A Separate, Race-Based Government for Native Hawaiians?
Mike Brownfield /
The U.S. House is expected to vote today on the creation of the largest tribal entity in U.S. history under the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act, despite last-minute opposition by Hawaii’s governor, Linda Lingle (R), and serious questions regarding the bill’s constitutionality. Meanwhile, President Barack Obama promised to sign the legislation.
The bill would establish a separate, race-based governing body to represent Native Hawaiians in negotiations with state and federal governments. As The National Review writes, the Act would:
…partly disenfranchise a portion of one state’s residents, create a parallel government for those meeting a legislated criterion of ethnic purity, and would portend the transfer of public assets, land, and political power from those who fail to satisfy the standard of ethnic purity to those who do.
The goal, as The National Review notes, is “to apply the model of American Indian tribes’ formal sovereignty to people of native Hawaiian ancestry.”