P. I. Pesos Here Tied Into Black Market of Manila        [print]

A drawer in a down-town office, stuffed to the top with Philippines bank notes, was reported this week as the most tangible local symbol of the Hawaiian phase of the Philippines black market in money.

Involved in the traffic are, reportedly, air lines employes, travel agents and even officials of the Philippines government. The peso-stuffed drawer, mentioned above, is in the office of a travel agency here which is said to conduct a high proportion of the sale of Philippines pesos for American dollars. Target for the operation is said to be high market price of U. S. dollars in the Philippines. Thus airlines employes, or regular travellers who are able to avoid Philippines customs officials, can buy dollars here at 2-1, or something close that figure, and sell them at a black market rate of as much as 4-1 in the Philippines.

Local targets for "the money traffic are returning Filipinos who are offered slightly more than 2-1 for their dollars. Such travellers are the best customers for pesos here, for upon their return, they will have to declare their money and change it at the official 2-1 rate. If they can make a better exchange here, they are eager to do so.

But when they actually get to the Philippines, some are angered to discover they might have had as much as 4-1 by taking a chance on the black market. "I changed $200 here," said one man who recently made a trip to the Philippines. "I made a big mistake. It is always better to hold onto your dollars as long as you can."

Although, as local authorities point out, there is nothing illegal about bringing money of any nation in any amount to Hawaii, the Philippines forbids ordinary outgoing travelers to bring more than $100.

Scandal In Manila Government officials are allowed $1,200 each and a current scandal in Manila is the disclosure that five members of the Philippines Congress have received allocations which allow two senators to bring $34,500 each and three other congressmen to bring $34,000, $20,000 and $10,000.

Local reports add that a number of persons travelling on official business for Manila have unloaded their pesos here in exchange for dollars, which will be more valuable in the Philippines.

"You can change money lots of places in town," said one man, pointing out, too, that anyone who has pesos and who is not travelling, prefers to change money with individuals, even at the official rate, for banks do not buy pesos at the official rate. Often their figure is as low as 40 cents a peso. New York banks are reported to pay only 20 cents.

On October 20, 1949, the RECORD published the first of a series of stories about death through the careless handling of dynamite and the lax practices which were constant hazards to life and property throughout the Territory. That campaign continued until Governor Stainback ordered an investigation—which brought recommendations for alterations in the laws governing use of explosives. July 1, a long step was taken toward correcting the practices exposed by the RECORD. Act 101 was passed this year by the legislature, and went into effect on that date. Here are some of the reforms effected by the new law: • Supervision of blasting is no longer under the Department of Public Works, but under the Department of Labor. (Formerly, a single powder expert, Frank Webster, was responsible for an blasting in the Territory—yet he had never been to the outside islands. He was responsible for a Territorial powder magazine at Hilo which he had actually never seen.)

"Dynamite men," to be licensed according to law, must be able to read, write and speak English and must pass written and oral examinations. (Formerly, there was no set examination and many of the 259 licensed men in the Territory had been given their licenses at the request of contractors, with informal examinations, if any.)

Dealers must make monthly reports of amounts of explosives on hand, amounts sold, and the names of the purchasers. Only licensed men are eligible to buy dynamite. Also, dealers must Store their explosives in Territorial magazines or in some private place approved by, the Territorial safety engineer. (Formerly, anyone could purchase explosives who got a police permit and police had no standard for granting permits.)

Violations of Act 101 bear a penalty of a $500 fine or six months in jail or both. (Formerly, the governor's investigation revealed, the law was so vague that it was illegal to shoot off firecrackers, but virtually impossible to prosecute offenders. Under the new law, for instance, Contractor J. M. Tanaka, on whose job one man was killed and two permanently injured in the Kaimuki Dynamite case of 1948, would be much more liable to legal action by the Territory. Under the old law, neither the attorney general nor the C-C prosecutor could find any grounds for bringing action against him, though evidence established that the explosion occurred under illegal circumstances.)

In this period of built-up hysteria, when fear stalks the land, when civil liberties guaranteed by the Constitution are trampled upon by those who gloat over the Taft-Hartley and the Smith Acts, Jack Kawano went to Washington to serve the notorious un-American committee.

In 25,000 apparently well-rehearsed words, he stoops to the role of a fingerman, smearing, fabricating and becoming a tool of one of the worst anti-labor, racist agencies we have in government.

Kawano ignores the role played by the ILWU membership in their achievements when he says the union is completely controlled by Communists. Everyone knows the tremendous gains in economic and social fields brought about in the Territory by the ILWU. This slighting of the rank and file members goes to show how far he has drifted away from them. At the same time, Kawano, in a backhanded manner, gives credit to the Communists for ail these gains by saying that they control the ILWU completely.

The officers of the various ILWU locals answered him: "We know of our own personal knowledge, that the ILWU involves the finest traditions of democracy. It is governed by the membership through its elected bodies, and will brook no interference or dictation from any outside organization."

Kawano says that he turned to the Communists when he and others tried to organize the longshoremen years ago. The employers wanted to smash all attempts to organize the dock workers and no civic or community organizations showed any signs of willingness to lend assistance.

While Kawano says, according to his testimony, that he found more than 10 years later that the Communists had motives other than the best interest of the workers in giving the longshoremen assistance, his dealings with the individuals he names show nothing of the alleged activities of Communists which are used in the usual Red scare and Red-baiting propaganda.

"Kawano's case is nothing new. The trade union movement is dynamic. As it progresses, some with ability go forward into positions of leadership, the same as in any other field. Others, some oldtimers, have been passed by, either because of lack of ability or by loss of militancy through the softening up process of employers and others, like politicians, who want to use the workers in achieving their own ends. Some labor leaders are thus captured, or bought out, and this, too, is an old, old story.

When a disgruntled former labor leader falls into the hands of anti-labor elements, like the notorious un-American committee, he is forced to name names, to smear and bring disrepute to individuals and in doing so, facts become unimportant.

Thus, the editor of the RECORD finds himself, in Kawano's testimony, attending "Communist" meetings in Honolulu in 1946 when he was actually serving in the army thousands of miles away in China. Also, as an army intelligence liaison officer, he was supposed to have been making contacts in China with the Japanese Communist leader, Tokuda, who was at that time, serving his 18-year sentence in prison somewhere in Japan for opposing the Japanese militarists.

Kawano's testimony is timed for the Lanai pineapple strike, the longshore wage stalemate and the current contract negotiations for 18,500 sugar workers. The employers are immensely pleased.

To serve the un-American committee, that has never done anything to benefit labor—the same committee that has led the attacks against minorities, including Nisei and their parents on the West Coast during the last war, means that Kawano has joined hands with anti-labor, racist elements. And he lets himself be used when workers are in crucial negotiations and on strike.

To say that he does labor a service is as illogical, and as far off the beam as to say that a man who is in China can be here at the same time.

We are familiar with the rise of labor to its comparative position of dignity in Hawaii—from days of contract labor and the blacksnake whip. We know of employer violence, of blacklisting and on the brighter side, of the gains made by the multitudes of working people.

The ILWU, which Kawano condemns as Communist-controlled, has done more for laborers here than any individual or organization attacking the ILWU. This is history.

Through participation in it, plantation workers have risen to positions of leadership, to sit across the bargaining table from employer representatives. This too, is history.

To say, as Kawano does, that workers have been duped into becoming leaders and duped to fight for better conditions is illogical and an insult to laborers who possess individual abilities.

