The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1911-02-09
JUDGE SILLIMAN TELLS KENTUCKY
BAR ASSOCIATION ABOUT HAWAII

half are Japanese. Last year they
marketed 100000 tons of sugar, worth
about $4O,0OO,OOO, or nearly the value
of the wheat crop of our best wheat
growing State.
Hawaii is a fully organized Terri
tory. 1t has a Government, Supreme
Territorial Court of three Judges, five
Circuit Courts with siv Judges, all
of whom are appointed by the Presi-
dent of the United States from resi-
dents of the islands Hawaii also has
United States District Court with
two Judges, a Clerk and a Marshal,
appointed by the President either from
island or mainland residents. Both
of the present Judges happen to be
natives of the islands. An appeal
lies to the United States Supreme
Court from all final decisions of the
Territorial Supreme Court where
more than $4,000 is involved,
while the District Court is attach
ed to the Ninth Judicial Circuit, and
appeals are taken as from other Uni
ted States Circuit and District Courts.
They have a Legislature, composed
of a Senate and House of Representa-
tives elected by what is practically
universal manhood citizen suffrage,
and they elect the usual Territorial
Delegates to Congress.
The native born people of Hawaii,
whether of Hawaiian, Japanese or
Chinese origin, are citizens of the
United States, while the dark skinned
people of Porto Rico and the Philip
pines are not. The Hawaiian islands
are Iof volcanic origin. They are
simply eroded volcanic cones. Hawaii
has two good harbors. They are on
the same small island. One is the
commercial harbor of Honolulu, the
| other the military and naval base
of Pearl Harbor, which. we have de-
cided to heavily fortify and make the
principal naval base of the Pacific
Ocean. Pearl Harbor is a beautiful
| sheet of water, lying between the
coral reefs and the indented tropical
mountains. Hawaii, gentlemen, is the
most picturesque of our island pos
| sessions, and l am going TO depart
from the usual practice on occasions
OF this kind and give you a little of
the local coloring.
Picture yourselves sailing in over
the surface of Pearl Harbor, IN eff
feet a land-locked lake, running back
from the coral fringed shore to the
foothills of the evergreen mountains.
To your left is a small buc ideally
symmetrical dark-brown range, COW
cred at the base with carpets of light
= green sugar cane. Inland is a plateau
feet next a panorama of long, slipping
tsblelands, deep-green tropical valleys,
the floors of which are cove eel with
satin sheets of waving grass. These
stretches of grass are boTdered by
! tangled masses of trees dr9pel with
lies, while the whole is surmounted
by ridges, the tops of soma Of which
are so narrow there is hardly room
along them for footpath, while the
sides in places fall away sheer a
thousand feet or more. Above the
ridges rise jagged points and several
substantial peaks. Below the second
range of mountains, and farther to
! your right along the lower slopes be-
/ tween the foothills and the sea, lies
the city of Honolulu. 1t is hidden
by wide-spreading, heavily-leaved trop-
ical trees, interspersed with waving
palms, which bow before the perpetual
summer breeze that blows almost con-
tinuously from the northeast.
! In Hawaii we see the origin and
growth of things laid bare. The
molten interior of the earth has forced
itself through the crust, raising the
lava cone, flow by flow, until we have
on the Island of Hawaii, the most
southerly and newest of the group,
two mountain peaks that rise nearly
$4,000 feet above the level of the sea,
which pulsates and pounds the rocky
1 shores below. One of these noun
tains, the far-famed Mauna Loa, is
still in process of formation, and we
continue to hear of its eruptions. In
small compass we have every kind
of erosion. On the windward side of
the older islands the mountains have
been deeply furrowed, while the rich
soil has been washed away and spread
out along the foothills. The watered
slopes are clothed with richest YER