The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-04-30
THE LEGISLATURE.

LEGISLATURE when it met, to keep 1t
from passing the ellis that are essential
to the welfare Of the Territory. Sixty
days were at its disposal. EAe Home
Rule party had a two-thirdss majority
| in the lower House; 1t had all but
two-thirds majority in the Senate. Its
program had been framed in caucus
which was nearly continuous for six
weeks before the Legislature assembled.
The power and the opportunity was
with 1t to introduce and pass every
measure In which ii nowf at the eleV-
| enth hour, pretends to have an interest.
We saw "pretends" because its work
within the last few days, despite It's
| loud professions, has been as aimless
! and incompetent as that which 1t tard-
iily essayed during the first half OF the
session.
WHY the Legislature acted as 1t did
and acts as it does, is chiefly matter
which affects persons; and the respon-
s;hility hanks back to the rank ana ME
Of the Home Rule party which sent
the very riffraff of its race, with put
two or three exceptions, to the Legs
|lature. There were bright and honest
lHawaiians in politics at the time, Out
they had Joined either the republican
or Democratic party. What was le1t
were chiefly the ignorant and vicious,
he two-bit demagogues, the gratters
and other scalawags; and these were
commissioned to make laws Tor an
American Territory. Some of them
knew more about breaking laws than
making them; none knew what Amer
icanism meant. A few Of these poor
creatures thought that they could re-
peal Federal statutes; others that they
could deprive the Governor of his pre-
negatives; and nearly all felt 1t to be
more to their advantage to talk ON the
floor than to work In the privacy Of the
committee room where the real tasks
of legislation are achieved. To. parade
up and down like the apes in Ktnpl1ngs
poem; to strike attitudes before the
public; to talk, talk, talk. with endless
liberation and about the most trivial
hings; to dodge everv chance. of hard
and useful work; to eschew evening
sessions until the very last, and to
shirk duty on Saturdays; to spena In
valuable time Tuning over the Gov
ernor and in contriving simian tricks
to annoy him; to give a week to a. dog
bill and hardly a moment to the Ques-
ton of Territorial revenues; to squan-
der hour after hour in maxillary tumult
over the way In which the Governor
signed official communications to
drop all work for a luau or drink or
or a secret and futile cabal with the
inflated Humphreys-these things tell
the story of the expiring and llnla-
nented Legislature precisely as 1t was
made up from day to day and from
week to week.
When a Legislature of this kind comes
together, sixty days is too much for 1t.
Under another form Of government
such body would be dissolved, and
those of it's members that were not
held on suspicion of their honesty OF
their sanity would be sent home Forth
with. Under the government we have,
the Legislature had to be endured for
sixty days. The cost has been $1,000
for each member; the result has been
an output of the rawest and crudest
bills: the atmosphere has been one Of
corruption. The sixty days, therefore,
were much too long time to give the
Legislature for the good of Hawaii;
an extension to ninety days would
have been an error of Judgment not
to be expected of Governor Dole or of
any careful executive.
True, the revenue bills have not beer
properly looked after, and it would be
worth another thirty days even of the
Bander-log, to have them taken up.
carefully considered and the best of
them in any amended form which wis
dom might suggest, given the force, ard
effect of law. But can we gather
grapes of thorns or figs of thistles? Can
the leopard change his spots? Will
the mire? The Legislature has shown
itself to be dishonest, incompetent and
wasteful. What assurance is there but
its own, that in the course of another
thirty days it would become honest,
efficient and economical?
We do not know how the question of
revenue will be solved; but it cannot be
solved properly, in any event, by men
of the mental incapacity and moral per-
versity Of those we are now considering
If no new sources of revenue are to be
provided we shall have to make the
best of 1t until Congress, In studying
the problems of expansion, comes to
see that universal suffrage has its
moral limitations and that American
ism cannot be guarded, inculcated or
spread by men who can barely speak
the language. who know nothing Of the
traditions, and who care nothing for
the principles of the American people.
The whole Legislative campaign
against J. A McCandIess is made for