"Whoever attempts to suppress that right, does it at his peril."

FRIDAY, JUNE 3, 1887.

MIDSUMMER MADNESS

  Are the King and his advisers mad? Is the preliminary sign of destruction already manifest in this case? It would certainly seem so. The action of the Government in opening packages by the Australia in search of arms and ammunition and the seizure of two lots of such goods, is one of those pieces of utter and unadulterated stupidity, in the performance of which Hawaiian officials have attained an undisputed pre-eminence. It is the act of men who show clearly thereby that they have the disposition to be arbitrary and despotic without the brain to conceive or the nerve to execute the measures necessary to make them such. Many a would be aspirant for irresponsible power and with much larger brains than any one in the Hawaiian Government, has come to grief by the practice of a policy analogous to that exhibited in Honolulu on Wednesday. It is a policy which irritates without intimidating, which exhibits venom and cowardice, or malice and impotence, in about equal proportions. It reminds one of a vicious and ill-conditioned cur, whose disposition to bite has survived the loss of all his teeth, and whose ugliest snarl only serves to render more Conspicuous his empty [text hidden by fold in paper] teach those persons in due time that the merchants of Honolulu will import such firearms, and as many of them, as the demands of their business may require, and that they will sell them to such customers as they sec fit. If a man chooses to amuse himself by buying specimens of the various kinds of improved guns and pistols now in the market, and converting his house into a kind of military museum that is his affair. It may be wise or it may be foolish--that depends At all events, it may be set down as certain that the right of the people to keep and bear arms is one of the things which will not be given up. It will be maintained at all hazards. Whoever attempts to suppress that right, does it at his peril.

[The Daily Herald, Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands, Friday, June 03, 1887. Vol. II. No. 82. Pg. 2]

   Hawaii was a sovereign kingdom from 1810 until 1893. The monarchy was overthrown by resident American, and some European, businessmen. It then was an independent republic until 1898 when annexed by the United States as a territory.