The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-05-29

live in a crowd and with exceptions
does not do otherwise when he becomes
his own master. There are undoubted-
ly many others of various nationaIities
! who have become habituated by long
! usage to contentment with present con-
ditions. But even among these more
room is appreciated. This is evidenced
by the fact that if 100 laborers are re-
moved from a plantation camp design
ed for 200, it will be a matter of only
a few days before the remaining 100
will, if permitted, spread themselves
out over the entire camp to secure
more room and privacy.
But there are thousands of other
cases in which. to a greater or less
degree, the home instinct and all the
incidental desires and feelings connect
ed Herewith, are possessed by plan
tation laborers as fully and completely
as by members of the community who
stand higher in the social scale. Take
the Portuguese for example. There is
not, to my knowledge, Portuguese
tenement house in the Territory They
have hundreds of little individual
homes, costing from $500 to $1,000 each,
which they have built with their own
money. wherever on the plantations.
there are detached houses with ground
around them, the Portuguese are eager
applicants for them
There has been, perhaps. more OPP
portunity for development and exhibit
ton of these tendencies among the Por-
tuguese and Germans, because the
migration of those two nationalities to
Hawaii has consisted exclusively of
families, instead of an overwhelming
proportion of male adults. Moreover
these nationalities have no intention of
returning to their old homes. They
have permanently expatriated them
selves and will never have any homes
except those which they make anew
for themselves. They also belong to
races which for generations have been
all over the world. Emigra-
ton and permanent settlement abroad
is therefore a common thought to them.
THE Hawaiian Territory is not the
only place where the labor question has
been a vital issue. Cuba was iii a
like dilemma, when, in 1885, slavery
was finally abolished The plantation
system had fiourished there for gen.
erations. When the slaves were set
free they would not work for small
wages and were too uncertain and lazy
position to wander and to become ire !
sponsibIe Migrants. Destruction star |
ed the planters in the face. They had |
to act quickly or go under. They acted |
both quickly and successfully. They |
cut up their vast estates into lots of
from ten to fifty acres, and sold or
leased them at nominal rentals to their |
former slaves. making contracts with |
them to buy the cane produced. This |
was the genesis of the so-called colo |
NAL system which has been success |
fully continued in operation in Cuba |
ever since.
Il believe that the suggestions MADE |
above. or some of them, or others along |
the same general lines, viii eventually |
be adopted. The same masterful spirit |
which has made Hawaii what it is will |
meet and solve the problem. Dan |
gerous conditions have been met and |
in the past, and the sugar |
industry of the Islands established on /
a broader and firmer basis than ever. |
1t will continue to expand and be a |
source of profit for generations yet to |
come. While it will take energy, |
breadth of spirit and progressive in
-elIigence to solve the labor problem,
the way will be found. sugar will long |
continue to be King of Hawaii