Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 12.djvu/497

OUR NEW POSSESSIONS. A77 mainland Is only separated from Asia by about fifty miles of water, at Behring Straits. And then our Aleutian archipelago continues out under the continent of Asia, into the longitude of New Zealand. This acquisition shifted the geographical middle of our country so as to place it some way out in the Pacific Ocean. And now we reach the recent and pending cessions. The Hawaiian Islands have now, six months ago, been added to our territories. They are 2100 miles out in the ocean, southwesterly from San Francisco, in the latitude of Puerto Rico and Cuba, and In the longitude of the western mainland of Alaska. Having failed In accomplishing this annexation by a treaty, the promoters of It secured the result, after the example of Texas, by a joint resolu- tion, during the war with Spain and as an incident to it. The res- olution is simply the acceptance of an unconditional offer from Hawaii. In the language of the resolution, " Said cession is accepted ; . . . the said Hawaiian Islands and their dependencies are hereby annexed as a part of the territory of the United States and are subject to the sovereign dominion thereof." Till Congress provides for their government they are under the President's supreme control. A few temporary provisions only, as to customs, treaties, and immigration, are made in the resolution. No promise of becoming a State has been made, and no assurance as to the status or control of the population. The proposition now pending in Congress for the estabHshment of a territorial government In Hawaii gives these Islands the full status of a territory of the United States, under a governor and territorial secretary appointed by the President, with power in the governor to appoint the judges and other officers, with the consent of the territorial senate. The legislature is to be composed of a house of representatives elected by the people who are male citi- zens of the United States twenty-one years of age ; that Is, as It Is rather oddly expressed, ** all white persons, Including Portuguese and persons of African descent," and all of the Hawaiian race who were citizens of the Hawaiian Republic just before the transfer of the sovereignty to the United States ; and of a senate, elected by such persons as could vote for representatives, being also owners in their own right of real property In the territory of not less than $1000, and paying taxes for the last year, or being In receipt during that year of a money income not less than $600. The commissioners who have prepared a form of government for Hawaii Intimate an opinion that it cannot form a precedent for