Kawano's blast against the Honolulu RECORD comes as the third anniversary issue goes to press. This weekly has won consistent support, despite attacks of big employers and their fronts.

The majority of our readers have been with us for nearly three years. They are mature individuals, capable of making individual decisions, and as many of the greetings in this issue signify, they appreciate the role the RECORD plays in the island community.

"Fearless and Independent" is the RECORD'S slogan and this it shall continuously strive to be.

Because of the failure of the C-C Planning Commission to follow through on landlords' bonds for substandard housing along the Kalihi tunnel approach road, the city government may be stuck for the expense of moving the housing when time for construction of the road arrives.

George K. Houghtailing of the planning commission assumes the fault directly and he says: "We stipulated the bonds must be posted but we did not follow it up. We were at fault."

The oversight was revealed through investigations following the rent control violations of a Kalihi St. landlord. In the end, the oversight may work some temporary relief for the tenants of the rundown, battered barracks.

Hiroshi Arakaki and seven other landlords on Kalihi St. are operating illegally, the RECORD learned, having been granted three-year variances in 1946 which have expired long ago, along with extensions granted since and approved by the City Planning Commission.

Arakaki, who was convicted earlier this year of charging above-ceilling rents, may face similar charges again very shortly on evidence and allegations that he has continued to collect the illegal rent. In its first report, the Rent Control Commission found that he was overcharging in 27 of the 43 units he maintains at 1810 Kalihi St., in the buildings left in an abandoned army camp. The other seven landlords have not been accused of infractions of the rent control law.

Bonds Never Asked

There is some doubt that the variances, granted because of the post-war housing shortage, were ever legally established, since their provisions were never carried out; Article 4 of the variances granted the eight landlords requires that they post cash bond to guarantee that the buildings would be removed from the property at the end of the stipulated period.

But testimony gathered by Investigator Sam Harris of the C-C prosecutor's office early this year indicates that the Department of Buildings, which was responsible for obtaining the bonds, never broached the matter to the landlords at all.

Arthur Akinaka, present superintendent of buildings, said the matter was decided before his appointment and he does not know why the stipulated bond was never asked or posted.

Arakaki, who has reportedly boasted at City Hall that he has friends of the government powerful enough to keep him from suffering any serious consequences of his rent ceiling infractions, did indeed receive some courtesy at the hands of the Department of Buildings early this year.

At that time, Edward Fung of the department visited Arakaki's units along with a health official and investigator Sam Harris to determine whether or not the units should be condemned.

Fung Gave Okay

According to Sam Harris' report, "Other quarters designated to be allegedly questionable were inspected and found to be in as liveable condition as could be expected, as far as substandard units go, Mr. Fung said."

Although Arakaki and the other landlords have expressed themselves as eager to move the tenants off and terminate the situation, there is evidence that some have actually rented their units after the expiration of the variances.

Condemnation of the land occupied by these units would not necessarily mean the immediate removal of tenants now living there, though much of the land is almost certain to be condemned eventually for the approach road to the Kalihi tunnel.

Tenants might be allowed to remain because of the housing shortage until actual construction of the road begins, with the C-C government acting as their landlord. George K. Houghtailing, engineer of the City Planning Commission, confirms that precedent for such action has been established at a number of park sites and most recently along the mauka arterial.

"As has been emphasized again and again, the primary function of our plantations is not to produce sugar but to pay dividends."—R. A. Cooke, in Proceedings of the 49th Annual Meeting of the HSPA (1930)

Dairymen's Association has been giving pep talks to its driver-salesmen to boost sales, according to employes of the company.

Reason for the campaign, the same sources say, is the entrance of a new competitor in the milk business.

Refused To Join Pool

L. W. Campos, who has been shipping approximately 8,000 quarts of milk a day to Dairymen's, will distribute his own milk after this month as his contract to supply Dairymen's terminates.

The Kailua rancher had sharp differences with Dairymen's last year when he began negotiating for a new contract. Dairymen's wanted him to join the milk producers' pool which supplies the company. The producers do not know what price they will receive until the periodic accounting, which is based on payment on butterfat content of the milk brought by each dairyman.

Campos wanted a contract that specified a flat rate for his milk, saying he wanted to know how much he will be getting as he hauls his milk over the Pali.

Announced Plan Last Year

Failing to reach agreement, Campos announced in September of last year (RECORD, Sept. 7, 1950) that he was starting his own milk distributing firm.. At that time, some milk producers felt that Campos' entrance into the milk business might start a price war.

Recently, after Dairymen's had increased the price of milk two cents a quart, it instituted a homogenizing process and is selling homogenized milk at no extra cost. Campos, according to reports among dairymen, has sold stock in his new venture to merchants who would be sources of outlet for his milk supply. Divided Reaction

Before Campos decided to terminate his contract with Dairymen's, a couple of delegations of milk producers went to see him in an effort to persuade him to stay on with Dairymen's, join the pool and be satisfied with conditions others had accepted.

Milk producers had divided reaction when Campos decided to distribute his milk directly to customers. Some strongly condemned him for wanting special treatment, which was unfair, they said, while others felt such opposition to Dairymen's is good. Campos' 8,000 quarts a day comprised part of the 60,000 quarts Dairymen's handles daily, according to January 1951 figures. They compare with 10,000 quarts handled by Moanalua Dairy, Ltd., and 7,200 quarts distributed by Provision Co., Ltd. (Rico).

Jay Verner, taxi driver, was bound over Monday by U. S. Commissioner Harry Steiner, to the federal grand jury on charges of selling liquor without a license.

Chief witness against him was Jack B. Smith of the Honolulu police who testified that on June 17 he purchased a bottle of whiskey from Verner for $10. To Verner, as to close acquaintances on Maunakea St. where the driver operates from a stand, there is more significance to the case than meets the eye.

"If they actually got evidence on him then," asked one, "why did they wait five weeks to bring charges against him?"

Car Searched Before

Another, a Hawaiian, said: "It's not the first time the vice squad has been after him, even though he doesn't fool with stuff like that. Not so long ago, Shaffer was in his car searching it when he left it on the street for a moment."

Another time, Verner says, an officer told him while giving him a ticket for a minor traffic violation, "Your race is against you."

Verner is one of the very few Negro drivers operating in the city.

The taxi driver wonders if there may be some connection between the charge against him and an altercation he had a few nights before. Then a man in plain clothes kept asking the driver to "get him a woman," Verner says. Finally, because of the man's insistence, the driver was forced to be abrupt with him in order to discourage him..

Now Verner wonders if that "customer" may have been an officer on an undercover assignment.

When the driver asked police last week, on the night of his arrest, why there had been such a long wait between the time the evidence was allegedly gathered and his arrest, an officer told him. he says, "We know you're doing a lot of other stuff and we were waiting to get you on that, too."

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[The RECORD's campaign last year against unsanitary outhouses at Kahuku Plantation was branded "a good deal of loose talk" by outside sources in the company's bi-weekly newsletter which was distributed to employes Nov. 3. But one month later the "Kahukuan" said, the comany had been ordered by the board of health to get rid of the outhouse toilets. ]

Here is House no. 8 with occupant Uldarico Agbayani standing by the mew addition to his home with flush toilet facilities.

Some progress in sugar negotiations was reported this week by ILWU spokesmen, since negotiators have agreed to consider cost items and non-cost items separately.

It was significant, union men felt, that progress was made in discussions of the non-cost items —which do not require any increase of pay or other money outlay on the part of the companies.

The new attitude of the companies, more amenable to bargaining than in the first week, was interpreted by some union men as being the reflection of the resentment expressed by men on plantations against the earlier, uncompromising manner.

