Sugar & Immigration in Hawaii

MODERN HAWAIIAN HISTORY

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Vocabulary

• Plantation - large commercial farm (grow crops to sell) where laborers live and work
• Paternalism - limiting behavior of a certain group for their supposed good (treating people like children)
• Hana - work (pidgin)
• Luna - field boss (pidgin)

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2

Kōloa Plantation

• The 1st sugar plantation was started at Kōloa, Kauai in 1835 by William Hooper, Peter Brinsmade, and William Ladd.
• They had a 50-year lease of 980 acres of land from Kamehameha III for $300 a year.
• Hawaiians worked as field workers.

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3

Kōloa means ‘great cane’ in Hawaiian

Kōloa Plantation

• Hooper, only 26, managed the Plantation.
• Hooper started with 25 workers in 1835, by 1838 he employed over 100.
• He was able to get the workers through an agreement with the Governor of Kaua’i and King Kamehameha III. Commoners, at the time, still had to do what their ali’i told them to do.

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4

Hooper paid $2 per month for each worker. This money went to the King and Governor.

Kōloa Plantation

• Hooper viewed this as a chance to bring “civilization” to Hawaii.
• He felt the commoners were enslaved by the ali’i (chiefs) and he could improve their lives.
• He thought this was the start of ending the enslavement of the commoners.

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5

Kōloa Plantation

• Hawaiian men made 12.5¢ a day, women made 6¢.
• In today’s money this is $1.62 per day for women and $3.38 per day for men.
• It was not actual money, but a coupon to use at the company store.

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Kōloa Plantation

Daily Work Schedule:

-Sunrise (600): wake up and head to the fields to work

-730: Breakfast, then back to work

-1230: Dinner (1 hour), then work until sunset

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Kōloa Plantation

• Workers had their own family homes on the plantation. Some food was also provided.
• Medical care was provided by a Doctor.
• Workers had small plots of land on the plantation to grow taro and vegetables. One day a week was set aside to work on their own crops/gardens.
• Saturdays were for the plantation store and farmer’s market.

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8

Kōloa Plantation

• Hooper had lots of trouble getting the Hawaiians to do their assigned work.
• He started to bring in a few Chinese male workers, especially to work the newly built Sugar Mill.
• Chinese men lived in dormitory style housing. They were separated from the native Hawaiian workers and their family homes.

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9

Kōloa Plantation

The new plantation opened the way for a major change in Hawai’i. Plantations:

• Owned by large corporations (Big Five)
• Ethnic groups were paid differently to keep them fighting amongst themselves
• Plantation workers were treated like children who needed guidance and direction (paternalism)

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Rise of Sugar Plantations

Between 1875-1910

• The # of workers increased from 3,260 to 43,917.
• Land used to cultivate sugar increased from from 12,000 acres to 214,000 acres.
• # of plantations increased from 20 to 52.

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In 1897, Hawai’i exported $16.2 million worth of goods, with sugar being $15.4 million of that #.

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Rise of Sugar Plantations

Increased Demand / Production

• 1848: Great Mahele
• 1849: California Gold Rush
• 1861-1865: American Civil War
• 1875-1898: Reciprocity Treaty

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Rise of Sugar Plantations

Increased Demand / Production

• 1848: Great Mahele

Sugar growers paid minimal sums of money to purchase large tracts of land from chiefs, and smaller holdings from commoners.

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Rise of Sugar Plantations

Increased Demand / Production

• 1849: California Gold Rush

Thousands of people move out to California to get rich after gold is discovered in 1848. From 1849-1851 Hawaiian sugar and other agricultural goods are shipped to California to supply the new settlers. Demand decreases after 1851.

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Rise of Sugar Plantations

Increased Demand / Production

• 1861-1865: American Civil War

South stops selling sugar to the North (at war), which boosts price of sugar from 4¢ a pound to 25¢. Sugar exports increased from 572 tons to 8,865 tons. Demand and price decreases after the war ends.

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Rise of Sugar Plantations

Increased Demand / Production

• 1875-1898: Reciprocity Treaty

Sugar production increases from 9,392 tons in 1870 to 298,544 tons by 1900.

In 1897 sugar exports accounted for 95% of the Hawaiian economy.

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Labor Immigration

• Hawaiians were the first workers on plantations, but there wasn’t enough of them and they didn’t stay on plantations for long.
• Major groups that came to Hawaii and 1st year major immigration started:
• Chinese (1852)
• Portuguese (1878)
• Japanese (1885)
• Puerto Rican (1900)
• Korean (1903)
• Filipino (1906)
• Spanish (1907)

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Immigration to Hawaii 1855-1929

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Labor Immigration

1852 - 1st Chinese contract laborers arrive

1878 - Portuguese workers brought in to counter growing Chinese workforce

1880s - Japanese workers brought in to to counter growing Chinese workforce

1900 - Chinese Laborers can no longer be imported after Hawaii becomes a US territory due to Federal Laws.

