Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 24, Number 10, 1 October 2007 — Hawaiian recognition supporters are the mainstream majority [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Hawaiian recognition supporters are the mainstream majority

By the time you read this article, the U.S. Civil Rights Commission road show will have eome and gone, with the national group poised now to rely upon any recommendation against the Akaka Bill as further grounds to demonstrate that the people of Hawai'i object to racial discrimination by Hawaiians against all others. More accurately, should the loeal committee find the bill discriminatory, it will be the recently appointed majority of its members - consisting of some of the harshest, most strident critics and opponents of the bill in the United States - who will have decided on behalf of us all. It will be a travesty of justice should this occur, and, just as last year, the Senate opponents and administration will undoubtedly use the commission's adverse findings to argue against the bill. I know this will not disappoint those who rail against the bill because it is too little too late, even though the reason for their opposition is totally opposite the commission's. Yet the two blindly join forces to defeat the mainstream Hawaiians who are merely seeking to preserve what they have today, including their identity as a distinct indigenous people and Congress' recognition of them via bills providing assistance for so many Hawaiian needs. This unholy allianee of opposite purposes to defeat the popular middle ground smacks of the 'a'ama syndrome. Hawaiians on all sides need to realize that stopping Akaka will severely affect their ties to the land, the sea, their iwi and their 'ohana. Their sovereignty cannot ever be returned in any form unless we are successful in passing Akaka. Sure the state could recognize a Hawaiian government, but how long before the next lawsuit? With Akaka, Hawaiians ean defend themselves in the

federal courts. Kamehameha Schools, OHA, DHHL, numerous Hawaiian nonprofits and even private enterprises and farmers ean survive, and Hawaiian rights that are provided for in our state constitution, including access, gathering, burial, etc., ean be protected. For Hawaiians who buy the equal protection, everybody the same, civil rights, discrimination argument, the defeat of the bill may satisfy their principles of citizenship and eomplianee with the 14th Amendment, but they fail to recognize that this is a poliheal, not a civil rights, issue. If Indians and Eskimos are indigenous, and if they have received recognition from Congress as peoples who have had their homelands taken away from them, why shouldn't Hawaiians as an indigenous people also receive the same recognition? Have Hawaiians so assimilated into the rest of society that they cannot be recognized as a distinct people? One might just look at the homeless, the imprisoned, the indigent, the unemployed, the less educated and ill to see that Hawaiians are not assimilated. Have the Hawaiian societies and organizations not continued to exist as distinctly Hawaiian? Has 'Ōlelo Hawai'i not been revived and recognized as an official language of Hawai'i? Has Kamehameha Schools not continued to perpetuate the Hawaiian people through education? Has Congress itself not recognized Hawaiians as a people deserving of help in numerous areas, with Hawaiian Homes leading the way, followed by aid in education, heahh, housing, legal issues, employment, etc.? And have the people of Hawai'i not recognized the uniqueness and importance of its indigenous peoples as reflected in its constitution and laws? With the recent Ward Research poll concluding that a significant majority of Hawai'i's people, including Hawaiians, favor recognition of Hawaiians by Congress, and roughly 20-25 per cent are opposed, with a small percentage clueless, Hawaiians should stand together with non-Hawaiians for passage of the Akaka Bill and preservation of the Hawaiian people. E3

LEO 'ELELE ■ TRUSTEE M ESSAGES

Bnyd P. Mūssman TrustEE, Maui