"But the boys are still storing up deposits of rice and other food-stuffs," said a union spokesman "They call it strike insurance."

Honolulu had a sit-down strike —or at least a sit-in strike—in March, 1937. Some twenty-five young women at the American Sanitary Laundry demanded that they receive 25 cents an hour instead of the 13 cents they were getting. Manager Alfred Magoon, after threatening to replace them with scabs, settled for 17 cents.

A Maui policeman who was demoted after differences with the department there, is still engaged in operating an illegal enterprise, according to reliable information. The enterprise has been going on for some time, but it was not the reason for his demotion.

* *

A Seattle woman, reading of the current drive by union and progressive groups against racial discrimination in places of entertainment, recalls how she participated in the same sort of drive in her home town. In the State of Washington, as in a number of other states, there is a law which forbids discrimination in any public places and makes violation punishable by a stiff fine. So the drive was one to see that the law was enforced. Mixed groups visited doubtful plates, gathered evidence and offered owners their choice of changing their policies or facing court. In the face of such a drive, discrimination disappeared quickly to a marked degree.

* *

The Washington law, incidentally, is not much different from the bill presented to the legislature in 1949 by the Hawaii Civil Liberties Committee. Opponents of such a measure here have always maintained that there is no discrimination and no need for such action. Then, the Star-Bulletin a few weeks ago, editorially excused the discrimination by some establishments by saying there are places where Negroes and other minorities can go if they wish. The same argument might be used in John Rankin's Mississippi to defend discrimination there. Or in Texas, from whence Riley Allen sprang.

* *

Is it a sign of the times? asks a lady, and she goes on to point "out that on two successive days the Advertiser has failed to capitalize "Negro." The days were July 27 and 28 and the stories were those relating to three union representatives who protested the manner in which local bars refuse service to Negroes and a story of a "spy" held by the Swiss.

"Negro" is capitalized always, of course, except in the most rabid of the Dixiecrat newspapers, and it has usually been capitalized in the Advertiser.

By "the times," the lady undoubtedly referred to recent outbursts of racism in Chicago and on the West Coast. * *

Chuck Mau, who received the thanks of Jack Kawano for assistance in testifying before the un-American Committee, may have been out to erase the smear talk which has allegedly kept him from being confirmed by the Senate judiciary committee. But if the opinion of Ed Toner, something of an expert in the lettersto-Washington department, Mau will never be confirmed. Toner is thinking of some other obstacle that might block Mau's appointment.

Toner still talks with much outward confidence of his chances to be Secretary of Hawaii, but he is also putting out feelers again to see if he might get to be C-C controller.

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Washington (FP)—William M, Boyle, Jr., Democratic national committee chairman, was linked to a $505,000 loan to a St. Louis print-Ing concern received from the Reconstruction Finance Corporation in 1949. The disclosure appeared in an exclusive St. Louis Post-Dispatch story.

The firm, the American Lithofold Corp., had been denied an RFC loan three times, but Was granted the first installment of the loan in 1949, shortly after it hired Boyle on a $500-a-month retainer.

Boyle issued a brief statement here saying he had represented the company only "in legal matters not connected with the company's application for an RFC loan."

American Lithofold is now being investigated by a federal grand jury in St. Louis in connection with $12,000 in fees it allegedly paid to James P. Finnegan, who recently resigned as collector of internal revenue in St. Louis. Finnegan and Boyle are close friends.

The Post-Dispatch story, charging that Boyle had received $8,000 in fees from American Lithofold, was read on the floor of the Senate by John J. Williams (R. Del.), who said: "These stories demonstrate how low the morals of this administration have deteriorated during the last five years."

Honolulu Harbor has been closed, by an order of the U. S. Coast Guard, to ships carrying more than 300 cases of dynamite.

The order, dated at Washington July 6, cited an explosion at South Amboy, N.J., May 19, 1950, in which more than 20 workmen were blown to pieces to such an extent that their bodies could not be identified. Chief local operation halted by the order was that of Gray, Cheeley & Graham, Ltd., a subsidiary of the Hawaiian-Dredging Co., which formerly imported dynamite which it unloaded at Pier 2.

Efforts of the company to change the unloading place to Pier 39, the Dillingham pier, were of no avail in the face of the Coast Guard order.

Since few, if any shipping lines care to handle consignments so small, a company spokesman told the RECORD, the order has the effect of closing the port to dynamite completely.

Two Choices

Alternatives suggested by the Coast Guard are:

1. Unload at Westloch, which is under Navy jurisdiction and would require permission.

2. Unload dynamite to barges in small quantities and unload again at the docks.

The company has not chosen either alternative. Unloading at Westloch would, a spokesman told the RECORD, double the freight cost because of the long haul to Honolulu.

Unloading to barges, the spokesman said, does not sound feasible.

"It sounds like the Coast Guard's way of saying 'no.' " he said.

In the meantime, with dynamite stores on Oahu getting low, the spokesman said, construction jobs will slow down and possibly even come to a stop altogether.

"The island is volcanic," the company man said, "and you can't even build a home here without blasting."

If a solution is not reached, the company man said, the future of construction on Oahu is not bright because if the unloading at West-loch and the subsequent hauling are found necessary, "it's the consumer who will finally pay the bill."

Parents of the Maemae school students did a remarkable job of lobbying for the $140,000 cafeteria but because they overlooked one step the appropriations bill must go through, they finally failed in their objective.

* *

The shortcoming was the failure to lobby in the governor's office. This happened, according to informed sources, because the parents took for granted that Governor Long, with his educator's background, would look favorably on such an urgently needed project. Governor Long vetoed the Maemae cafeteria but gave $400,000 for the auditorium at Farrington high school. Both should have gotten the facilities and the cafeteria the priority.

* *

It rains frequently in the Maemae school district off Nuuanu Avenue, and students who buy their lunches at the school kitchen and walk back to their classrooms get wet and slip on the ground, necessitating their purchasing another 15-cent lunch.

* *

Some parents feel that Governor Long was influenced by DPI and PTA elements who frowned upon the effective lobbying by the Maemae PTA members. The DPI wants the PTAs to work closely together with the department, but past experience has shown that schools in areas with higher income families get priority. Thus, parents of various neglected schools are forced to take independent action.

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"The big shots in Honolulu asked me to give protection to their ship." explained Sheriff Henry Martin after 73 of his Big Island police officers bayoneted, shot, gassed

and clubbed peaceful demonstrators, injuring 51, on Kuhio dock on August 1, 1938.

The members of the Hilo Chamber of Commerce were all smiles, and chortled: "Property rights had been preserved."

Felt the Bayonet

Down on the Hilo dock 13 years ago. 500 unionists, family members, friends and supporters, demonstrated against the scab-manned Waialeale. The Inland Boatmen's Union and the ILWU Local 1-37 had struck the Inter-Island Navigation Co. two months before.

About 10 a. m. the demonstrators were sitting down, watching the ship coming in to dock. Kai Uratani, a longshoreman, was sitting down also and toward him came Officer Charles Warren.

"Get the hell out of here!" barked the cocky officer.

Uratani later said he rose to move back, and as he turned, he felt "the point of the bayonet go through the left side of my back."

The first blood had been spilled.

All hell broke loose when at 10:15 Deputy Sheriff Peter Pakele gave orders to shoot.

Obeyed Honolulu "Big Shots" Officer Warren later said: "I was so excited I don't know what I did."

