The happy hawaiians are not the ones who are pushing for sovereignty.

Actually, I thought the term happy hawaiians was kind of an unfortunate stereotype that Hawaiians don’t much like. But then I see there is a band called The Happy Hawaiians. Tongue in cheek, perhaps? Just how popular is the idea of sovereignty?

Oh, quite popular among the activists, most of whom haven’t really thought it through.  There’s probably a hard core of a thousand, with a herd of ten thousand or so behind them (I’m probably overestimating a little).  It’s hard to tell, because there hasn’t been a referendum, and when you point out that when the statehood vote took place it got 95%, meaning a lot of Hawaiians voted for it, the activists get huffy.

That’s part of what the Akaka bill was about; it was meant to give Hawaiians full recognition by the Feds, similar to Native American tribes.  It failed on a cloture vote back in June or July.

But there’s a lot of fuzzy thinking going on in that bunch.  The US military isn’t gonna go away.  The 750K of us who aren’t Hawaiian own land and property.  The newly-sovereign state wouldn’t have the kind of tax revenue needed to buy us all out, and I don’t think a Zimbabwe-like land grab would go over real well.  Also, there are a lot of Federal benefits like Social Security, Disability, food stamps etc. that their community collects.  Presumably that would go away too.

I think there must be fuzzy thinking going on because I’m having a hard time understanding exactly what it is they want other than “sovereignty”. It almost sounds as if their aim is to turn Hawaii into one big reservation, especially if they are looking for recognition from the Federal government. That’s not somewhere they probably want to go.

The most militant don’t want a reservation; what they want is to return to the 19th century politically but with all the mod-cons of the 21st.  They want their monarchy back (presumably with a representative parliament).

What the militants really want is power.  Most of them are fairly easily ignored, which bothers them.  What’s annoying to me is that the same people who are the most strident are the ones that—surprise!—got all through school on Federal grants and now work for public entities like the University.  I keep thinking, “er, how do you reconcile all the government paychecks with your anti-government stance?”

So, how does the Akaka bill fit in? It doesn’t sound as if it was attempting to establish sovereignty, though some kind of separate governing entity. Mainly it seemed to be looking for recognized indigenous status of Native Hawaiians with full Federal benefits. If the sovereignty people want their own monarchy why would they care if they have Federal recognition? Or is that supposed to be a stepping stone toward total sovereignty?

The latter.  There was some disagreement within the groups (there are several) about whether to support Akaka or not.  The Senator’s intent was to establish recognition, thus eliminating several ongoing lawsuits which question the racial component in determining admission to a school funded by Princess Bernice Bishop’s estate (it’s all-Hawaiian now), and others which question why taxpayers should fund an Office of Hawaiian Affairs which exists to funnel money to Hawaiians wanting to homestead land.  And lots more.  It’s very complicated, and I don’t claim to be an expert.

A blood quota? That’s controversial territory among indigenous people.

I can’t blame Hawaiians from wanting recognition and redress from the wrongs committed against them. Unfortunately, time marches on and it can’t go back. Militants make it difficult for “outsiders” to see the value in the protection and preservation of indigenous cultures. It’s been the same story with Native American militants who, while doing a great deal of good, also manage to turn off a lot of the people they need for support and action. And there’s the infighting as well.

None of the indigenous issues are easy and all of them are complicated.