involving the surrender of enormously unequal sums of revenue, involving the surrender of inmensely larger volumes of home trade than are offered to us in return, and involving constitutional questions of the gravest character, are untimely, and should everywhere be regarded with disfavor."

Later, in speaking of the same subject, Mr. Morrill remarked: 30

"Such treaties are unrepublican in their origin and character, having been sternly and unanimously rejected by the earlier statesmen of our country, and because they obviously tend largely to the increase of the executive power by making Congress the obedient registers of its will."

This growth of hostile sentiment in America was, however, more than offset by pressure for closer relations with us due to the constantly increasing tendency of the Hawaiian Government to slip more and more into the hands of the so-called "missionaries" and of the American capitalists in the Islands. The annexation idea was, in fact, stimulated by the growing feeling in the United States that reciprocity of the Hawaiian variety was unjust. The planters saw that their differential advantage could not be defended on economic grounds, and they likewise foresaw the coming of a time when they would either have to surrender their claims or secure annexation to the United States. As a result of these facts, the political situation in the archipelago speedily developed to a very critical point. The antipathy of the natives who were revolted by the attempt to exploit their labor on the plantations, and who disliked the constantly increasing numbers of orientals, culminated in an "anti-missionary" movement which came to a head in 1886. This was followed by a reactionary revolution in 1887, set on foot by the sugar planters, it was supposed, but meeting with only partial success. Two years later occurred an effort at a native reaction, but this attempt met with total failure. The measure of power regained by the planters in 1887 partially reassured the annexationists, whose fears

so Ibid., p. 513.

were, moreover, quieted by the final exchange in the same year of ratifications of the new treaty with the United States. Curiously enough the passage of the McKinley act of 1890, in which the duty was taken off from raw sugar and the exceptional advantage enjoyed by the planters thus destroyed, almost coincided with a movement which again put the native party into control of the government. Thus a double impetus was a second time given to the annexation schemes of the planters. They not only feared native rule, but they suddenly saw their prosperity snatched away, in prospect at least, by the McKinley act. 31

The readoption of the Hawaiian treaty had carried it forward, of course, for a period of seven years subsequent to 1884, the date from which its life was reckoned, although, as we have seen, ratifications were not exchanged until 1887. The agreement would thus expire in 1891 and would then continue subject to abrogation on one year's notice from either party. When the McKinley bill came up for discussion in the House, it was feared by some that it would have the effect of abrogating the Hawaiian reciprocity arrangement, for it contained a clause repealing all acts and parts of acts inconsistent with the bill itself. Whether this would have operated as was feared is, of course, a legal question which could have been determined only by actual test before courts of law. The question, however, did not come to this acute stage, for a special bill designed to set aside any such fear by directly providing against it was presented. The clause of the McKinley bill from which difficulty was expected was the usual clause inserted in bills of all kinds and had no exceptional meaning. That such was the case Mr. McKinley himself bore evidence. On December 4, 1890, he introduced the bill just referred to, which was reported favorably by the Committee on Ways and

81 A review of the politics of the Hawaiian situation from the native standpoint may be found in the statement of the Hawaiian Patriotic League in Foreign Relations of the United States for 1894, pp. 916-919, etc.

Means on January 13, 1891. In recommending it, the Committee stated that "the purpose of this bill is to provide that the commercial treaty with the King of the Hawaiian Islands shall not be impaired by the act approved October 1, 1890." It also significantly hinted that:

"It is believed in some quarters that the act alluded to may abrogate the Hawaiian treaty. There are special reasons for the maintenance of the treaty at this time."

These special reasons were known to be the maintenance of the Pearl Harbor concession, which was of particular importance, in view of the annexation sentiment then so strong in Hawaii.

