The New Breed

It was nearly 3 p.m. in Washington, nearly 10:30 a.m. in Hawaii 5,000 miles away. In the House chamber of the Capitol, the debate rattled on, while off the floor, two men placed two separate long-distance calls to Honolulu. One was the Territory's twelfth appointed Governor, Republican William F. Quinn, who was calling Acting Governor Edward E. Johnston. The other was Democratic Territorial Delegate John Burns, who got through to Territorial House Speaker Elmer F. Cravalho, who was standing on the dais in the assembly chambers of Hawaii's lolani Palace.

"Yes, yes, Jack," cried Cravalho to Burns, "I can hear you fine. Have you got anything to tell us yet?" He listened, frowned, then brightened. "Jack says everything looks fine," he told the legislators and onlookers.

The Long Wait. "Everything," in fact, was never better. At that moment, the U.S. House of Representatives was approaching a final vote on the Hawaii statehood bill, passed overwhelmingly (76-15) by the Senate the day before. Now, after 59 years of territorial status, 40 of them spent waiting impatiently for statehood, Hawaii was on its way. For years congressional opposition had been overpowering, for the pivotal Southern bloc of Democrats never relished the idea of a new state whose population and character was so seemingly alien--and so Republican to boot. It looked dark for Hawaii last year, too, when Delegate Burns deliberately stepped aside to let Alaska make its big statehood pitch alone; he was berated at home for not insisting on coupling the two appeals.

But Burns's strategy paid off. Alaska's victory softened almost all further opposition; even Sam Rayburn, long opposed to Hawaiian statehood, decided to go along. And even Virginia's stubborn Rules Committee Chairman Howard Smith had seen the handwriting on the bill, decided that he could not prevent its movement to the floor (TIME, March 16). Added to that was the momentum of the Senate's victory, planned by Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson, who had even won over some Southern defectors (although not such diehards as Virginia's Harry Byrd, Mississippi's Jim Eastland, Arkansas' John McClellan and J. William Fulbright). House opposition was so weak, in short, that only a few recalcitrant Southerners took the trouble to harangue for the sake of the record. Swiftly the vote came to the floor--a rousing 323-89--and swiftly the word sped to the two Hawaiian officials holding the phones.

Wiggles & Giggles. "Sound the sirens!" yelled Governor Quinn to his listener. "Close the schools and get going!" Delegate Burns hollered the same news into his phone, and instantly the palace in Honolulu was rocking with cheers. The throng swelled with a lusty singing of the Hawaiian anthem, Hawaii Ponoi, and the Star-Spangled Banner, and then fell silent in prayer. ("I'm a grown man," blubbered Quinn's administrative assistant, Bob Ellis, happily. "Why am I crying?")

As the sirens screamed, offices, schools, industrial plants began to disgorge jubilant hordes of people. Confetti swirled down from Honolulu's office buildings, and a flight of Air Force jets swept low across the city in a deafening salute. The first shock subsided shortly, but by evening, Hawaii was ablaze with celebrators. Hula dancers undulated delightedly in front of the Iolani Palace and city hall, high-schoolers chimed in with raucous rock 'n' roll. Street dancers jiggled to the beat of Dixieland jazz, the blare almost dissolving the dulcet sounds of the famed Royal Hawaiian Band playing in front of the sedate old Moana Hotel. Crowds ranged aimlessly up and down the avenues, soon made way for swarms of horn-honking autos nudging bumper-to-bumper through the streets. Bonfires crackled, corks popped, girls kissed strangers, and strangers joyously greeted each other with "Hello, citizen!"

Prayers & Answers. Next day was an officially proclaimed holiday, too, but the first hours' spontaneity gave way to less noise and more thought. Into the Kawaiahao Church (the "Westminster Abbey of Hawaii") flocked Hawaiians--led by robed members of the territorial legislature--for thanksgiving prayers led by a native, the Rev. Abraham Akaka.

Through all the dancing, singing and thanksgiving, even tourists felt a profound, almost mystical awareness of the victory's meaning. By this one act the U.S. had bridged an enormous gap, leaped over its old, European-rooted consciousness of Caucasian identity, clasped the hand of a strange breed known as "The Man of the Pacific," a breed produced of countless strains of Oriental, Polynesian and Western blood (see box). And as the U.S. took into the union this mixture of people, it won another kind of victory visible from Bangkok to Little Rock. Explained 31-year-old Patsy Takemoto Mink, housewife, mother and territorial senator: "For decades, Asians have been saying to us, 'Why don't you admit the truth? You're nothing but colonials, and you're going to remain colonials until the end of time.' Well, here's the answer to that."

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