| This story has been corrected. See below. |
A federal panel hearing opinions on a possible relationship with a potential Native Hawaiian government has heard the passion pouring out over two days of testimony, a Justice Department official said.
Sam Hirsch, acting attorney general for the Justice Department’s environment and natural resources division, began the third in a series of 15 islandwide hearings Tuesday night by saying, "We’re hearing a lot of passion."
The federal government’s 1893 overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy, Hirsch told the capacity crowd at Nanaikapono Elementary School in Nanakuli, is "not a happy history — we understand that deeply — going back more than a century to the illegal overthrow. We hear you, and we hear the pain that has caused. But we are here focused on the future … about how we can be helpful, if at all, in making a better future."
Hirsch’s comments followed the first two meetings on Oahu on Monday — one at the state Capitol and one in Waimanalo — that were dominated by speakers who sometimes politely and often angrily told the six federal officials to go home and leave the organization of a Native Hawaiian government up to Hawaiians.
Rhea Suh, assistant secretary for policy, management and budget for the U.S. Department of the Interior, told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser before Tuesday’s meeting that she and Hirsch have represented the federal government in Alaska and on Native American lands, where they have heard similar strong emotions.
Following the first two meetings on Oahu, Suh said, "the outpouring of emotions and intensity wasn’t surprising. They were deep-seated emotions."
The officials are in the islands to hear testimony about whether the Department of Interior should begin a process that could set the framework to re-establish a government-to-government relationship with Native Hawaiians.
At the beginning of Tuesday night’s three-hour session, 125 people signed up to speak, and most pushed back against any efforts to have the U.S. government involved in a sovereign Native Hawaiian government of any form.
But Melva Aila, wife of state Land Board Chairman William Aila, expressed a minority view to the panel in favor of starting a process that could lead to a federal relationship with a future Native Hawaiian government.
If such a relationship improves education for Native Hawaiian children and helps seniors, among other positive results for Hawaiians, Aila said, "Then I say yes."
Before the comment portion of Tuesday’s session even began, Kamahana Kealoha of Nanakuli typed the word "farce" onto his iPad and held it up for the audience.
To reinforce his point, Kealoha repeatedly yelled out "farce" from the audience as yet another speaker told the panel to leave.
"This is a belligerent occupation," Kealoha yelled.
DeMont Conner of Nanakuli spoke at the first two sessions and on Tuesday repeated the sentiments of many speakers packed inside Nanaikapono.
"We have no reason to trust what you’re doing," Conner told the panel. "If I have true self-determination, then I have the ability to tell you to pack up your stuff and leave."
He asked the officials to go back to Washington and instead exercise the federal government’s ability to investigate.
"There was a crime committed upon my people," Conner said. "Investigate that."
Suh told the Star-Advertiser that many of the comments have been nuanced and reflect "many different types of issues."
In addition to two weeks of public sessions on all of the major islands, there will be a 60-day period for people to provide written comment, which began last Thursday.
Suh told the Star-Advertiser that written comments are likely to express other points of view.
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CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story and an accompanying photo caption misstated the location of Nanaikapono Elementary School. It is in Nanakuli, not Waianae.