The bill came up for debate on February 16, 1891, and finally passed the House on the same day, when Mr. McKinley himself explained that:

"The only purpose of this resolution is to make certain that nothing in the tariff act of 1890 shall be held to impair the treaty which the United States has with the Hawaiian Islands."E

Thus, Congress did everything in its power to maintain our grasp upon the archipelago, while at the same time riding roughshod over the economic interests of the sugar planters in order to secure a basis for new reciprocity treaties, and at the same time to placate the sugar refining interests of the Atlantic coast, which had long regarded without envy the cheap and abundant supplies of raw sugar shipped from Hawaii to the Spreckels refineries in California.33

The fact that the McKinley bill admitted sugar free was, of course, a severe blow to the men who had been profiting so largely from the operation of the treaty. It placed sugar on the free list, as we shall see in a subsequent chapter, and

32 Congressional Record, 51st Congress, 2d session, p. 3620.

as The Bill itself read as follows: "Be it enacted, etc., That nothing in the act approved Oct. 1, 1890, entitled 'An Act to reduce the revenue and equalize duties on imports and for other purposes,' shall be held to repeal or impair the provisions of the convention respecting commercial reciprocity concluded January 30, 1875, with the King of the Hawaiian Islands, and extended by the convention proclaimed Nov. 9, 1887; and the provisions of said convention shall be in full force and effect as if said act had not been passed."

the duty it imposed on rice from other countries formed a very poor compensation for the differential advantage which had been enjoyed by the Hawaiian sugar producers. The planters, indeed, early protested most vigorously against the action proposed in the McKinley bill:

"In the opinion of all well-informed persons here," wrote Mr. Stevens, our Minister to Hawaii, to Mr. Blaine, then Secretary of State, under date of May 20, 1890," "to place sugar on the free list would be the virtual annulment of the reciprocity treaty and the destruction of the prosperity of the Islands. Thus it is easy to understand why there is so deep an anxiety among business men of Hawaii as to the present aspect of the sugar question in Congress. They clearly understand that it is a matter of life and death to the Hawaiian kingdom."

Enough has already been said concerning the effect of the McKinley act, with its treatment of sugar, upon the treaty as such. The real difficulty which troubled the minds of Hawaiian business men was, of course, no quibble over international law, but the other fact suggested by Mr. Stevensthat the new attitude towards sugar would destroy the prosperity of the Islands. The protest of the American interests in the archipelago availed nothing, and, as already indicated, the formal life of the agreement came to a close about a year thereafter.

As early as September, 1891, therefore, Minister Stevens reported a project for the revision of the reciprocity treaty, and late in the same year Mr. Mott Smith was appointed Special Envoy from Hawaii to the United States to negotiate such an agreement as would somehow restore the Islands to the favorable position they had lost.

Mr. Smith's mission proved to be without result. There was no way in which the sugar of the Islands could regain its former exceptional market in the United States, nor could Hawaiian producers enjoy the benefit of the bounty which

* Foreign Relations of the Unitel States, 1894. Affairs in Hawaii, p. 320.

we had accorded to our own planters, inasmuch as the Islands did not lie within our jurisdiction. It was this situation which in part led to the vigorous annexation movement that culminated in the revolution of 1892-1893. The time which had elapsed since the McKinley act had not, however, been long enough, nor had the suffering of the planters been sufficiently severe to produce such a movement unaided had there been no other causes for it. We have seen that annexation had long been a favorite idea with a large party in the Islands and with many persons in the United States. This sentiment was stimulated by the critical state of things produced or threatened by the treatment accorded to sugar in the McKinley act. Without going into the intricacies of Hawaiian politics, it is enough to say that on January 17, 1893, the Hawaiian monarchy was overthrown and a provisional government formed with Sanford B. Dole as President. The first act of the new government was to seek for annexation with the United States and a treaty to that effect was negotiated in Washington, February 14, 1893, but failed of ratification.35

It was evident, however, that offensive action on the part of Hawaii would be useless. It would have availed nothing to give notice of the termination of the reciprocity treaty. Moreover, the political situation had been changed by the election of President Cleveland in 1892, and the evident intention of his administration to abandon the idea of reciprocity. While the administration was favorable to free raw materials it was hostile to the idea of the sugar bounty, which had had so disastrous an effect on our national finance. Besides, a duty on sugar would be productive and would give a much needed relief to the Treasury, already so severely strained. It was not hard to foresee, therefore, that Hawaii stood a good chance of recovering her old position in the sugar market should she simply remain quiet and give no offense to the

35 Ibid., p. 197.