This same officer had thrown a tear gas bomb at Hilo longshoremen on July 22 when they had held a demonstration by the scab-manned Waialeale. The company cancelled the Hilo trip but the Hilo Chamber of Commerce wanted the scab ship to come in.

The "big shots in Honolulu" had given the order to the Big Island's elected sheriff to carry out the violence. And because the "big shots" controlled politics through their dollars, Martin did as he was told. He was told to spill blood and he did exactly that.

Historical Mile Post Thus "Bloody Monday" became a historical mile post.

Chairman Spencer of the board of supervisors said: "I was supposed to have a meeting with the sheriff and other officials before the actual shooting had started but the sheriff went and took things in his own hands." The trade union movement in the Territory's industries was young then. The militant longshore union in Hilo had come to life in September 1935.

By terrorism, violence, blacklisting and bribing, employers tried to destroy the fledgling unions.

Same Motives

Today, Hawaii's Big Five employers would let a $20 to $25 million in pineapple crop rot on Lanai in attempting to wreck the pineapple workers' union. What the workers are asking would cost the Hawaiian Pineapple Co. Ltd., about $64,000 a year.

Union strength has grown through numbers and experience in fighting for pork chops and better conditions. The employers use different tactics today, but their anti-union battle is cut out of the same cloth. "Bloody Monday" thus is part of the warp and woof that makes the tough fabric of Hawaii's organized, "and also unorganized, workers without whom no merchant or employer can survive in business.

[Sheriff Martin denied that Officer Charles Warren bayoneted Kai Uratani, Hilo longshoreman, but evidently the sheriff was too busy to make such observations. Here he is trying to make a getaway as he is trapped between bombs hurled by his officers.] For more info on the Hilo Massacre, check out CLEAR's website at http://www.hawaii.edu/uhwo/clear/Pubs/HiloMassacre.html

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Maui—The Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar Company may expect an effort from the Maui County government to fix the responsibility for damage the company's huge tournahaulers have done to the roads, best informed sources say.

Although the form of the action has not been determined, it was believed Harold Duponte, county attorney, was preparing a plan which will be put into action within the coming few weeks.

The RECORD first called attention of the Territory to damage by tournahaulers at places where the HC&S was crossing the government roads. In that story, July 13, 1950, the RECORD reported Supervisor John Bulgo as expressing some concern over tournahauler damage.

James Buchanan was the only bachelor ever elected president of the United States. Eight presidents had no children during their lifetime. William Henry Harrison had ten, the most of all presidents.

The Philippines government has "turned a new leaf" under President Elpidio Quirino's more determined leadership and graft and corruption are things of the past, according to Felino Neri, the Republic's undersecretary of foreign affairs, who passed through here recently.

The "determined leadership" of Quirino was well demonstrated last month when the president called a special session to pass the budget bill.

* *

Here is how the Philippines Free Press, independent weekly magazine, editorialized the incident:

"When President Quirino called Congress to a 10-day special session in order to work on the unpassed budget bill, only seven droopy-eyed representatives—out of a total of 99—answered the roll call. A plausible but not quite convincing explanation was offered the surprised public: the solons had gone home to their respective provinces to relax . . . 'after 100 days of gruelling legislative work. . .'

* *

"The unvarnished fact, however, was that the majority of the honorable gentlemen of the House were still in Manila. Only a few had rushed off to their individual districts, apparently on missions of great importance—but really to act as sponsor in a baptism or wedding or to crown a town fiesta queen in some out-of-the-way barrio . . .

"It was pleasantly surprising to note, however, that on the following day the 'resting' legislators rushed back to the city, presumably to attend the special session ...

* *

"Maybe it was just another case of coincidence. But it is worth mentioning here that the day before, Senator Pablo Angeles David, vice chairman of the Senate committee on public works, had issued a press statement to the effect that pork barrel would be distributed to members of Congress. According to (David) every Senator—regardless of party affiliation—would be entitled to the amount of P100,000 ($50,000) and each Liberal representative, P150,000 ..."

* *

Senator Tomas Confesor returned to the Philippines in time to attend three days of the 100-day congressional session. Like the Soongs and Kungs, Chiang Kai-shek's in-laws, Senator Confesor seems to have shipped to the U. S. quite a bit of his fortune made in his native land through the work of ill-paid laborers and peasants. Looking after his interests in the U. S. apparently was more important than being present at the congressional sessions.

* *

Senator Micente Madrigal was also absent from the last session of Congress, and as the Free Press commented, attending "doubtless to his many financial interests" in the U. S.

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Maui—When Charles G. Kendall, Hawaii Government Employees Association executive, last visited Kula Sanitarium, he may have talked himself right into a debate.

According to reports from Kula, Mr. Kendall devoted some of his time and energy telling how he had often challenged Henry Epstein of the United Public Workers of America to debate on the issues on which the two organizations differ. Epstein, Kendall is said to have told Kula workers, always refused all challenges.

When Epstein visited Kula a little later, the employes told him of Kendall's words and the upshot was, we are informed, that Epstein forthwith sent off a challenge to Kendall to debate over the airwaves of KMBI.

Probably the chief issues to be debated, if Kendall accepts, will be those arising from provisions for employe elections to choose the organization to represent them, as those provisions were presented to the legislature.

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Look out the window in Washington most any time, and there's a parade of retiring generals and admirals going by. They are leaving Uncle Sam's service with generous pensions in their pockets, and are taking highly-paid positions with big business corporations and "associations." . . . High military officers constantly deal with big business for Uncle Sam. Is it a good thing for them to be expecting fat jobs with big business? Doesn't that put them under temptation not to offend big business by protecting Uncle Sam?

—Labor (Railroad Unions)

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Working longshoremen at an ILA convention? As rare as a softhearted ship owner!

That's what a rank and file member of "King Joe" Ryan's International Longshoremen's Association (AFL) has to say of the union into which Ryan last week invited ILWU longshoremen to return. His story on "King Joe" is published in the March issue of the "March of Labor."

Although the ILA constitution provides that there shall be one delegate for each 100 members, very little pretense is made at carrying out those provisions, the writer reports, for few of the 180 locals of the ILA even hold meetings. Of the 80 locals in New York, he says, 60 "hold no meetings at all." Consequently, delegates at the ILA convention are preponderantly those appointed by Ryan, himself, and if anyone lifts his voice in opposition to a Ryan move he's likely to be set upon by goons.

When a motion to make Ryan "president for life" in 1943 was on the floor of the convention, a Canadian delegate rose to say he didn't think any man ought to be appointed president for life. He was immediately surrounded by a number of bruisers who advised him to take off and miss future sessions of the convention. He did, and the motion was carried without opposition.

Gangsters Present

While there may be few longshoremen at an ILA convention, the rank-and-filer writes, there] are plenty of gangsters like the 11th international vice president, Gus Scanavino, who is alleged to have engineered the murder of Pete Panto ILA rank-and-filer. With that sort of "democracy" in the union, it's no surprise to the rank-and-filer to note the average pay of a New York longshoreman is $2,400 a year as compared with the $4,000 average received by a San Francisco ILWU longshoreman. Yet ILA men in other ports receive even less than the New Yorkers, differences being as great as 77 cents less per hour.

Though New York ILA men do get pension and welfare benefits to compensate somewhat for their low income, ILA men in other ports do not.

Instead of anything resembling a hiring hall, ILA men still stand for the shape-up and one of the demands of the rank and file at present is to limit shape-ups to one a day.

Trouble Ahead

As he approaches 68, "King Joe" faces more trouble among his subjects than ever before. Two locals, that in Philadelphia and New York's all-Negro Local 968 have rebuffed all efforts of Ryan to force them to elect his officers, and they continue to elect militant officers of their own choice.

