ight upon the progress and consummation of this
scheme of annexation. A very brief and imperfect reference to the facts
and evidence at hand will exhibit its character and the incidents in
which it had its birth.

It is unnecessary to set forth the reasons which in January, 1893, led
a considerable proportion of American and other foreign merchants and
traders residing at Honolulu to favor the annexation of Hawaii to the
United States. It is sufficient to note the fact and to observe that
the project was one which was zealously promoted by the minister
representing the United States in that country. He evidently had an
ardent desire that it should become a fact accomplished by his agency
and during his ministry, and was not inconveniently scrupulous as to the
means employed to that end. On the 19th day of November, 1892, nearly
two months before the first overt act tending toward the subversion of
the Hawaiian Government and the attempted transfer of Hawaiian territory
to the United States, he addressed a long letter to the Secretary of
State, in which the case for annexation was elaborately argued on moral,
political, and economical grounds. He refers to the loss to the Hawaiian
sugar interests from the operation of the McKinley bill and the tendency
to still further depreciation of sugar property unless some positive
measure of relief is granted. He strongly inveighs against the existing
Hawaiian Government and emphatically declares for annexation. He says:

In truth, the monarchy here is an absurd anachronism. It has nothing on
which it logically or legitimately stands. The feudal basis on which it
once stood no longer existing, the monarchy now is only an impediment to
good government--an obstruction to the prosperity and progress of the
islands.

He further says:

As a Crown colony of Great Britain or a Territory of the United States
the government modifications could be made readily and good
administration of the law secured. Destiny and the vast future interests
of the United States in the Pacific clearly indicate who at no distant
day must be responsible for the government of these islands. Under a
Territorial government they could be as easily governed as any of the
existing Territories of the United States. * * * Hawaii has reached
the parting of the ways. She must now take the road which leads to Asia,
or the other, which outlets her in America, gives her an American
civili