1900 - Workers 1st imported from new US colony of Puerto Rico to counter growing number of Japanese workers.

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19

Labor Immigration

1901 - 200 Black workers from Tennessee are imported to Hawaii.

1902 - Korean workers 1st imported to Hawaii.

1905 - Korean government bans emigration to Hawaii.

1906 - 1st Filipino laborers from the new US colony of the Philippines come to Hawaii

1907 - Gentleman’s Agreement restricts Japanese laborers from coming to Hawaii

1907 - Spanish brought in to supplement Portuguese workers.

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Why do people immigrate to the US/Hawaii?

Push Factors

Problems at home country

• Political or Religious persecution
• Refugees
• War
• Economic hardship
• Environmental Problems

Pull Factors

Better life in new country

• Work
• Family
• Education
• Quality of Life

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Chinese Immigration (1850s-1900s)

Why they came?

Mostly single males came here due to war and hardships in China

In Hawaii…

-Married Hawaiian women

-Made sure their children were educated and started businesses in Honolulu (Chinatown) once they left the plantations.

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Chinese Immigrant family living in Honolulu (1893)

Portuguese Immigration (1870s-1900s)

Why they came?

Families and single males recruited with promise of higher wages and a better life

In Hawaii…

-Married Hawaiian women

-Worked as lunas (field bosses) on the plantations

-Still treated as 2nd class citizens by plantation owners

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Madeira Islanders cutting sugarcane

*not from mainland Portugal, but came from the Azores and Madeira (islands in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Africa)

Japanese Immigration (1880s-1924)

Why they came?

Economic depression in Japan causes many farmers to lose all their money and have to sell their land.

In Hawaii…

-Sent back for their families or ‘picture brides’

-Japan looked after their citizens and made sure they were treated fairly.

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Japanese passport

Puerto Rican Immigration (1900-1930)

Why they came?

Two hurricanes devastated Puerto Rico in 1899 destroying many sugarcane plantations. Workers needed jobs.

In Hawaii…

-Intermarried with other ethnicities.

-Mostly absorbed into new plantation culture

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Damage from Hurricane San Ciriaco

Korean Immigration (1903-1924)

Why they came?

Fled Japanese imperial control over Korea. Famine and few job prospects existed in Korea.

In Hawaii…

-Brought their families and picture brides from Korea

-Worked towards restoring Korea’s independence from Japan.

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King Gojong of Korea

Spanish Immigration (1907-1913)

Why they came?

Recruited to work as lunas (field bosses) as an alternative to Portuguese

In Hawaii…

-Stayed only long enough to fulfill their labor contract then most moved to the mainland USA (California) for better jobs.

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Spanish children land in Honolulu in 1907 on the SS Heliopolis

Filipino Immigration (1906-1934*)

Why they came?

Escape economic hardship and come back to the Philippines with money

In Hawaii…

-Last major group to arrive so they faced discrimination and were paid the least amount of money

-Recruited to break strikes by Japanese workers.

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Filipino Immigrants in 1906

Vocabulary

• Factor - working as an agent for one or more business (basically lending money)
• Oligarchy - a small group of people having control of a country or organization
• Irrigation - watering the land for farming
• Directorate - appointed or elected group of people who run a company. Also known as a Board of Directors.
• Interlocking directorate - practice of members of a corporate board of directors serving on the boards of multiple corporations.

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Why did plantation owners want foreign workers?

• A docile (weak / quiet) workforce
• Far way from home, can’t easily quit.
• Foreigners think America is Great!
• Better than going back home.
• More likely to stay on the job.
• Constant supply of new workers
• Bring in new workers to replace those who quit or go on strike.
• New workers can be paid less $

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Plantation Owners

• Big Five Factors
• These companies helped finance plantations and provided other services like shipping, banking, etc...
• By 1900 they controlled 95% of the sugar industry in Hawaii.
• Used their economic power to control Hawaii’s territorial government (oligarchy)

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Plantation Owners (The Big Five)

C. Brewer & Co. (1820)

-Began by selling supplies and insurance to whaling and trading ships

Theo H. Davies & Co. (1845)

-Started by owning several trading ships and being the agent for a cattle ranch

American Factors (1849)

-Originally known as Hackfield & Company and started by a German trader

Castle & Cooke (1851)

-Founded by missionaries after their funding was cut off.

Alexander & Baldwin (1869)

-Started by sons of missionaries as a sugar company and built massive irrigation ditches on Maui.

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Plantation Owners (The Big Five)

• These companies are run by interlocking directorates.
• They worked together to control the sugar industry in order to:
• Keep down wages
• Set costs
• Decrease competition between companies
• Control government to keep making money (oligarchy)

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Plantation Owners (The Big Five)

• HSPA (Hawaii Sugar Planters’ Association) is run by the Big Five and was how they worked together to unify their policies on labor, legislation, and scientific research (how to grow sugar more efficiently)
• HSPA and the Big Five controlled sugar production, processing, and shipping

34

Hawaii becomes a US Territory

• The Organic Act of 1900 makes Hawaii officially a territory of the United States and all US Laws now apply to Hawai’i.
• Labor contracts like the 3 year plantation contracts are illegal under US law. All contracts are immediately terminated.
• Some workers immediately left and headed for the US mainland.