The Philadelphia local defied Ryan during the Hawaii strike and refused to unload the "hot" cargo by which shippers tried to dodge ILWU West Coast picket lines.

The Philadelphia local, which has often demanded non-segregated hiring, actually includes 60 per cent of Irish extraction and in its last election, it ignored the Ryan slate and elected militant officers, including a Negro president.

In 1945, Ryan's crown was shaky for three weeks when New York dockers went out on strike without any authorization. "King Joe" had to call an official strike to save his own face, the rank-and-filer writes. The upshot was that the strike won far better conditions for the stevedores than Ryan had ever mentioned.

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Opium smuggling in the not-so-far-gone days, says an old-timer, was done largely via the Empress Lines. When an Empress ship was nearing the harbor, old style sampans would go out to follow her wake. The pickup sampan often flew a long red banner as a signal to the passer on ship to heave his bundle or bundles over the side. The bundles were small bales tightly wrapped in cotton that would float them for a long time. When the pickup sampan got the bales, it would pass them on to another and that one to another until a pattern was set up believed sufficient to confuse searching authorities.

Many bundles were missed by the pickup men of course, and were later found by fishermen — to whom local dealers left a standing offer of $10 per bundle for all they found and turned over.

Protests against racial discrimination in Honolulu's places of entertainment were made to the liquor commission on July 26 at the commission's regular meeting. Members of the group which visited the commission included Ernest Arena, ILWU; Wallace Ho, Marine Cooks and Stewards, and Charles Lovell, Independent Taxi and Busmen's Union (UPW).

Commissioner Gilbert W. Root told the union representation that the commission is powerless to act against discrimination in the absence of a law to buttress the action.

Mr. Arena, acting as spokesman for the group, told the commission that the unions are not finished with action against the racist policies of bars and dance halls here. He said there may be picket lines around such establishments if their policies are not changed.

Fifty Korean laborers at Kohala Plantation rioted on August 7, 1905, stoning one of the lunas. Police arrested the Koreans. Then they learned that the luna had first assaulted one of the Koreans. The story ends quite unusually, with the Koreans released and the luna arrested instead.

A columnist in the Pacific Commercial Advertiser of March 26, 1905 commenting on the firing of Superintendent of Schools A. T. Atkinson, states that the first attack on Atkinson was made by Pioneer Mill Co., Ltd. It wanted 600 acres of Lahainaluna school land which the superintendent thought should be kept for the school.

Detriot (FP)—Delegates from almost 40 states to the national Townsend Plan convention, voted for repeal of the federal social security act because it is inadequate and demanded universal old-age pensions starting at age 60.

A number of Negro laborers were imported in 1901 to work on Maui. One of them, Will Towles, was committed for larceny. He had stolen sugar cane stalks to gnaw on when hungry.

One of the little known nationalities imported to labor on Hawaiian plantations is the Greek. Sixty-two Greeks were recruited in 1901, but only 14 arrived on the Mariposa on April 13, the other 48 having run away on the Mainland. The 14 were shipped to HC&S plantation.

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Forty-two per cent of the Territory's total land area of 4.1 million acres is pasture land. Thousands of these acres are leased from the Territory largely by big ranchers who pay as low as six cents per acre on a thousand-acre leasehold.

The L. L. McCandless estate pays about 6 cents an acre on a 1,067.70-acre lease in South Kona. Lester Marks, former land commissioner, is manager of the estate. Gay and Robinson pays seven cents per acre on a. 6,770-acre lease in Waimea, Kauai. Robert Hind, Ltd., leases 123,945.54 acres in North Kona at 12 cents an acre. Robert Hind Jr., was chairman of the House lands committee during this year's legislative session. The Hind lease, signed in 1937, will continue until 1960.

Smaller Ones Squeezed Out Richard Smart of Parker Ranch, has a lease of about 14,000 acres for approximately 25 cents an acre. He also has numerous other leases.

Can small ranchers and farmers (some of the land listed as pasture land is adaptable to diversified farming) get the use of this land cheap?

The power of the big monopolists over the government was apparent when about two years ago two comparatively large ranchers got together to bid for pasture land in Kohala. Neither of them was in a position to lease the whole area. The Territorial government refused to split the land and this meant that a big rancher would get the lease.

Several months ago, again on Hawaii, big ranchers squeezed out the smaller ranchers in leasing Territorial land.

A Closed Business Land monopoly in the Territory gives little hope for ambitious young farmers who love the soil and livestock but cannot acquire land. Because the land monopolists have been able to get almost all the pasture land so cheap, at the taxpayers' expense, by controlling the government, they have found almost no necessity for improving the carrying capacity of the land The cattle roam far and wide, on many acres.

The big ranchers seem content on their present production which requires small expenditure, although they can increase their output by improving the pastures and, stock feed.

The beef industry has not grown, mainly for this reason, from 1910. In 1906, there were 83,391 head of cattle; in 1910, 136,447, and in 1950, 141,400.

But cattle raisers, whose land rent is low on a long-term lease, have hiked beef prices which hit the consumers' pocketbooks. Last year, despite a decline in cattle marketings of from 33,700 head in 1949 to 29,500, the ranchers made $7.2 million against $7.1 in 1949. Grip On Land Monopoly

The agricultural extension service of the local university has been working on grasses that would improve the carrying capacity. The agricultural engineering department has produced the forage chopper, which under the present land system, is more adaptable for dairies. But if grazing is done more intensively, the forage chopper would mean tremendous economy, to ranchers.

If land is made available to the small ranchers, to farmers who want to raise a few head of livestock on the side, it will not only mean their sharing in the $7 million industry, but will also increase the islands' beef production. The Territory imported in the first nine months of 1950, according to the Shoemaker Bank of Hawaii report, $3,268,000 worth of fresh beef and produced $4,530,000 worth. We imported $13,984,000 worth of fresh, chilled, canned and processed meat.

But for the small ranchers and farmers, land ownership or even the leasing of government lands, will come when the system of land monopoly is broken here in the Territory.

Up To the People

Public officials have advocated this. But many have their private interests. A former land commissioner became head of the American Factors land department. Former Governor Stain-back talked of breaking the land monopoly, but he tried hard to become a trustee of the Campbell Estate. Politics controlled by big interests, perpetuates land monopoly.

It is thus up to the landless people to force the breaking up of the land monopoly so that instead of a few, many would own properties and derive their livelihood from the land neglected by those who cannot find economical use for all of their holdings, either in fee simple or lease.

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[PAGE 13] [back to the top]      [print]

Key to Map

BLACK: Small holdings (including those by several "Big Five" firms such as the pineapple companies, Kekaha Sugar Co., Ltd. and Waimea Sugar Mill Co., Ltd.)

UNSHADED: Government lands, chiefly held by the Territory.

Ie: Lease, held from Territory of Hawaii by the lessee whose initial is given.

