King Kawika La‘amea Kalakaua was determined that his dynasty would not be ended by the election of an unrelated monarch. He won that battle.The Hawaiian Constitution of 1864 provided for the continuation of the Kamehameha dynasty beyond the death of Kamehameha V. However, even with an explicit constitutional order of succession, there were many problems. The first major problem is simply that the 1864 document—intended by King (Lot Kapuaiwa) Kamehameha V to restore royal prerogatives and native rule—was never declared or enacted. He just wrote it up, signed it privately and began ruling as though the ali‘i and legislature had approved it. Also, the other potential Kamehameha rulers all died leaving no qualified children while Lot was still on the throne. He had only Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop to choose, and she refused to rule.
In keeping with a failsafe clause in the 1864 constitution, when Lot died without an heir or designated successor, the legislature invoked its right to elect a new stirps (a person from whom a line of descendants would be recognized). They elected Lunalilo without dissent, but he demanded a public election. Although it was never constitutional—that established the “tradition” of general elections. A year later, on Lunalilo’s death, an election resulted in Kalakaua’s ascension to the throne.
Lest there should be additional elections replacing himself as royal stirps of Hawai‘i, Kalakaua went to great lengths to establish his bloodline-right to rule. It is unclear whether any significant number of people either questioned or accepted his claims. Nonetheless, the claims were institutionalized by his “enemies” in the Bayonet Constitution of 1887, designating his sister Lydia, Princess Lili‘uokalani, as heir to the throne.
Like Kawika Kalakaua, Lydia had been raised among Kamehamehas and other high ali‘i, but she arrived at adulthood with no thought of ever ruling. Her upbringing and training would have been very different if she, her relatives, the ali‘i or, very significantly, if the dominant Euro-American educator-missionaries had imagined she could ever be queen. Therein lies a huge problem no one foresaw.
Kalakaua himself turned out not to be a problem for his opponents because his attention was so much on the twin dreams of reinstituting some Hawaiian cultural traditions (primarily hula) and the pleasures that wealth and position could afford him. Lydia was another matter. She had suffered the oppression she shared with all Hawaiians and nursed a disgust for her oppressors. Kalakaua’s ascension to the throne and her designation as Princess Lili‘uokalani, heir apparent, gave her a context in which to conceive of opportunities to express her feelings and to eventually redress some of the grievances she shared with all Native Hawaiians, especially the nobles.
The brother of Lili‘uokalani and Kalakaua, Prince Leleiohokukalaho‘olewa (commonly called Leleiohoku) should have become king, and his educators had prepared him to be a king of the Kalakaua-kind. He was trained more in music than law and royal prerogative. In fact, even though he died at 23, his musical compositions were numerous and are still popular today. Had he lived to be king, there might well have been two Merrie Monarchs. On his death, Princess Ruth—adoptive mother of Leleiohoku—had applied to be designated heir apparent. That was complicated by the fact that the change in family-line succession to accommodate Ruth would actually have put Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop, a Kamehameha, next in line to the throne, potentially ending the new Kalakaua dynasty.
The Bayonet Constitution cleared up all questions of succession by naming Lili‘uokalani. No one was disturbed or frightened by the idea of another Kalakaua monarch. A playboy king had proved no problem. How could his sister, a poet-composer, be difficult?
The willingness of the business interests who forced the 1887 (Bayonet) Constitution on King Kalakaua to name Lili‘uokalani proves that they knew little about the middle-aged princess. Her stubbornness would surely have frightened them and, had they known of her arrogance and unwavering certainty that Americans had undercut the powers of the monarch, the succession would have been otherwise designated.
In the four years after Lydia Lili‘u Loloku Walania Wewehi Kamaka‘eha became Princess Lili‘uokalani, the world saw these “regal” qualities, but the deed was done. By constitutional law, she would succeed her brother.
When Lili‘uokalani became the designated heir to the throne, her already famous arrogance—surely called self-confidence by her adherents and friends—was energized. In the same process, her equally famous wit (so important in her poetic songwriting) took a turn that made it more a weapon than a social grace.
In the next column, we’ll begin to look at Lili‘uokalani’s brief and stormy reign, her plots and the plots against her.