The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-12-01
As Others See Us
E. 1owrey, washn gton correspondent
Evening Post accompanied Congressional Party

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HILO. Island of Hawaii, June IL
Journeying from one island to another,
one is bound to hear lot of talk about
the need for Americanizing Hawaii.
Different men mean different things
when they employ this phrase or ra tn
er they have widely varying prescrip-
tions for bringing about the same re-
suits. The ideal they seek is the agri-
cultural communities of the well-peo-
pied farming States of the mainland.
When they talk about Americanizing
Hawaii they see in their minds eye the
fertile valleys of these islands divided
into small farms, and each farm owned
by a white American citizen and rails
ing a diversified crop. They see the
Asiatic eliminated as a social and labor
factor. They think of every man own
ing his own home. They want to see
these small farms growing coffee, pine
apples, tropical fruits, cocoa, rubber
and<sisal, as well as sugar. This. it
is to be feared, will be a dream. for a
long time to come.
If it We're not for Hawaii's primacy
as a sugar-producing country, do not
believe there would be a thousand peo-
pie in the islands today. There would
be nothing to keep them here. Broad
IL speaking, nothing is being raised on
large scale, and profitably, except
nj nj Ln nd INa-
ing, grown successfully both on Ha-
wall and oahu. But pineapples are not
one of the staple necessities of life,
and the market can be easily glutted.
Again, they cannot be raised profitably
except in the vicinity of a cannery.
Presently the leases will expire on
large tracts of Government land now
planted in sugar cane. What is tn be
done with this land? Many people say,
cut it up into homesteads for new set
tiers. The query arises, what would
people grow on the land? Nobody
seems to know, or rather everybody
seems to know, but to have different
ideas. All of the big cane plantations
were cattle ranges before they were
taken up and planted in sugar. The
improvement was made possible by
COSllyH lfIlSdliOn NOlhSs Ii Lie sugar
plantations were destroyed, many be-
lieve that the land would revert to its
original condition, and the wealth of
the Territory be swept away as though
by an earthquake.
AMERICAN FARMERS WILL NOT
COME.
The men most deeply interested in
ha f1ft oeI aEn rrf1-
up hope of inducing American farmers
to come from the mainland and settle
here in the islands. There is not wide
enough play for opportunity. If a man
makes a failure here at. mis- undertake
ing, he has no recourse left except to
go back home, and home is more than
2, 900 miles away. Conditions here are
wholly unlike those on the mainland |
AS in other tropical countries. the /
agricultural products that can be rails /
I'd successfully must be grown on large .
areas of land, cultivated by a low
priced and unambitious tenantry. A !
man with broad outlook and with
my desire to improve himself in the
world would hardly be contented cut
ing cane.
To preserve her economic balance,
Hawaii must have a large number of
laborers willing to work
heaply and not DESTROYS of improving
heir lot This is the basis of some of
he feeling against the Japanese: that
hey are not content to stay in the
ane fields, but move on to the main
and, where better wages and better
onditions OF living prevail. Of those
hat stay behind, many seek To better
themselves by going into business or
ecoming artisans in competition with
rhite and native labor.
1t is the hope of those who are bring
lg Portuguese laborers to the islands :
ow that they will establish homes
nd become rooted to the soil. Oppos-
d to the principle of settling the in
abitants of the country upon the land, {
nd giving them individual crops, has {
cen the plantation systematic homes. :
18th individual interests in the system
doing things by wholesale, by COM
ming large capital with labor in 8
reat numbers-the very antithesis of :
lie homestead or individual system. :
MEN WANT NO +
SMALL FARMERS, Il
The advocate of the plantation sys- n
m looks with a shudder upon an in g
ependentIy owned kuleana anywhere n
thin the radius of his jurisdiction, Il
Id buys every small holding that is e
T sale. As for selling piece of b
nd lying within his sphere of in 7
lence" to a laborer or small farmer. n
e bare suggestion of such propo- Il
ton seems sacrilegious to the ultra "
lvocate of the plantation system. T
The sugar industry of Hawaii and h
e plantation system have grown up b.
1t has been a natural W
owth. In the early days of the in W
stry. when the plantations were OF
emseIves small. lands adjacent to m
e plantation were almost entirely ST
Id by those who had neither capital. fl
nor desire to engage in the
gar cane business. They were con-
ut to work for wages, and small J.,