Mr. Stevens to Mr. Blaine.
Honolulu, September 5, 1891.
Sir: The Hawaiian cabinet, with the approval of the responsible citizens and the Queen, is about to renew the effort for a revision of the treaty with the United States, and the aim will be to secure entire free trade, with the exception of opium and distilled liquors. Believing that such an extension of the trade relations would be beneficial to both countries, I will endeavor to condense what seem to me the chief reasons why such a treaty as proposed should be made and carried into effect with reasonable promptness. The present reciprocity treaty has been highly advantageous to this country, has largely developed its resources, added to its wealth, and much increased American interests and influence here. It is just to say that it has had a tendency to carry investments and business enterprise too exclusively in a single channel. The repeal of the sugar duty by the United States has struck the principal material product of Hawaii a very severe blow, and with the most favorable estimate it now looks as though bankruptcy must be the inevitable fate of more or less of the sugar-planting firms and corporations.
It is fair to state that a large proportion of the liberal profits of sugar-raising made under the present treaty while the United States maintained the sugar tariff recently repealed has been expended in starting new plantations, in the building of expensive mills, purchasing improved machinery, and securing expensive methods and means of irrigation. It is obvious enough that no probable legislation or treaties can give the production of sugar here the prosperity it has had in recent years. It is equally obvious that a more diversified industry, a more varied business and development, would be for the ultimate welfare and civilization of these islands whose resources are much greater than the present population and the general American estimate of them seem to indicate. But reconstruction of business, like reconstruction in architecture and in government, is expensive to those who make it, whether by choice or compulsion.
A new, enlarged, and liberal treaty with the United States would aid the present businessmen and holders of property here to parry the blow which the free-sugar policy of the United States has dealt their chief industry and means of commerce, and would tend to foster other agricultural products and commercial interests. A liberal and comprehensive policy, in the direction indicated, is absolutely necessary to save these islands from grave disaster and secure the American interests and influence here which our Government has so long held of vital importance. In default of such a treaty and policy, Americans and the sons of Americans, who reside and have their investments here, will be driven to California, to Oregon, and Washington, in the desire of benefitting their fortunes and of enjoying the full citizenship of the United States. Much as Americans may desire the rapid growth and great prosperity of these splendid Pacific States, whose great future is so wellassured, it is manifestly not for the best interests of the United States to have their population of business men increased by depleting these islands of those who are now the very best sentinels and supporters of American interests here. Bear in mind that the prospects and prosperity of the American Pacific States are becoming more and more attractive to Americans here, and it is no imaginary danger of which I speak.
[Page 351]It is also becoming more and more obvious that these islands are to be of commanding importance in the near future to American trade in the North Pacific. Great Britian, France, Germany, and Spain have taken possession of nearly all of the principal groups in the South Pacific and of the small isolated islands in the Central Pacific. If the Hawaiian group should slip from our control our national rivals would gain great naval and commercial advantage in the North Pacific, whose dominance fairly belongs to the United States. Nothing can be plainer than that it is our imperative duty to hold these islands with the firm resolution and the invincible strength of the American nation. To ignore their prospective value and to treat them other than with a liberal and fostering policy would be one of those blunders which justly have their place among the crimes of statesmen. Nothing should be done or neglected to be done, which would drive them into the control of England or Germany. At the present time the German plantation owners and the German commercial houses tend strongly towards the United States and want Hawaii to become an American dependency, and would even favor annexation. A majority of the English would yield readily to the same tendency if our Government should not hesitate.
The thrifty and prosperous Chinese merchants and property-holders are ready to follow the lines of their interests in the same direction. But coldness and neglect on our part could not fail to strengthen foreign political interests here to the future embarrassment and injury of the United States. The rapid decay of the native race of these islands now reduced to two-fifths of the inhabitants, and the increase of the foreign population, are tending to create new political and commercial contingencies and duties which can not be ignored, nor safely disregarded. A prompt and vigorous American policy would prove the safest and most economical in the end. A liberal and wise consideration of present exigencies and opportunities, the laying of a cable from San Francisco to Honolulu, and the opening of the Nicaragua Canal would make these islands a garden, with a population thrice its present numbers, with taxable resources enough to pay the expenses of their government and institutions, and help make Honolulu and Pearl Harbor impregnable with fortifications securely backed as they are by walls of highlands and mountains. Commercially and politically they can be rendered of more value to the United States than Malta and Cyprus are to Great Britain.
Napoleon’s axiomatical remark that “an army marches on its belly” has an equally forcible application to commerce as to war. Whether the agencies of transport are caravans, railroads, steamers or electrical forces, there must be feeding places, coaling stations, and storehouses. No thoughtful legislator or commercial agent with a good marine map before him, can fail to see that in the grand future now dawning on the Pacific, these islands will be of immense importance to the United States, and that necessarily and inevitably they must continue under the increased fostering care of the United States, or fall under foreign control. A niggardly, hesitating, and drifting policy towards them would be as unwise and unsafe as unstatesmanlike. There is certainly no possible objection to negotiating and carrying into effect a full free trade treaty with them, for the aggregate of their products would be relatively so small compared with the vast productive resources and requirements of the United States as to make little perceptible difference in American markets and prices.
[Page 352]Believing that the views I have herein expressed are in accord with much in the past course of the American Government and in harmony with the opinions of the President and of the Department of State, I submit them for what they are worth. As an American citizen, loving my country and caring for its welfare and its future greatness, I can say no less. As the official representative of the Government of the United States in these special circumstances I can properly say no more.
I am, etc.,