Opinion ID: 2329815
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Privilege For Native Hawaiian Practices Requires The Finder Of Fact To Balance Competing Interests.

Text: The privilege afforded for native Hawaiian practices, as expressed in our State constitution and statute, is not absolute. The language of the provisions protecting customary native Hawaiian practices display a textual commitment to preserving the practices while remaining mindful of competing interests. For example, the constitutional language protecting the right to traditional and customary practices is qualified by the phrase subject to the right of the State to regulate such rights. As a second example, HRS § 7-1, a statute protecting gathering rights, provides that native Hawaiians may gather traditional plants, but specifically exempts from protection the gathering of these items for commercial purposes. In our previous cases, this court has interpreted the constitutional and statutory language as requiring consideration of the facts and circumstances surrounding the conduct. Chief Justice Richardson explored this balance in Kalipi v. Hawaiian Trust Co., Ltd., 66 Haw. 1, 656 P.2d 745 (1982). The plaintiff in that case, William Kalipi, owned a taro patch in the Manawai ahupua'a and an adjoining houselot in Ohia ahupua'a, on the island of Moloka'i. Kalipi, 66 Haw. at 3, 656 P.2d at 747. He lived in a nearby ahupua'a called Keawenui. Id. For years, Kalipi and his family had entered Manawai and Ohia to gather ti leaf, bamboo, kukui nuts, kiawe, medicinal herbs, and ferns. Id. at 4, 656 P.2d at 747. When the Hawaiian Trust Company refused him the access to which he was accustomed, Kalipi brought suit alleging that he had a right to enter the property to gather the items as he wished. Id. Chief Justice Richardson's opinion acknowledged the tension between modern concepts of land ownership and native Hawaiian gathering rights. He explained that any argument for the extinguishing of traditional rights based simply upon the possible inconsistency of purported native rights with our modern system of land tenure must fail. Id. at 4, 656 P.2d at 748. Similarly, the court implicitly recognized that the bare assertion of this privilege is inadequate to defeat all property rights. That is, the two conceptions of property must coexist somehow, and the court saw its task as: to conform these traditional rights born of a culture which knew little of the rigid exclusivity associated with the private ownership of land, with a modern system of land tenure in which the right of an owner to exclude is perceived to be an integral part of fee simple title. Id. at 7, 656 P.2d at 749. The court in Kalipi struck a balance in its interpretation of HRS § 7-1, which at the time of the Kalipi opinion stated: Where the landlords have obtained, or may hereafter obtain, allodial titles to their lands, the people on each of their lands shall not be deprived of the right to take firewood, housetimber, aho cord, thatch, or ki leaf, from the land on which they live, for their own private use, but they shall not have a right to take such articles to sell for profit. The people shall also have a right to drinking water, and running water, and the right of way. The springs of water, running water, and roads shall be free to all, on all lands granted in fee simple; provided, that this shall not be applicable to wells and water-courses, which individuals have made for their own use. Id., HRS § 7-1 (1976). [11] In construing this statute, the court articulated two standards: one for developed land, and one for undeveloped land. Id. at 8, 656 P.2d at 750. The court held that there is no right to exercise native Hawaiian practices on developed land because it would so conflict with understandings of property, and potentially lead to such disruption, that we could not consider it anything short of absurd and therefore other than that which was intended by the statute's framers. Id. at 8-9, 656 P.2d at 750. Second, for undeveloped land, the court instructed that land use should be determined on a case by case basis, and that traditional rights should in each case be determined by balancing the respective interests and harm once it is established that the application of the custom has continued in a particular area. Id. at 10, 656 P.2d at 751 (emphasis added). In Kalipi's case, the court did not proceed to the balancing test because it held that the statutory provisions he cited did not protect the rights of non-residents of an ahupua'a. Id. at 9, 12, 656 P.2d at 750, 752. Kalipi also cited HRS § 1-1 as a source of his right of entry. At the time of Kalipi's case, that statute provided: The common law of England, as ascertained by English and American decisions, is declared to be the common law of the State of Hawaii in all cases, except as otherwise expressly provided by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or by the laws of the State, or fixed by Hawaiian judicial precedent, or established by Hawaiian usage. . . . HRS § 1-1 (1955). [12] The court determined that this provision