the constitu-
uonal and legitimate Government in Hawaii.
This singular deluson crops out at every step
taken in the covert and furtve proceeding which
eliminated in Minister Willis's now confessed
demand upon the Provisional Government that
IT abdicate In favor Of the Queen
PIGMENT OF THE IMAGINATION.
That Mr. Cleveland was ever invested with the
functions Of arbitrator between the Queen
and the Provisional authorities is as pure a fig
ment OF his own Imagination as was any similar
fancy that filled the brain Of the ingenious knight
OF La Mancha. Nevertheless on this nure as
sumption OF arbitratve authority. Mr. Cleve-
land secretly decided that LiIiuokalani should
De restored to the throne of her barbarous an
cestors and that the recognized Hawaiian Gov
eminent should be told to abdicate. with the
implied threat that If it did not surrender peace
soiy 1t would be deposed by force. Minister
Wills had reached Hawaii on this extraordinary
mission and was supposed to have executed his
instructions before Mr.. Cleveland degned to
communicate to the public or TO Congress the
decision which he had thus arbitrarily and un-
warrantaby made
Inc indignant response Of both Congress and
'he country TO this fanciful assumption of power
seemed Tor moment TO threaten the Admins
"ation with Just and emphatic rebuke for
such a hagrant stretch Of executive authority
when, by lucky chance II was discovered that
through hitch In the negotiations with the
Queen Minister willis's anticipated notice Of
usPossession on the Provisional Government had
0 YET oeen served. Snatching at this opportune
accident the President hastily assumed that he
1'o extncate himself from the awkward posi-
.'on IN which his precipitancy had placed him
" throwing the whole fault Of the failure OF his
p'o'ect on the Queen. admitting the abortive-
Ae'' oi The restoration scheme and shifting the
e'pohsipility OF settling the Hawaiian question
tne shoulders Of Congress
HE COUNTED WITHOUT THE QUEEN
IN mis- eagerness to escape from his dangerous
S'"'tion befores Congress and the country, Mr..
S'S'eand seems to have overlooked the i'm
'a"ce OF precluding any change OF feeling on
pa'' OF the Queen and Of barring her def