BE:Bernice P. Bishop Estate (large cross-hatch; northern Kauai and kuleanas in Wailua Valley)

F: H. P. Faye, Ltd. (heavy triangular pattern; near Waimea)

GF:Grove Farm, Ltd. (very fine dots; stretching from Lihue to Koloa)

HC: Hawaiian Canneries, Ltd. (lessee in Anahola) Knudsen Trust properties (circles and dots; Koloa and near Waimea)

HH: Haena Hui (medium dots; northern "Kauai)

JTW: John Thomas Waterhouse (irregular pattern; Kipu Kai)

Kn: Knudsen Trust properties (circles and dots; Koloa and near Waimea)

KKT: Kaleipua Kanoa Trust Estate (Bishop Trust Co., trustee) (medium dots; south of Nawiliwili)

KS: Kekaha Sugar Co., Ltd. (lessee in southwestern Kauai)

KSP: Kilauea Sugar Plantation Co. (heavy slanting lines; northern Kauai, in four sections)

L: Mary N. Lucas (14-18), Frank C. Bertlemann Estate (2-18), Janet M Scott Akana Trust (1-18) , Rubena F. Scott Trust (1-18) (medium dots; east of Kilauea)

LP: The Lihue Plantation Co., Ltd., and subsidiaries (vertical lines; five acres northward from Lihue to Hanalei)

McB: McBryde Sugar Co., Ltd. (perpendicular lines; southern Kauai and Wainiha Valley)

MT: W. D. McBryde Trust Estate (Hawaiian Trust Co., trustee) (perpendicular lines and dots; in midst of homesteads in southern Kauai)

R: Gay & Robinson partnership and individual Robinson holdings (large dots; Makaweli, Moloaa, Wainiha)

USA: United States of America (unshaded; Mana airport strip)

W: Wilcox family members (heavy triangular pattern; near Lihue, near Moloaa, and along Hanalei Bay)

WR: William Hyde Rice, Ltd. (small heavy cross-hatch; Kipu and in Nawiliwili Valley)

Note:Small properties held by various large and small landowners are so mixed together in Waimea, Hanapepe, Koloa and Anahola that boundaries can be shown only approximately. The many small houselots held by licensees in the Kokaa region are indicated in a very general manner.

Government Lands

Federal..............................................................2165 A.     (     3.4 sq. mi.)     0.61%

Hawaiian Homes Commission..............................28739 A.     (   44.9 sq. m.)      8.09%

Other Territorial...............................................107781 A.     ( 168.4 sq. mi.)    30.34%

County of Kauai...................................................1877 A.     (    2.9 sq. mi.)       0.53%

Total Government Lands...................................140562 A.     ( 219.6 sq. mi.)      39.57%

Large Private Holdings

Robinson Family Holdings
(Gay & Robinson) (1945) * .................................55447 A.     (    36.6 sq. mi.)     15.61%

The Lihue Plantation Co., Ltd (1950).....................43393 A.      (   67.8 sq. m.)      12.22%

Grove Farm Co., Ltd. - Including
former Koloa Plantation (1645)............................22712 A.      (   35.5 sq. mi.)       6.40%

McBryde Sugar Co., Ltd. (1950) .........................22285 A.      (   34.8 sq. mi.)       6.27%

B. P. Bishop Estate (1945)..................................10747 A.      (    16.8 sq. mii.)       3.03%

Kilauea Sugar Plantation Co. (1945).......................7820 A.      (    12.2 sq. m.)       2.20%

Knudsen Trust Properties (1951) at least...............5926 A.      (      9.3 sq. mi.)       1.67%

Wm. Hyde Rice.....................................................4131 A.      (     6.5 sq. mi.)       1.16%

Marty N. Lucas and others (1951)
Mostly leased to Kilauea, at least...........................3536 A.      (    5.5 sq. mi.)        1.00%

Total Large Private Holdings...............................175997 A.     ( 274.9 sq. mi.)        49.56%

Some Medium Holdings

Kaleipua Kanoa Trust (1951) at least.......................1709 A.     (    2.7 sq. mi.)

Haena Hui (1951)...................................................1600 A.      (   2.5 sq. mi.)      

Wilcox Family Holdings (1951) at least.....................1403 A.      (   2.2 sq. mi.)     

John Thomas Waterhouse
(Kipu Kai) (1951)...................................................1070 A.      (   1.7 sq. mi.)       

H.P. Faye, Ltd., and Waimea Sugar
Mill Co. Ltd. (1951)..................................................705 A.      (   1.1 sq. mi.)       

W. D. McBryde Trust Estate......................................356 A.      (   0.6 sq. mi.)    

Total Medium Holdings Listed...................................6843 A.     (  10.8 sq. mi.)        1.92%

All other Private Holdings, Less than .....................31798 A.     (  47.6 sq. mi.)        8.95%

Total,.................................................................355200 A.     ( 550.0 sq. mi.)    100.00%

*The Robinson also own the Island of Niihau, 72 sq. mi., making their total holdings 158.6 sq. mi.

Sources: Real Property Schedules showing ownership January 1, 1945, printed on page 762 of the 1946 Statehood Hearings; Manual of Hawaiian Securities, 1950; inspection of Tax Maps, July 1951. Government Lands from Biennial Report of Commissioner of Public Lands, June 30, 1948.

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Criticism of the choice of the craft, "Abner T. Longley," by Ben C. Rush of the harbor commission, has not ceased. Critics say the fireboat is not adequate for the needs of Honolulu harbor because

this harbor is "outside," or unprotected from the open sea. Although the Longley is similar to boats used at Philadelphia and Galveston, a shipping master says, "Philadelphia is 90 miles up a river and Galveston isn't as open as the port here. If the boat ever has to go to sea, she'll turn over."

The shipping master pointed out that if a ship bearing explosives were to catch fire, it would be the function of the fireboat to tow her out to the open sea where a possible explosion would not damage the harbor. He maintained that the craft was chosen by experts from the Propeller Club rather than by maritime experts.

"She really out to be called," he said, " 'Rush's Folly.' "

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Before the days of unions, the workers' methods of dealing with unpopular lunas and executives were sometimes too drastic. Early in 1904 the man in charge of the Makaweli Ditch on Kauai, Arthur Glennan, was blown up in his bed by a dynamite charge reportedly set off by Japanese laborers.

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Answering the charge of the U. S. Senate crime committee that the International Longshoremen's Association is "still infested with hoodlums," President Joseph (King Joe) Ryan said that though some ILA members may have run afoul of the law, the same thing is true of every other union, every body of citizens and even of Congress, itself.

Some Congressmen have been convicted as criminals, he said, and asked if it would be fair to say Congress is "infested with hoodlums."

Washington (FP)—An Office of Price Stabilization official took issue with President Truman's statement in his mid-year economic report to Congress that "some rollbacks will be needed in selected cases . . . where prices axe excessively high."

The official said flatly no price ceiling would be set for the purpose of reducing profits.

"That's not the way OPS operates," he commented. Meanwhile a new OPA order confronted consumers with the immediate prospect of higher clothing, particularly on woollen goods, and threatened the existence of the five-cent bottle of soda pop.

The OPS order was expected to permit price boosts on about 75,000 manufactured items, including shoes, textiles and machinery.

The order would make "no appreciable difference" in the cost of living, OPS officials said.

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By Edward Rohrbough

There, in the lead story of Colliers magazine, July 21, is her picture!

She's in Formosa, looking over reports, the cutline says, and behind her hangs the flag of Kuomintang China. She's Huang Pamei whom they used to call "Two-Gun Molly" in Shanghai—one of the "guerrillas" Collier's and correspondent Robert Shaplen call "Our Hope In Red China."

I, for one, am fascinated because I knew Miss Huang in other days and was her guest shortly after V-J Day.

Miss Huang has been successively, a pirate, a puppet of the Japanese, a Kuomintang guerrilla (during World War II), an American agent, an ally of the Communists, and now as Collier's put it, "Our Hope."

In the last year of the war, she and her pirates were operating in the Hangchow Bay area, and they had made a deal with an American agency called Air-Ground Aid Service (AGAS) to pass on such intelligence as she might come across, in return for arms and ammunition.

