The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1896-03-04
The Action of u. S. Minister
Willis.
Consul Gilman Says the Minister Is
Friendly-The Star Says He Is
Influenced by CleveIand-The Pos
sibility of a RecaIl-Comments

While there is hope here that the
latest report from Honolulu connect
ing Minister Willis with an indignity
offered to the Hawaiian Government
may prove upon fuller Information to
be exaggerated, the story as given is
by no means improbable in the light
of the Minister'S past behavior, says
the Washington Star. He is no friend
of the Dole Government. He went to
Honolulu to inaugurate a policy for
it's destruction, and he probably today
regrets the failure of that scheme. 1t
is an open secret that for some time
past he has been at his post practical
ly by the sufferance of the Hawaiia u
authorities. The Minister of any
other power would ia like circum
stances have long since received his
passports. But the friendship felt by
the Hawaiian people for the people of
the United States, and the knowledge
that that friendship was cordially re-
ciprocated, caused the vagaries and
other manifestations of Mr.. Willis to
be condoned.
Sees No One but Mr.. Cleveland.
Mr.. Willis at Honolulu, if this
latest episode has not been misrepre =
sented, is shaping his course by the
Bayard pattern set in London. That
is to say, he ignores the people of the
United States, whose servant he is,
and acts upon his individual views
and those he thinks will meet with
the personal approval of the President.
cd 70 ~ nj fa s1oL 4.
of what may Oe termed the Hawaiian
4th of July, he declines, upon the
ground that the means employed in
the establishment of the Hawaiian
Republic were publicly reprobated by
Mr.. Cleveland. Mr.. Willis. looking in
this direction, is unable to see any-
body 0ut Mr. Cleveland. The people,
80 far as he is concerned, are COM
pletely lost in the Presidents ample
shadow. He knows, and knows of
ficially, that the President was at last
forced by the people to acknowledge
the Dole Government, but, as Senator
Gray would say, he barks back on
the old track" and refuses to obey the
horn of freedom and progress.
The Same Case with Bayard.
This was the nature of Mr.. Bay
ards offense in England. He took no
thought of the people of the United
States at all. The fact that protection
had been the policy of this govern
ment from the beginning, and that
his own party, after a successful bun
cOmbe campaign for free trade, had
passed a protection tariff bill itself,
was wholly ignored when he came to
speak. He only considered that his
own views and those of Mr.. Cleveland
were opposed to protection, and he
fired away. He did not deem himself
answerable to the people of the United
States.
He was not, in his opinien, their
representative, but the representative
of the official who had selected him
for his post. Being certain of Mr..
Cleveland and of himself, therefore,
he took no further thought as to the
prOprlety of his course. He is a pious
man, and not to be suspected of en-
ploying Mr.. Vanderbilt's expression
about the people, but his action might
be explained in that famous phrase
without injury to the meaning it con
veyed to the people.
A Possibility to Come.
There are such possibilities ia this
line of procedure for the assertion of
contempt for public sentiment by for
House, it is thought, in the coming
debate on the Bayard matter, could,
with profit, go thoroughly into the
subject. AnOther opp0rtunity-it
may not be seized-wiH shortly occur
ia this Cuban business. Congress,
despairing of co operation with . the
President, will shortly declare for the
Cubans. When that is done, will
Minister Taylor at Madrid feel iusti-
fed IN saying TO the Spanish authori-
ties that the deliverance is of no mo-
ment? Mr.. Bayard or Mr.. Willis in
place would probably say: "Don't
mind that. 1t is only an expression
of COngress-a body gathered from
the turbulent people. 1t is of no inn
pOrtaDce. The President does not
approve it. The President is the state
the United States. Keep your eve
on him. So long as he is with you all