The Maui news. [volume] (Wailuku, Maui, H.I.) 1900-current, 1919-02-28

loan facilities and many other good
measures that would aid the people
and further the happiness, prosperity
and Americanization of the islands.
There will be an effort made by this
class to kill effective farm loan legis>
lation in this legislature by propos-
ing an appeal be made to Congress.
They realize that it would be very un-
popular to oppose the demand for
adequate farm loans, SO will pose as
favoring it, but favoring -congression-
al, instead of territorial legislation,
knowing perfectly well that con-
gressional action either will not be
taken at all, or will be hopelessly in
adequate. Senator Wise has an
nounced his intention to introduce a
good measure to provide for territori-
al farm loans. l hope he will be able
to secure a majority for it in the
Senate. The House will undoubtedly
pass it.
The third point, hat of aiding the
farmers in production, is already well
taken care of in the Territory by the
College of Hawaii, with its county
agents, the federal and sugar plant
ers' experiment stations. and the
Board of Agriculture and Forestry.
And the legislature has done its
utmost to provide for the fourth point,
that of marketing Cat least for the
producer of miscellaneous crops)
thru the establishment of, and splen-
did support now given to, the Terri
torial Market. If that agency has
failed to fuction as effectively as it
should the responsibility is upon the
executive, not the legislative, part of
our government. We might well
have some government agency to
oversee the dealings of the canneries
and sugar mills with those small
farmers who grow product for them.
The failure of the executive branch
to carry out good laws is a very real
and d~iscouraging difficulty in Hawaii
for which it is hard to find q solu-
ton. We can secure any good law
we want, for we elect every man con-
nected with the making of them. But
we cannot get the laws enforced.
Anyone who will read Sec. 73 of the
Organic Act and our land laws based
upon it connot but be impressed with
how carefully the farmers of those
llN > tllutdN Oltu " DlONlht lOl ltdl
demonstrating and prevent specula-
ton, and had any conscientious effort
been made by the ~sub-agents, the land
commissioners and the governors to
see that those laws were obeyed and
enforced the whole history of home
stealing in this territory would have
been different. Their neglect of their
duty has been little short of criminal.
w L---l --z,,I4@r- aDI %lAn
wonder hat we have them with us.
We set a bait for them, and wonder
that they swarm to it. G.. Brewer and
Co. stated before the 1915 Legislature
that of 200 600 tons of cane bought
by their mills from homestead land
less than l percent was grown by a
homesteader. About 1912 the home
steads at Haiku where l live were
opened up. Today, of the II home
steads in the long strip between the
gulches, on what We speak of as the
third ridge, only three are occupied
by homesteaders, and only two of the
three work the places with their own
labor. From all of the others the
homesteaders are gone, and the
places are either idle, or leased to
the Japanese, or have been bought by
the rich in violation of the Organic
Act. Yet in the face of such expert
ences as these a year ago the Hale
akala homesteads were opened under
the same terms, and right now the
Waiakea homesteads are being open
ed under terms but little different.
Every child in the schools has a rela-
tive who lives in town and draws
from a bit of government
land he managed to grab some time
back. Little wonder that they grow
up with the ambition to do the same.
breed spectators.
1t is interesting to compare with
conditions in Hawaii what other
have done and are doing. 1t
was in New Zealand that the renew
able lease was devised to keep out
the Spectator, and there it has been
so successfully used in disposing of
the hOmesteads made from the great
which the government has
bought and divided. In Canada a
homesteader may get the following
terms, according to an advertisement
now running in the agricultural pap
ers. Ten percent down at the time of
purchase, then no payment on the
principal until the end of the fourth
year. Interest is 6 percent. A loan
for improvements, up to $4,000 can be
with no other security than
the land, and the payments for the
farm, and repayment of the loan, may
be extended over 20 years.
There is no reason why Hawaii
should not proceed to people her
lands under terms as certain to the
government to secure what is desired
and as advantageous to the home
steader as any other place in the
EnUvTNr n MnNDE