The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1904-07-29
MEETING OF THE COUNTY
ACT Commissioners
Question Of Appointive Or Elective
Supervisors is Debated
at Length.

Fourth: Base To county system per-
manently upon the right of the Gov
| ernor to appoint all county boards.
When Congress has conferred beyond
dispute the right of elective boards will
be the right time to reconstruct our
county system.
Fifth: The county act should by all
means provide for the county control
of education, health, roads. bridges and
| wharves.
Whether the people are to have an
| elective system of government or not,
they want local control of these things.
| The outside islands are right tired of
having bureaucratic government with
every high official stationed in Homo
| lulu.
Let uniformity and cooperation be
secured in education, health, public
works and other matters by providing
that the head officials upon the differ
ent islands shall constitute boards of
education, health, public works, ETC.,
and let the officials sitting as such
boards make rules and regulations for
the guidance of all officials in such de-
partments throughout the Territory.
| i am,
| Yours most respectfully,
| (Signed) JOHN d. WILLARD.
| SMITH HAS A PLAN.
In requesting views from the citi
zens present Mr.. Cooper put himself
on record by stating that there should
| be no plan looking to the appointment
of the Boards by the Governor if there
was any possible opportunity of elect
ing them.
Mr.. Smith said in part: THAT mat
ter of the appointment of Boards on
the requirement in the Organic Act
that all of the Boards should be ap-
pointed by the Governor is a very diff
cult one to overcome. This suggestion
occurs to me, (and 1 would like to say
that it is merely a suggestion that I
have not thought out entirely. might
this difficulty not be overcome by hav-
ing larger number of people elected
by the electors of each county, say
seven, nine or twelve. from which the
Governor would appoint the five super
visors, thus complying with the Organ
ic Act. This would bring the matter
within the provisions of the Organic
Act that Boards shall be appointed by
the Governor"
Mr.. Watson: "The Governor would
not necessarily be bound to appoint
any of the seven or nine elected. He
could still appoint outside of those If
the Governor has the right to appoint,
he has an unrestricted right
Mr.. Cooper: II think we are all of
one accord that the Boards should be
elected if the Organic Act provisions
are so construed"
Judge Dole: DO you thing it would
be invalid if you had an alternative in
the Act, that if the Court decided the
Boards could not be elected, they
could be appointed?"
Mr.. Stewart: Yes, sir"
Judge Dole: THE fact of Govern
ment being in the alternative does not
make it invalid"
Mr. Cooper But 1t is not positive
legislation in either case"
Judge Dole: ut is legal until one
feature is declared invalid. In that
case the other feature becomes valid.
/ don't believe there is any danger of
an elected county board declared lille
gal under the Organic Act. The Ha-
waiian Government during the past
three years has construed that law to
mean that road boards for instance be
appointed by the Superintendent of
Public Works, being boards whose
functions are restricted to their dis
tricts."
Mr. Cooper: "They We're subordinate
boards"
w. o. Smith: II have come prepared
to present a suggestion which 1 made
some years ago in the matter of county
government. After working on the
county act of three years ago and two
years ago, attention was called to the
matter of what the real need of a
county government was. On visiting
each of the other islands on business
and meeting intelligent foreigners and
Hawaiians. it seemed to resolve itself
down to this: The reason county gov
ernment was desired was ~ the peo-
pie wished to have a voice in the se-
lection of their local officers (2) to
have the control of the disbursements
of the monies which We're available for
the public use of the island; (3) a
recorders office: (4) a district attor-
ney.
When we attempted the task OF
framing fun nedged County Act suited
to the conditions i'm the islands We en-
oountered great difficulties and the re-
suit was bin suited TO circumstances
! as much as possible,
The experiment which we recently
had Was not a fair test OF county gov
rrnmenL but az the samo time the re-
suit WAS not encouraging, either 10 the
haWailans or their white brethren, In
somr pAris of the Islands there was dis
! appointment lu people who had adyo,
rati ihls fom ~ governments since
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