Committee of Safety (Hawaii)

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For other Committees of Safety, see Committee of Safety (disambiguation)

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Lorrin A. Thurston led the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawai'i through the Committee of Safety in 1893. He eventually appointed Sanford B. Dole to the office of president of the Republic of Hawai'i.

The Committee of Safety, formally the Citizen's Committee of Public Safety, was a 13-member council composed of American Hawaiian and European Hawaiian citizens, as well as American and European residents in Hawaii that planned and carried out the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi on January 17, 1893. Though this was not the first attempted coup d'état in Hawaiʻi, it was the one that succeeded.^{[citation needed]} The Committee of Safety was organized by the Hawaiian League, also known as the Annexation Club, a group of over 400 businessmen, merchants, and planters. The group's unofficial leader was Lorrin A. Thurston, the son of a missionary and publisher of the Honolulu Advertiser, a newspaper that is still published today. The goal of this group was to achieve annexation of Hawaiʻi to the United States. The new independent Republic of Hawaiʻi government was thwarted in this goal by the administration of President Grover Cleveland when he took office in 1893, and it was not until 1898 that the United States Congress approved a joint resolution of annexation creating the U.S. Territory of Hawaiʻi in 1898.

1 Revolution
2 International Response
3 Members of the Committee of Safety
4 See also
5 References

[edit] Revolution

On January 17, 1893 about 1500 members of the Honolulu Rifles, a militia composed of local citizens, occupied government buildings, disarmed the Royal Guard, and declared the Provisional Government of Hawaiʻi. As these events were unfolding, American citizens living in Honolulu expressed concern for their safety and property.^[1] United States Government Minister John L. Stevens, informed about possible threats to non-combatant American lives and property by the Committee of Safety,^[2] obliged their request and summoned a company of uniformed U.S. Marines from the U.S.S. Boston and two companies of U.S. sailors to land on the Kingdom and take up positions at the U.S. Legation, Consulate, and Arion Hall on the afternoon of January 16, 1893. 162 sailors and Marines aboard the USS Boston in Honolulu Harbor came ashore well-armed but under strict orders of neutrality. As U.S. troops marched past ʻIolani Palace on their way to their stations, they dipped their U.S. flag, as a sign of respect to the Queen. The sailors and Marines did not enter the Palace grounds or take over any buildings, and never fired a shot.^[3]

[edit] International Response

During the overthrow, the Japanese Imperial Navy gunboat Naniwa was docked at Pearl Harbor. The gunboat's commander, Heihachiro Togo, who later commanded the Japanese battleship fleet at Tsushima, refused to accede to the Provisional Government's demands that he strike the colors of the Kingdom, but later lowered the colors on order of the Japanese Government. Along with every other international legations in Honolulu, the Japanese Consulate-General, Suburo Fujii, quickly recognized the Provisional Government as the legitimate successor to the monarchy.^[4]

Every government with a diplomatic presence in Hawaii recognized the Provisional Government within 48 hours of the overthrow, including the United States, although the recognition by the United States government and its further response is detailed in the section above on "American Response". Countries recognizing the new Provisional Government included Chile, Austro-Hungary, Mexico, Russia, the Netherlands, Imperial Germany, Sweden, Spain, Imperial Japan, Italy, Portugal, Britain, Denmark, Belgium, China, Peru, and France.^[5] When the Republic of Hawaii was declared on July 4, 1894, immediate recognition was given by every nation with diplomatic relations with Hawaii, except for Britain, whose response came in November of 1894.^[6]

[edit] Members of the Committee of Safety

Henry Ernest Cooper Sr., arrived in Hawaiʻi 1890 from Indiana, named chairman at mass meeting January 14, 1893
Crister Bolte, German national, Hawaiian subject, member
Andrew Brown, Scottish national, member
Charles L. Carter, American, naturalized Hawaiian subject, member, died during 1895 counter-revolution
William Richards Castle, born in Honolulu 1849, attorney general for Kalakaua 1876, Hawaiian legislator 1878-88, member
John Emmeluth, American citizen, member
Theodore F. Lansing, American citizen, member
John A. McCandless, American, naturalized Hawaiian subject, member
F. W. McChesney, American citizen, member
William Owen Smith, born on Kauaʻi 1838, sheriff on Kauaʻi and then Maui, deputy attorney general and legislator 1878-1892, member
Edward Suhr, member
Henry Waterhouse, Hawaiian subject of Tasmanian birth, came to Hawaiʻi 1851, member
William C. Wilder, American, Hawaiian subject, member

[edit] See also

[edit] References

^ The Morgan Report, p808-809, "At the request of many citizens, whose wives and families were helpless and in terror of an expected uprising of the mob, which would burn and destroy, a request was made and signed by all of the committee, addressed to Minister Stevens, that troops might be landed to protect houses and private property.
^ The Morgan Report, p881, "Under the diplomatic and naval rules, which were and are imperative, the U. S. minister and naval commander would have shamefully ignored their duty had they not landed the men of the Boston for the security of American life and property and the maintenance of public order, even had the committee of public safety not requested us to do."
^ The Morgan Report, p367, "In landing the troops from the Boston there was no demonstration of actual hostilities, and their conduct was as quiet and as respectful as it had been on many previous occasions when they were landed for the purpose of drill and practice. In passing the palace on their way to the point at which they were halted, the Queen appeared upon the balcony and the troops respectfully saluted her by presenting arms and dipping the flag, and made no demonstration of any hostile intent."
^ The Morgan Report, p1106-1107, "The receipt of your communication, dated the 17th instant, inclosing a copy of proclamation issued on the same day, informing me that for reasons set forth in said proclamation the Hawaiian monarchy has been abrogated and a Provisional Government established, which is now in possession of the Government departmental buildings, the archives, and the treasury, and requesting me on behalf of H. I. J. M.'s Government to recognize said Provisional Government as the de facto Government of the Hawaiian Islands, pending the receipt of instructions from H. I. J. M.'s Government, to whom advices of your action and of the position which I have taken in relation thereto have been despatched."
^ The Morgan Report, p 1103-1111
^ Andrade, Ernest (1996). The Unconquerable Rebel. The University Press of Colorado, 147. ISBN 0870814176. "The provisional government, whatever its faults, had had little difficulty in obtaining recognition, even from Cleveland, and it was not considered likely that the republic would have any foreign problems. Recognition came even more quickly than it had in 1893, for at least there was no question of a revolution's having taken place or of the government's control of the domestic situation."