Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 18, Number 2, 1 February 2001 — Ceded lands [ARTICLE]

Ceded lands

There are many critics of natives benefiting from ceded land ineome, based on constitutionality. In the Statehood Act, Hawaiians were recognized as beneficiaries, but with a blood quanmm requirement. The 1959 Compact of Statehood was

based on the 1898 annexation caveat that ceded land ineome was to be used solely for the educational and public purposes of the inhabitants. Inhabitants are defined as permanent residents. Natives are permanent inhabitants because they have been in Hawai'i since time immemorial. With the failure of the terms of statehood being met via payment of ceded land revenues, would that mean that the terms of granting statehood are being violated? Why would natives have any interest or benefits from ceded lands? Because the federal government in 1898 realized that there was created in all the ceded lands a eommon and vested native interest in all Hawai'i's lands based on the 1848 Māhele. The Māhele designated three classes

of Hawai'i's 4.1 million acres. 1) the king or crown was allotted and received about 1 million acres, 2) the chiefs were allotted 1.6 million acres, and, 3) the people or tenants were allotted 1.5 milhon acres. While the king and chiefs received their allotments, the people only received 28,000 acres or less than one percent of their share of the Māhele. The attempts to reduce the ceded land ineome to natives does not reduce or impair the eommon and vested interests natives stUl possess in their homelands. Louis "Buzzy" Agard, delegate Native Hawaiian Convention

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