The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1901-04-18
THE FUSION PROGRAM
REPUBLICANS NOT CONSULTED
so FAR.
Senator Cullom and President McKin-
ley Said to Have Interested Them
selves in a Proposed Combine.

A mass meeting of Home Rulers, to
ratify the action taken in Fosters hall
Tuesday night will probably be called
in the near future. In the meantime
the opposition to the Wilcox plan is
working among natives and the mass
meeting If the delegate anl his sup
porters decide they uare face one, Will
be the scene of quite as lively con-
troversy as was the private meeting at
which the title of the party was amend
ed.
The Wilcox plan has not yet been
communicated officially to the Republi-
can party. Before. any union of the
parties can be complete the Republican
and Home Rule central committees
must meet and arrange terms of ANAL
gamation. The first steps will have to
be taken by the Home Rule committee.
At the present time there are not
enough members of the Republican CEN
trail committee in Honolulu to hold
meeting, but others would be sent for
should the fusion proposition be offi-
cially broached, When the committee
was formed Oahu was given five MEM
bers, so that there might be working
majority on the island at any time, the
whole committee consisting of nine
members but the absence of chairman
j. A. Kennedy and of W. j. Coelho, who
is supposed to be warbling sweet Ha-
Wallan melOQleS at buIdlO I6uuCSS lllS
number here below quorum. The
committee consists of ]. A. Kennedy,
w. j. Coelho, T. McCants Stewart, j. P.
Cooke, b. H. Wright H. p. BALDWIN,
John Mcclure, A. N. Kepoikai, B. F.
Sandow. E. r. Hendry is secretary of
the committee.
Secretary Hendry stated this morn
ing that so far no proposition had come
from the Home Rulers, but he had no
doubt the committee would hold a
meeting to consider the matter should
the Wilcox proposition be made. "Of
course l cannot forecast the result OF
such a meeting" said Mr.. Hendry, "and
at the present time it is not easy to say
just what the proposition is. No one
knows what Delegate Wilcox said to
the Home Rulers at that secret meet
ing"
The chief obstacles to the union are
thought to be the anti-haole sentiment
that dominates many Home Rulers and
the factional differences in the local Re-
publican party.
The report is current among Home
Rulers and others that Senator Cullom
deserves most of the credit of pro-
posing the fusion scheme. He is said
to have impaired it to Wilcox at Wash
ington and to have advised Wilcox to
leave for Hawaii at once and work 1t
out. 1t is also said that President Nc
Kinley took an interest in the suggested
conversion of Home Rulers to Repub-
licanism and expressed a hope that the
natives of Hawaii would become MEM
bers of the party.
Other Republican leaders at WASH
ington took similar positions. The
whole Wilcox program as proposed here
is said to have had it's origin at Wash
ington and Wilcox is said to have left
the national capital after the short Ses-
sion of Congress adjourned after tell
ing Culom and others that he could
sink Home Rula" in the Republican
party. The attitude of natives of Ha-
waii in opposing the party that gave
annexation and passed the Organic Act
was quite distasteful to Republicans at
Washington, especially the expansion
lists and Wilcox will be considered to
have earned a reward from the party If
he can go back and say he has swung
the natives into the Republican line.
The local program, if the project OF
union is CARED out, will be a meeting
of the two central committees and their
joining forces, then election of a new
committee representative of the newly
created party. Then it would remain
for the first election to show how COM
plete was the fusion for after all ANAL
carnations of central committees do not
count unless the general voters follow
them.
The first test would come-should the
county government pass-in June neXt
when the first county elections are tC
be held, according to the bill.