Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 28, Number 1, 1 January 2011 — CHAMPION OF JUSTICE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

CHAMPION

OF

JUSTICE

BY Kathy Muneo Along career, a long life ended all too suddenly when Senior U.S. District Judge Samuel Pailthoipe King died two days after a fall on Dec. 5 at the age of 94. With his passing, Native Hawaiians lost not only a ehampion of justice but a caring yet fiery soul who would just as soon stand up against a behemoth as stand up for the most fragile of life. "Your inihal reaction to Sam was here's a guy who's eonfident of himself and confident of his plaee in the world and was aware of the inhuenee he might have over people's lives and their thinking," says retired state Intermediate Court of Appeals judge andformer Office of Hawaiian Affairs Trustee Walter Heen, who knew King for 54 years. But, Heen says, "He's actually a very warmperson." King, Heen, Gladys Brandt, Monsignor Charles Kekumano and University of Hawai'i law Professor Randy Roth wrote the Broken Trust essay published in the Honolulu Star-BuUetin in 1997 - a scalding criticism of Kamehameha Schools/Bishop Estate (KSBE) Trustees and how they were selected that catalyzed major change. In reaction to its ramifications, King said, "The oatmeal hit the fan," recalls Heen. The state launched an investigation of KSBE three days after the essay was published. Two years later, all five KSBE Trustees resigned or were removed. "He (King) was satisfied with the fact that the Trustees were ousted," says Heen. "None of us were satisfied that the Supreme Court justices didn't suffer more than criticism." The justices had been selecting the Trustees, but now a state Probate Court judge selects them based on recommendations from a court master and Trustee selection committee made up of eommunity members. One of King's rulings as a judge also had a significant impact on KSBE, a major landowner in Hawai'i, as well as on many Hawai'i homeowners. He upheld the state's 1967 Land Reform Act, allowing leasehold tenants to purchase the fee-simple interest in the land under their homes. And when Heen is asked how he feels King's rulings affected Native Hawaiians, he immediately points to "the palila bird case" as a showcase of King's philosophy, "his understanding that this is a special plaee with special rules

that need to be applied to ordinary situations." In 1979 King ruled that the palila, an endangered Hawaiian honey creeper, could sue the state for not protecting it from wild sheep and goats, whieh are a threat to its habitat on Mauna Kea. King ordered the state to permanently remove the sheep and goats in the area and he continued to protect the palila through subsequent rulings over following decades. An interview on PBS Hawai'i's Long Story Short also proved revealing of King and his eoneem for Hawaiians. King said "... I'm really a backer of OHA, because that's one plaee where they ean protect the future for our Hawaiians. And I interpret Hawaiian as real Hawaiians; not like me. What do I have; three-sixteenths? You know, I got an eighth from my mother and a sixteenth from my father; three-sixteenths. I'm not talking about myself. Although emotionally, I'm with them. And naturally, I'm an official of the federal government too." King was born in China to Pauline Nawahine'okala'i Evans and Navy officer Samuel Wilder King, who would heeome governor of the Territory of Hawai'i and a Bishop Estate Trustee. King grew up in Windward O'ahu, graduated from Punahou School and earned his bachelor's and law degrees at Yale University. He was an attorney in Hawai'i and a Japanese translator during World War II, having had attended Japanese school. He was appointed to the District Court in 1956, Circuit Court in 1961, ran unsuccessfully for governor in 1970, losing to John A. Burns, and in 1972, President Richard Nixon nominated King to the U.S. District Court. Heen says he, King and Roth still met monthly, always at Zippy's, and King always ate pancakes, Portuguese sausage and egg. "It was fun, commenting on puhlie affairs of the moment, talking about perhaps we might do something, put out another paper regarding certain things." Heen wouldn't elaborate except to say that some of those "things" did have to do with Kamehameha Schools. They last met about a week before King's death, King still making Heen laugh with his "very sharp wit" and still fighting for what's just andright. "I don't think Sam ever lost that fire, ever in his life." ■ Kathy Muneno is a Contributing Writerfor Ka Wai Ola. She is a weekenā weather anchor at KHON2.

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Samuel P. King Apnil 13, 1916 - Dec. 7, 2010

H / ■ Aui./'.nn' \ i \ > x*_ Federal Judge Samuel P. King in his chambers in July 2009. - Photo: Courtesyof Honolulu Star-Advertiser