Document 1.
Question 1
The author’s goal is to end hostilities between landowners and residents. He thinks that everyone is to blame and that they should collaborate to find a resolution. He is also of the opinion that the law enforcement should be called in to remove the land grabbers from the premises. Land grabbers should shoulder the burden for the bloodshed they provoked. First, they started trespassing on neighboring properties by tearing down fences and occupying unclaimed territory.
What followed was a period of widespread bloodshed. The people also bear some of the responsibility for the violence because of how they have responded to it. They haven’t come together to figure out a solution, and landowners have continued to expand their holdings as a result. The author maintains that a joint effort between the parties is required to reach a satisfactory conclusion. He also thinks the government should intervene to force the land grabbers off the property. When the fighting finally ends, the people may finally rest in peace.
Question 2
As thus, the author’s argument fails. Landowners keep getting what they want because the populace stands idly by and lets them. This is due to the fact that the author does not provide a workable resolution for all concerned parties. People want to prevent land grabbers from continuing to seize land. The author proposes that the landowners be forced out of their homes by the courts.
This would put an end to the fighting and restore calm to the community. Yet neither the land grabbers nor the displaced citizens are eager to give up their newfound territory. It’s imperative that all parties involved come together to find a way to end the fighting. The author’s argument fails because he does not provide a solution that can be accepted by all parties.
Question 3
Those who oppose the land grabbers are known as the White Caps. They think the land grabbers should be stopped since they are responsible for the violence. Those who have helped landowners expand their holdings are also targets of their hostility. The White Caps are of the opinion that a resolution can only be reached via collaborative effort from both parties. They also think the government should intervene to force the landowners to leave. Hopefully this will put an end to the fighting and restore calm to the community.
The White Caps’ counterargument falls flat. The settlers have long allowed land grabbers to encroach on their territory. This is due to the fact that the White Caps don’t provide a compromise that can be accepted by both parties. Both the people and the land grabbers are intent on continuing their land acquisition strategies. There can be no end to the fighting unless the parties involved get together to find a compromise. Since the White Caps don’t provide a compromise that would work for all parties, their argument falls flat.
Document 2.
According to this article, Recent complications in the Hawaiian Islands have been caused by a small number of residents motivated by their own self-interest. These individuals, almost all of whom are not native to the islands and many of whom are aliens, have attempted to involve our government in the domestic affairs of a peaceful but weak nation. A claim that the Hawaiian monarchy under the reign of Queen Liliuokalani was a semi-barbaric regime with no solid or moral foundation, dead in everything but its vices, coarsely luxurious in its tastes and wishes, constantly sending out impure exhalations, and spreading social and political demoralization across the islands, provided the justification for the intervention. In his scathing attack on the monarchy after he left the islands, the late Minister Stevens claimed that the Queen had maintained scandalous and immoral relations with one of her ministers. Given this alleged flaw in the Hawaiian government, an appeal is made to the moral conscience of the American people to legitimize the overthrow of the current administration in favor of what its supporters have dubbed “a Christian government,” by which we can assume they mean a government whose leaders are Christians.
The interim administration that was set up was based only on the so-called “great mass assembly” of January 16, at which little more than sixteen hundred people were present. This assembly established a committee of public safety that afterwards declared itself the temporary government. There was no attempt to get the town meeting’s stamp of approval on this interim administration. The marine forces aboard the United States steamship Boston, which was anchored in the harbor at the request of the committee of public safety and the American minister, were landed and stationed at such points as the American minister, acting in conjunction with the provisional government, directed. Without them, the government would not have survived for even an hour. The amazing revolution in the Hawaiian Islands was won while these American armed soldiers stayed ashore in Honolulu for 75 days. Whatever its flaws, the Hawaiian government was not established with a bayonet; the entire armed forces of the queen numbered less than a hundred men and served primarily as a police or constabulary force to keep the peace in and around the city of Honolulu’s public buildings. The presence of U.S. troops alone was enough to destabilize the regional authority. Queen Elizabeth II has written an appeal to the President of the United States in which she explains that she surrendered to the superior forces of this government in order to avoid conflict and that she has faith in the justice of our government to restore her to her rightful position once all the facts are known.
According to me, the form of government that may or may not be in place on the Hawaiian Islands has nothing to do with the citizens of the United States. Equally unimportant to them is whether or not the government treats its citizens and subjects fairly. Hawaiians have the final say on whether or not their government is decent and just. Neither monarchy nor republicanism can claim divine authority in this world. The right of the people to govern themselves is the very essence of divinity in these situations.
It is worth noting in this context that American minister Mr. Blount, in his report to this government summarized by Secretary Gresham, states that while in Honolulu he did not meet a single annexationist who expressed a willingness to submit the question of annexation to a vote of the people, and that he also did not speak with one on that subject who did not insist that if the Islands were annexed to the United States, suffrage should be I have personally discussed this issue with the interim government’s Washington representatives on multiple times, and I have specifically asked why steps were not made to ask the people of Hawaii whether they wished to keep the provisional government or be annexed to the United States. Everyone I asked said the islanders couldn’t handle running their own government, and that if the matter were put to a vote, the majority would be against independence. The people of Hawaii have not been asked their opinion on this matter. They are not responsible for the formation of the so-called provisional government and they do not recognize it. Usurpation, which without the presence of the overwhelmingly powerful United States armed forces could have had no de facto existence, to say nothing of a rightful existence.
Document 3.
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