In Shanghai after V-J Day, Miss Huang and her adjutant, Miss Helen Chang, gave a dinner and invited her three American acquaintances, of whom I was one.

She entertained with large amounts of yellow wine, though she drank none herself..

As an aide explained: "She does not drink. She is a devout Buddhist. She has killed 60 men with her own hand, but she does not drink."

Pulls Both Pistols The conversation became small talk and an aide told of a time when Miss Huang, dressed in a man's uniform, visited a somewhat hostile magistrate.

When he stared at the bulge above her belt, Miss Huang rasped: "You think I'm pregnant, don't you? Well, I'm not."

And with that, she whipped two pistols from her waist and covered the trembling official.

Months later, I learned more about Miss Huang from a man who had spent the war in her area.

"She was too bad a puppet for the Japanese," said my informant. "She was shameless."

I mused, "Do you think she really killed 60 men, herself?" "If she did," was the sarcastic answer, "most of them were her husbands. Of course she did kill many peasants." I'm wondering if the "Col. Chang Hsi-ming," a woman who commands 4,000 guerrillas near Shanghai according to Shaplen, could be Molly's adjutant, Helen Chang. She looks like the same woman and in any case, I'm sure she's someone equally interesting.

But I'm afraid I know too much about Miss Huang and Miss Chang to see them as "Our Hope In Red China" or anywhere else. So far as I'm concerned, they'll just have to go on being the "hope" of Robert Shaplen and Collier's, who think American taxpayers ought to supply them with guns and ammunition.

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Although several applicants have forwarded their qualifications to the Urban Redevelopment Agency to fill the new managership position Chairman Adolph Mendonca says no appointment has been made.

The position, which carries the equivalent salary of a civil service or P-8, approximately $8,580 to $10,680, does not have to be filled by a civil engineer, Mr. Mendonca says, but "we hope to find someone who knows something about engineering and appraising." Mendonca says, "The job is essentially an administrative-executive one."

By September 1, Mendonca says, the URA hopes to have the position filled, and it also hopes to have received enough of the funds due it from Washington to set its plan in operation.

By the first of 1952, the URA hopes to begin the actual operation of removing residents from slum areas which it plans to clear and replace with new housing projects. For the past year, the URA has been drawing up plans for the elimination of Honolulu's most distressed slum area and to remove the block placed on it by the '49 session of the legislature, which granted it insufficient powers to make it eligible for federal funds. The '51 session did grant those powers after the URA conducted an extensive educational program among representatives of civic groups to emphasize the need for slum clearance.

The largest obstacle Mendonca says will be that of finding adequate housing for persons who are to be moved from the slum areas where antiquated and dilapidated housing is to be destroyed.

"It's something like a game of checkers," Mendonca says "We can't move anyone, you know, until we find a place to put him.."

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Detriot (FP)—Though plenty of new cars have been available, sales have run consistently below a year ago in the months of April, May and June. This is the main factor behind present and prospective layoffs in auto plants.

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(Following are excerpts from a report issued by the Bank of Hawaii. It was prepared by James II. Shoemaker, vice president of the bank)

"War in Korea, the defense program, and the business activity it has brought with it, will not solve Hawaii's real problems. We must go ahead to develop our own permanent industries to employ more people and. earn more Mainland dollars. We still have unused, manpower and idle resources. We should put them to work NOW to produce more so that we can earn more and live better in Hawaii— on a permanent basis . . ."

"Between November, 1949 and March, 1950, unemployment in Hawaii stood at an all-time high, ranging between thirty-two and thirty-four thousand . . .

". . . Outmigration has been a primary cause of the reduction in unemployment. (In November, 1950, unemployment was 16,396.

Between July 1, 1948 and October 1, 1950, 51,695 people had left the Territory.—Ed.)

". . . Only twelve per cent of our production is for our own use. The balance of our production— eighty-eight per cent—is used to pay for things we need but can't or don't produce here—in other words, our imports. In short, we have been 'running in the red'— our books on Mainland trade haven't balanced.

"To increase employment and bring our account with the Mainland into balance, we must expand Hawaiian exports and at the same time, produce more things for our own use."

On the first of July, 1936, Hawaiian Pineapple Company raised the wages of its female employes no less than 25 per cent!

They had been receiving 20 cents an hour; now they got 25 cents.

Men's wages were raised from 25 cents to 30 cents an hour.

In 1950 more than five million urban families live in dwellings without baths or indoor toilets.

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Tuesday, Mayor Wilson and the board of supervisors heard the opinions of one pro and several hundred cons on the proposal that beer be allowed in public parks. The cons came first and included such widely varied and well known persons as Riley Allen, editor of the Star-Bulletin, and the Rev. Leonard Oechsli who represented the Honolulu Council of Churches. An effective opponent of any proposal to introduce beer in parks was Mrs. Paul K. Miho, president of the League of Women Voters, who said she felt there are already enough places for drinking without adding parks to the list. She said 90 per cent of the members of her organization have gone on record as opposing beer in parks. Other members of the opposition to beer in parks brought petitions with many signatures.

The single proponent of such a proposal was David Van Geison, unsuccessful Democratic candidate for the board in the last election.

Why Can't Public? "For years," Mr. Van Geison said, "we had a special group that enjoyed the privilege of drinking at the Ala Wai. That was the Officers' Club. Now John Q. Public wants to do the same thing." Van Geison suggested that drinkers might be controlled by the simple expedient of making it mandatory that they drink only when sitting down—a rule applied to bars by the liquor commission.

Van Geison's suggestion was greeted by jeers and laughter from the anti-beer-in-parks crowd, and Mrs. L. E. Blackman asked facetiously: "Why not make them lie down to drink?"

"Good," answered Van Geison, undaunted, from the rear of the room. "Make it a motion."

The board voted to have Mayor Wilson and the parks board consider the matter Friday.

News that five typewriters were bought from the legislature by the Honolulu Advertiser brought a number of sidelong observations from those who remembered the vigor with which the 'Tiser struck out against the practice of allowing legislators to purchase typewriters at their cost minus the rentals paid on them during the session.

Perhaps the most pertinent was that of a UPWA man who commented: "Now I suppose the guys at the Advertiser will be writing stories against this kind of sale— on the very typewriters that were bought that way."

The revelation at the beginning of the last session, that many legislators used such a method to avail themselves of cheap typewriters caused a nine-day sensation in the dailies.

"An attempt by Matson Line officials to fire a union stevedore, Hokama, after he had disputed a company foreman's anti-union remarks in an uptown cafe, was thwarted by Harry Kealoha, agent for the local stevedores' union, yesterday afternoon (April 23, 1936).

"Hokama stated that the trouble arose when the foreman bragged of his anti-union principles and challenged any union man to a fight. Hokama accepted.

"When the union man returned to work he was met by Captain Powers, Port Captain for Matson, and ordered home.

"The discharged man then reported to the union agent who entered a protest to the Matson office. After passing the buck through the various company channels he was reinstated."

—Voice of Labor, April 24, 1936

During the 1920 sugar strike, 12,010 persons were evicted by the sugar plantations of Oahu. Of these, at least 2,634 were women and 3,856 children. Twelve hundred of the victims of this eviction fell sick with the influenza epidemic then raging.

