AANHPI Heritage Month: This land is your land, too, says our Nat'l Parks Service

The  National Parks Service has created a list of historic sites and monuments describing
the role of  AANHPI in the making of the United States.

One of leading misconceptions that haunt AANHPI folk is that of a "perpetual foreigner." No matter how many generations AANHPI families have been in the United States, other Americans tend to label them as outsiders. The National Parks Service seeks to correct that.

The National Parks Service, under the directive signed by President Biden, recognizes that despite what history school books say -- or, more accurately, what they don't say -- is that Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders have been here for centuries. 

From the well-known sites such as the camps used to incarcerate Japanese Americans during WWII, to a ship's hold where laborers from Asia were transported to our shores to harvest sugarcane, to a town in the California Delta where Chinese workers helped build the levees protecting rich farmland, evidence of our presence is all around us and should be taught as part of American history.

The Department of the Interior, which includes our national parks and monuments, recognizes the role AANHPI have played and have gathered them together on their website. You might be surprised, some of these sites might be near you.

The AANHPI communities make our nation more vibrant through their diverse cultures, languages and religions. 

There is no single story of the AANHPI experience, but rather a multitude of contributions that enrich the country. The American story as we know it would be impossible without the strength, voice and legacies of AANHPI individuals who have helped build and unite this country.  

As we celebrate AANHPI Heritage Month, we also acknowledge the shameful parts of our history including the unjust incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II as well as the many challenges these communities face today.  

Throughout the month, we encourage you to take the time to reflect on our nation’s history, visit a historic district near you or learn more about what the Department is doing to preserve and protect these communities to build a more inclusive and equitable future.   

The Department of Interior is committed to supporting AANHPI communities by protecting important archeological areas, preserving the loss of Native Hawaiian language and providing infrastructure investments to facilitate conservation, resiliency and economic growth. The DOI recognizes the unique impacts that climate change and coastal erosion have on our island communities. 

Additionally, the Department’s Office of Native Hawaiian Relations recently announced $1 million in NATIVE Act funding through the HŌʻIHI grant program for Native Hawaiian Organizations that aim to build more sustainable tourism models and protect the natural and cultural resources of local communities. 

As more states make teaching AANHPI history part of the public school curriculum, the DOI has even developed material to help develop lesson plans, series of articles titled Finding a Path Forward: Asian American Pacific Islander National Historic Landmarks Theme Study for visiting these historic sites. 

FYI: To learn more about AANHPI heritage and history, visit the National Park Service’s Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage website.  

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow @DioknoEd on Twitter or at his blog Views From the Edge.

New Department of Interior policy seeks to strengthen bond with Native Hawaiians

Some Native Hawaiians want to secede from the United States.

The Federal government took a small but significant step towards healing the wound created when the US took part in the overthrow of the Hawaiian Monarchy.

The Department of the Interior announced Oct. 18 that, for the first time in the agency’s history, it will require formal consultation with the Native Hawaiian community. New policies and procedures, subject to formal consultation, will further affirm and honor the special political and trust relationship between the United States and Native Hawaiians.

“The Interior Department is committed to working with the Native Hawaiian Community on a government-to-sovereign basis to address concerns related to self-governance, Native Hawaiian trust resources, and other Native Hawaiian rights,” said Secretary Deb Haaland.

“A new and unprecedented consultation policy will help support Native Hawaiian sovereignty and self-determination as we continue to uphold the right of the Native Hawaiian Community to self-government.”

The draft consultation policy and procedures seek to, among other things:

• Bolster the Department’s consultation efforts to encourage early, robust, interactive, pre-decisional, informative and transparent consultation;
• Require that Department staff undergo training before participating in consultation;
• Establish bi-annual meetings between the Secretary and Native Hawaiian Community leaders to consult on matters of mutual interest;
• Clarify that the Department’s decision-makers must invite Native Hawaiian Community leaders to engage in consultation; and
• Require a record of consultation.

The draft requirements help further the spirit and intent of President Biden’s “Memorandum on Tribal Consultation and Strengthening Nation-to-Nation Relationships,” which outlines the Administration’s efforts to engage Indigenous communities early and often in federal decision-making.

 

The changed in relationship might stem to the growing movement that wants Hawaii to secede from the United States.

In 1893, with a contingent of 300 US Marines behind him, businessman Sanford Ballard Dole overthrew Queen Liliuokalani, the Hawaiian monarch, and establish a new provincial government with Dole as president. In order to avoid bloodshed, the queen surrendered. The coup occurred with the foreknowledge of John L. Stevens, the US minister to the Kingdom of Hawaii.

On February 1, Stevens recognized Dole’s new government on his own authority and proclaimed Hawaii a US protectorate. Dole submitted a treaty of annexation to the US Senate, but most Democrats opposed it, especially after it was revealed that most Hawaiians did not want annexation.

President Grover Cleveland sent a new US minister to Hawaii to restore Queen Liliuokalani to the throne, but Dole refused to step aside and instead proclaimed the independent Republic of Hawaii. Cleveland was unwilling to overthrow the government by force, and his successor, President William McKinley, negotiated a treaty with the Republic of Hawaii in 1897.

In 1898, the Spanish-American War broke out, and the strategic use of the naval base at Pearl Harbor during the war convinced Congress to approve formal annexation. Two years later, Hawaii was organized into a formal US territory and in 1959 entered the United States as the 50th state.

Unlike Native American tribes and Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians are not federally recognized by the US government as having their own sovereign nation.

During the Obama administration, the federal government attempted a more formal government-to-government relationship with Native Hawaiians but the process got mired by the deep divisions in the Native Hawaiian community.

This new consultation policy appears to be a renewed attempt by the Biden administration to put Native Hawaiians on similar footing as other Indigenous groups that are federally recognized.

The Office of Native Hawaiian Relations (ONHR) will host two virtual consultations on Thursday, Nov. 10 from 9 to 11 a.m. HST and Monday, Dec. 5 from 6 to 8 p.m. HST to gather feedback from the Native Hawaiian Community on the new policy. ONHR discharges the Secretary's responsibilities for matters related to Native Hawaiians and serves as a conduit for the Department’s field activities in Hawaiʻi. 

More information about the consultations is available on ONHR’s website.

Senator Brian Schatz, D-HI, chair of the Indian Affairs Committee, praised the new path created by the DOI.  The policy was a “very big deal and a vital first step,” Schatz said.

“One of the most important principles in policymaking, especially as it relates to Native communities, is: ‘nothing about me, without me,’” said Schatz in a prepared statement. “This policy update recognizes that consultation with Native Hawaiians is an essential aspect of decision-making for the federal government and key to upholding its trust responsibility. We have a long way to go, but all progress starts with listening.”

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow @DioknoEd on Twitter.