TODAYʻS THE LAST DAY TO HELP CHANGE THE NAME OF MCKINLEY HIGH SCHOOL
The McKinley High School name-change resolution HCR 26 (also HR 24) is scheduled to be heard TODAY, Thursday, March 24, at 2:00 PM by the House Education Committee.
Click here - http://TinyURL.com/McKinleyTestimony then click "SUBMIT TESTIMONY" at the very top of the page to submit your testimony supporting theses bills.
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Then go here - http://TinyURL.com/McKinley-Members to email individually each of the members of the House Education Committee and let them know you support HCR 26 (also HR 24)
PLEASE SUBMIT YOUR TESTIMONIES TODAY before 2 PM then contact and lobby committee members and let them know you want the McKinley name changed and the statue removed.
Hereʻs Hawaiian Patriot Leon Siuʻs testimony. Feel free to make your testimony like his -
HCR 26 HR 24 Testimony House Education Committee March 24, 2022 – 2pm
Testimony in SUPPORT of HCR 26 and HR 24.
From: Leon Siu
Aloha Chair Woodson, Vice-Chair Kapela and Members of the House Education Committee:
Today, the world expresses its outrage at the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Even Hawaii leaders have decried this destructive action.
But something similar happened here in Hawaii in 1893 when America invaded and in support of insurgents fomenting a regime change. But the world raised no objection. Then in 1898, led by President McKinley, America brazenly stole our country, and the world remained silent.
State of Hawaii leaders condemning the Russian invasion of the Ukraine have no moral basis to do so without first condemning America’s invasion and annexation of the Hawaiian Islands.
The legacy of President McKinley was that he led the US to commit brazen crimes against humanity: the Hawaiian people as well as Native Americans and the Filipinos. The sad thing is that and no world leaders or countries objected.
Today we are grappling with the truth of what happened in Hawaii. Ironically, one of Hawaiiʻs premiere schools stubbornly holds on to the name of President William McKinley honoring the historically disgraced U.S. leader. It would be as if 124 years from now, a school in Ukraine would insist in bearing the name of Vladimir Putin.
To elaborate:
1. William McKinleyʻs policies were driven by his white supremacist, racist beliefs.
He said annexing Hawaii was tantamount to a moral obligation because Hawaiians were too primitive and backward to be able to governing themselves. This was a cover for the real motives —more money, and power for the local white elites... and a strategic military base in the Pacific for the U.S.
President William McKinley was a major proponent of Manifest Destiny — the political doctrine that the United States is destined by God, to expand its dominion around the world. Thus, McKinley justified extending America’s power across the Pacific Ocean, even if it meant trampling the nationality, language, culture, health, lands and everything else that belonged to the Hawaiian people.
2. McKinley Acted Against the Hawaiians’ Love for Their Nation
No vote for annexation was ever conducted in Hawaii because Hawaiians strongly opposed annexation. In 1897, 39,000 Hawaiian nationals signed petitions categorically opposing annexation. This represented the will of over 80% of the adult population of the Hawaiian
Islands. The petition was delivered to Congress and it stopped the treaty ratification in its tracks. But President McKinley and his cohorts in Congress devised a way to skirt the law.
3. McKinley Faked Hawaii’s Annexation (1898)
After failing three times (once in 1893 and twice in 1897) to annex Hawaii by TREATY, McKinley and his cohorts in Congress, in July of 1898, resorted to passing a Joint Resolution (the Newlands Resolution) that purported to annex Hawaii, knowing a joint resolution had no legal power to annex a foreign country. Thus, white McKinley and white Congress deliberately collaborated with the white oligarchy in Hawaii to commit fraud to usurp the Hawaiian Islands, but making it appear legitimate.
The result of the usurpation/annexation displaced Hawaiians and robbed them of their identity, their lands, their homes, and their physical, psychological and spiritual well-being. It turned the Hawaiian Islands into an overseas colony, completely dependent on the U.S. for everything.
4. Schools Turned into Centers for American Indoctrination
In order for the widely despised and obviously illegal annexation to succeed, Hawaii’s children (whose parents a few years before had signed the anti-annexation petitions) were targeted for re- programming; to make them think of themselves as Americans, not Hawaiians. All school curricula were tailored to teach children to reject being Hawaiians and embrace being Americans.
The American indoctrination program has been in Hawaii’s schools for over six generations. It was so pervasive that until about 20 years ago, no student emerging from Hawaii’s schools had an inkling of the illegal overthrow and the illegal annexation. Today, 123 years after the U.S. takeover, the slanted, pro-America narrative is still being taught in most of Hawaii’s schools.
5. Honolulu High School renamed President William McKinley High School (1907)
A key component of the political indoctrination strategy was to change the name of the flagship, Honolulu High School, to President William McKinley High School, to cast him as a hero and icon for Hawaii. But today, McKinley is an icon of American fraud; a shameful contradiction to the noteworthy accomplishments of the school and its generations of illustrious students.
To continue honoring the President William McKinley ignores and condones the travesties he committed against the people and nation of Hawaii. For these reasons and more, the name of President William McKinley High School should be changed.
Mahalo a nui loa,
Leon Siu
