Hawai’i residents, Hawaiian and non-Hawaiian alike, are being inundated with headlines regarding the Supreme Court ruling in Rice v. Cayetano. The headlines, to a large extent, couch the ruling as a win-lose scenario. When in fact it is not. Simply
Hawai’i residents, Hawaiian and non-Hawaiian alike, are being inundated with
headlines regarding the Supreme Court ruling in Rice v. Cayetano. The
headlines, to a large extent, couch the ruling as a win-lose scenario. When in
fact it is not.
Simply stated, the ruling finds that it is unlawful to
limit elections of state officials to one racial segment of Hawai’i
residents.
The Office of Hawaiian Affairs is a state agency. There are no
if, ands, or buts about that. More plainly, OHA is a social service
agency.
If you believe that Hawaiian sovereignty is embodied in a state
agency, then without question, the Rice ruling is a strike at the heart of
Hawaiian sovereignty.
If you believe that OHA is a state agency charged
with providing social programs for the betterment of Hawaiians, and is not the
entity that represents Hawaiian sovereignty, then the ruling is not a strike or
set back.
Hawaiian sovereignty, the ability to be self-governing, the
ability to set our own destiny, is a journey. It is not a destination,
somewhere we arrive and then it is pau.
Self-governance is achieved in
degrees; sovereignty is exercised and achieved in degrees.
The Rice ruling
says very loudly and very clearly that the exercise of Hawaiian sovereignty,
within a state agency, is limited, and frankly, it is insufficient for our
people.
The task at hand is to make the journey for sovereignty at the next
level—the federal government of the United States of America. This is not an
abandonment of OHA, or the trustees.
We must seek federal recognition of
an autonomous Hawaiian nation, whatever that constitution may be, while
supporting and maintaining OHA as a state social agency.
The Rice ruling
is a call to Hawaiians, an invitation to Hawaiians to seek recognition of our
sovereignty rights, not from the halls of the state Capitol, but from the halls
of the U.S. Congress.
Robin Danner
Project Hawaiian Justice