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In 1922 an organization called the United Workers of Hawaii asked for a corporation charter. Their intended activities were:

To settle disputes between employer and employee; to assist in securing higher wages and better conditions; to encourage and engage in cooperative purchasing; to promote beneficial associations; to conduct open forums; to establish a labor paper; to operate employment agencies; to establish a labor temple; to maintain free reading rooms; to establish an emergency fund for needy members.

Governor W. R. Farrington refused the charter on the ground that these proposed activities appeared to be un-American.

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Our Subversive Documents

As I have said many times, I have faith in the people. Despite the barrage of propaganda, despite the siren songs of the betrayers, despite the luring melodies of the Pied Pipers of Bunk, the people have a way of eventually finding their way back to the long trail of progress.

More than once I have said that if Thomas Jefferson or Abraham Lincoln or Tom Paine or other great Americans of another day were alive, they would be classed as subversive or Communist and be called before the un-American committee. Our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution might well have been the work of Karl Marx.

People Now Fear Even Constitution

This has been confirmed by a United Press story from Madison, Wis., appearing in the Sunday Advertiser. A reporter who tried to get signatures for a "petition" composed of excerpts from the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution was accused of having "Communist sympathies." Only one person out of the 112 he approached last July 4 would sign the document.

According to the reporter, who works for the Madison, Wis., Capital-Times, most of those approached refused to sign "for fear of the consequences" and 20 persons asked him if he was a Communist. A woman said: "That may be the Russian declaration of independence, but you can't tell me it is ours."

The incident was mentioned by President Truman in his speech at Detroit. The President was shocked, and yet if there is any individual who can be blamed for this condition, it is this same Harry S. Truman.

Violate Declaration of Independence and the Constitution

At no time since its inception has the Constitution had full meaning for all Americans. Negroes constantly have their constitutional rights violated, particularly in Dixie; American citizens of Japanese ancestry were denied the protection of the Constitution on the West Coast during World War II when they were herded into concentration camps.

But since Truman and his gang took over the administration, the Constitution has meant less and less for more and more Americans. It is viewed by the Federal government as a relic to be preserved under glass and looked at, instead of a document by which to live.

For instance, the Declaration of Independence states boldly that people, when tired of one government, have the right and the duty to replace it with another. Yet Communists are being rounded up today and jailed on the charges of "conspiracy to teach" the kind of action written into the document which is the foundation of our nation.

The first amendment to the Constitution guarantees the right of freedom of speech, yet in the last five years this right has been taken away by a Supreme Court packed with Truman appointees. Truman's own loyalty order denies the right of assembly and establishes guilt by association, in direct violation of the Bill of Rights.

Immortal Documents Foreign To Every Day Living

Is it any wonder, then, that in a period when we all are supposed to think the thoughts cleared as safe by Washington, the ordinary citizen will view such radical documents as our own Declaration of Independence and Constitution as "Communist stuff" and "the Russian declaration of independence"?

For Truman, or anybody who has joined with him in scrapping the Constitution, to express shock at the success of their efforts, is itself shocking. Instead, they ought to be pleased for they are reaping just what they sowed.

Ten years ago I never thought the day would break when Americans would find their own immortal documents so foreign to every day living that they would look upon them as Communist propaganda. Yet at the same time it serves to underwrite the revolutionary tradition of our own nation as well as the radical ideology of our revered founding fathers—traditions and attitudes that are today officially un-American.

When the People Realize

The bright side of it all is the possibility that the 112 persons approached by the Wisconsin reporter—along with those who read the article— may suddenly realize how far away we have strayed from our national heritage. They may be induced, to read those sacred documents again and learn with amazement the kind of deal we're getting now.

That is why I say I have faith in the people. When the majority come to realize how false have been their leaders, they will rid themselves of those who have subverted their traditions. Then there will be companions for the lone person who signed the reporter's petition, saying:

"Sure, I'll sign the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights. We were never closer to losing the thing they stand for."

The Iwilei Slave Pen

We have had so many requests from our more recent readers to reprint the first Looking Backward—"The Iwilei Slave Pen"—that ran in the RECORD more than three years ago, that we are complying in this, our Anniversary Edition. The article first appeared in the sample edition of the RECORD, July 1, 1948.—Ed.

"Sufficient evidence is locked away in police records to indicate to authorities that a vice syndicate is in operation in Honolulu."

So stated an article in a Honolulu daily which is running a series on this booming, immoral business.

The daily put it very mildly. Some readers got the impression that coping with this vice syndicate is really beyond the ability of our law enforcement body.

But to old-timers in Honolulu who are familiar with racketeering and the maneuvering of high-class brothel operators this was nothing new. They recalled "Old Iwilei" which was a never-to-be-forgotten landmark.

In the early years of this century, respectable residents of our city guided tourists through the barracks of Iwilei's Slave Pen. There visitors watched girls barely in their teens offer their bodies for hire.

The Iwilei Slave Pen resulted from the great fire of 1900 that burned to the ground the slum tenements of Chinatown. Up to then, brothels thrived on Pauahi Street with licensed prostitution enjoying legal protection by the Act of Mitigate of 1860.

When the brothels were razed, along with other tumbledown buildings, the authorities decided to improve the morals of the city by moving prostitution to its outskirts. With no effort at all they found an enterprising construction company ready to put up a stockade in the swamp lands at the Ewa side of Iwilei.

"The Slave Pen occupies about two acres of ground, surrounded by a board fence about 12 feet high," Federal Investigator Victor H. Olmstead wrote in February 1901. "Within this enclosure are five one-story buildings, each about, 250 feet long and 24 feet wide, of light frame construction . . . These buildings are each divided into two parts by a partition running lengthwise . . . are subdivided into rooms of about 10 by 12 feet; which are paved with concrete (to facilitate their ready cleansing by 'turning on the hose'), and are scantily furnished, all exactly alike, with a double bed, a small table, a couple of chairs, a washstand with bowl, pitcher, towels and a small lamp."

Of the 194 inmates, almost all were Japanese prostitutes. They were complete slaves of Japanese operators who practically monopolized organized prostitution with the cooperation of respectable Caucasian businessmen and public officials. The girls—average 15 years, as young as 12 years—were stripped of every penny they made. They were bartered and sold at prices ranging from $100 upwards. When their money-making days were over, their masters sold them as personal servants or concubines.

Then, as it is now, those who failed to earn enough to satisfy their bosses or who showed signs of revolt, were cruelly beaten. Suicide was common.

Federal Judge Morris M. Estee called the stockade "a mere money-making institution." On an investment estimated at less than $5,000, its owners raked in from $32,400 to $40,000 a year.

Pointing at the root source of the crime, Abram S. Humphreys, a crusading young circuit judge, stated: "At least two of the directors of the corporation which built, own and rent these miserable bazaars of crime are men who hold high official positions in this Territory."

According DO Judge Humphreys, neither Governor Sanford B. Dole nor his nephew, E. P. Dole, the attorney general, attempted to enforce federal and territorial laws against vice and involuntary servitude.

Also failing to act were a federal grand jury and two territorial grand juries, drawn from the cream of the business community. Prominent members of the juries included names such as Atherton, Carter and McInerny.

The grand jury of 1900 reported to Judge Humphreys: "The condition of the premises and general management, which is conducted under the supervision of the Police Department and the Board of Health, is as satisfactory as could be expected, provided this shameless vocation must be tolerated as a necessary evil."

High Sheriff A. M. Brown, who directed the Lwilei stockade, was one of the leaders who endeavored to remove Judge Humphreys from office. The judge knew from where the pressure came. He stated that Iwilei "was supported by the sugar planters ..."

As a segregated district, muddy, dirty and sordid, Iwilei continued until 1914.