sought to permit native Hawaiian practices which did not unreasonably interfere with the spirit of the common law. 66 Haw. at 10, 656 P.2d at 751. The court again held that the practice must be considered on a case by case basis. This court has since read Kalipi as merely informing us that the balance of interests and harms clearly favors a right of exclusion for private property owners as against persons pursuing non-traditional practices or exercising otherwise valid customary rights in an unreasonable manner. PASH, 79 Hawai`i at 442, 903 P.2d at 1263 (emphasis added). Following Kalipi, the next main case to consider native Hawaiian rights was Pele Defense Fund v. Paty ( PDF ), 73 Haw. 578, 837 P.2d 1247 (1992). In that case, PDF, a non-profit corporation whose stated purpose is to perpetuate Hawaiian religion and culture, challenged the constitutionality of a land transfer in which the State traded public land, including the Wao Kele `O Puna Natural Area Reserve, in exchange for land that had been privately held. Id. at 584, 837 P.2d at 1253. PDF asserted, among other claims, that the transfer violated Article XII, § 7 of the State constitution because it denied access into Wao Kele `O Puna for PDF members who wished to exercise their traditional practices. Id. at 613, 837 P.2d at 1268. In analyzing this claim, this court first distinguished the residency requirement holding of Kalipi because Kalipi's claims had been based on a claim of ownership, while PDF's claims were constitutional and founded in custom. Id. at 618-19, 837 P.2d at 1271. After determining that the constitutional provision at issue was intended to protect the broadest possible spectrum of native rights, the court held that it may protect rights that extend beyond the ahupua'a of residence because the purpose of Article XII, § 7 was to reaffirm  all rights customarily and traditionally held by ancient Hawaiians. Id. at 619-20, 837 P.2d at 1271-72 (emphasis in original). The court limited practices on others' ahupua'a to situations where such rights have been customarily and traditionally exercised in this manner. Id. at 620, 837 P.2d at 1272. The court remanded, and wrote that in addition to proving that the practice is traditional and customary, PDF must also show that it meets the other requirements of Kalipi.  Id. at 621, 837 P.2d at 1272. In a subsequent case, PASH, this court identified the other requirements as referring to the requirements that the land be undeveloped and that the activity cause no actual harm. PASH, 79 Hawai`i 425, 439-40, 903 P.2d 1246, 1260-61. The question presented in PASH was whether Public Access Shoreline Hawai`i, a public interest organization, had standing to participate in a contested land use case hearing regarding a proposed development on the island of Hawai`i. Id. at 429, 903 P.2d at 1250. This court held that the group had standing to participate in such a hearing, and proceeded to articulate the constitutional analysis for the case on remand. Id. at 435, 903 P.2d at 1256. First, the court noted that the constitutional protection is not absolute; it only protects the reasonable exercise of native Hawaiian rights. Id. at 442, 903 P.2d at 1263. Then, the court pointed out that the constitution gives the State the power to regulate the exercise of customarily and traditionally exercised Hawaiian rights, and that the same provision obligates the State to protect the exercise of those rights to the extent feasible. Id. at 450 n. 43, 903 P.2d at 1271 n. 43. A common thread tying all these cases together is an attempt to balance the protections afforded to native Hawaiians in the State, while also considering countervailing interests. In the criminal context, one countervailing interest of particular importance, and explicitly stated in the constitutional provision, is the right of the State to regulate such rights. In the first case examining the native Hawaiian privilege as a defense to a criminal conviction, State v. Hanapi , Alapai Hanapi was convicted of trespass after he entered his neighbor's land to observe the restoration of the Kihaloko and Waihilahila fishponds. 89 Hawai`i 177, 178, 970 P.2d 485, 486 (1998). Hanapi argued that his trespass was constitutionally protected because he went to the property to perform our religious and traditional ceremonies of healing the land and to make sure that restoration was done properly. Id. at 181, 970 P.2d at 489. The court articulated the three-point test, holding that a criminal defendant asserting this privilege as a defense to criminal charges must, at minimum, prove the following: (1) the defendant must be native Hawaiian according to the criteria established in PASH [13] , (2) the claimed right must be constitutionally protected as a customary or traditional native Hawaiian practice, and (3) the conduct must occur on undeveloped property. Id. at 185-86, 970 P.2d at 493-94. The court affirmed Hanapi's conviction, holding that Hanapi did not satisfy his burden to prove that he was engaged in a traditional practice while on his neighbor's land. Id. at 187, 970 P.2d at 495.