35

Hawaii becomes a US Territory

• HSPA was worried that workers will try and roam the islands looking for better pay.
• In response the HSPA sets pay standards for each Island and plantation.
• HSPA brings in new workers from other places like Puerto Rico.
• Plantations refused to hire workers from other plantations unless the worker had a paper saying they left their old plantation on good terms.

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Managing the Workers

• Workers were FINED (money taken from paycheck) for offenses like tardiness, insubordination, drunkenness, not completing their work.
• Plantation bosses encouraged competition between ethnicities.
• Police worked for the plantation bosses and rounded up deserters.

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Managing the Workers

• Bonus pay, was also used.
• Workers would sign a 2 year contract to grow sugar from scratch and received bonuses or profit-sharing depending on how many tons of sugar cane they grew.
• HSPA monitored and adjusted wages for workers every year.

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Vocabulary

• Labor Union - an organized association of workers formed to protect and further their rights and interests
• Strike - a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to work (usually to call attention to employee grievances)
• Perquisite System - Benefits given to plantation workers by the owners instead of higher wages.

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Labor Unions

• Labor Unions let workers bargain with their employer collectively (as a whole group) rather than individually. This gives the workers more power.
• Unions can go on strike all together, if employers refuse to listen to their demands.

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Difficulties Organizing

• Anti-union laws passed by Hawai'i’s territorial legislature.
• Workers who tried to organize unions were simply fired or not hired
• Management encouraged workers to mistrust each other.

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Labor Unions

• Employers, like plantation owners (HSPA), tend not to like labor unions.
• Labor unions cost employers money when they have to raise wages and benefits

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1909 O’ahu Strike

• Japanese earned $18 a month, compared to $22.50 for Portuguese and Puerto Ricans for the same work.
• Motoyuki Negoro, a young lawyer, wrote a series of articles in a Japanese newspaper pointing out this inequality.
• This led to the formation of the Zokyu Kisei Kai (Higher Wage Association), the 1st true labor union in Hawai’i

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Fred Makino, one of the founders of the Higher Wage Association

1909 O’ahu Strike

• The HWA (Higher Wage Association) asked for a conference with the HSPA (Hawaii Sugar Planters Association) to negotiate, but the Owners refused to meet.
• After 4 months of waiting, in May Japanese workers at ‘Aiea, Waipahu, Ewa, Kahuku, Waianae, and Waialua voted to strike. Japanese on other plantations and outer islands gave financial aid to the strikers.

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Fred Makino, one of the founders of the Higher Wage Association

1909 O’ahu Strike

• HSPA hired Portuguese, Chinese, and Hawaiian workers as strikebreakers at $1.50 (double the pay of the Japanese)
• Newspapers (including one run by W.R. Farrington) called the strikers unskilled, thugs, and agitators.
• In June, some workers were evicted from their plantation homes and marched from as far as Kahuku to Honolulu where makeshift housing for over 5,000 Japanese was set up.

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Fred Makino, one of the founders of the Higher Wage Association

1909 O’ahu Strike

• June 8th - Waipahu strikers were rounded up by police at gunpoint and forced to return to work
• June 10th - The leaders of the HWA were rounded up and arrested
• August 5th - Strike is called off and workers return to their plantations.

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Fred Makino, one of the founders of the Higher Wage Association

1909 O’ahu Strike

Results

• Cost the Japanese workers around $40,000 to maintain the strike
• Cost plantation owners around $2,000,000
• Soon after the end of the strike, ordinary workers had their wages raised a small amount and the racial difference in pay was gradually closed

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Fred Makino, one of the founders of the Higher Wage Association

1909 O’ahu Strike

Results

• HWA is shattered with leaders in jail, and public opinion against them
• Large #s of Filipinos are imported to ward off future strikes
• Perquisite System is established by plantation owners who try to keep workers happy by providing better housing, building schools, churches, playgrounds, recreation halls, etc… BUT not significant pay raises.

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Fred Makino, one of the founders of the Higher Wage Association

1909 O’ahu Strike

“Plantations view laborers primarily as instrument of production. Their business requires cheap, not too intelligent, docile, unmarried men”

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-Commissioner of Labor Statistics in Hawaii (1911)

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Fred Makino, one of the founders of the Higher Wage Association

1920 O’ahu Strike

• 1917 - New union is formed (Federation of Japanese Labor) and reminds the HSPA that $20-24 a month is not enough to live on.
• Filipinos form their own union, the Filipino Labor Union.
• These unions worked independently from each other.

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Pablo Manlapit, founder of the Filipino Labor Union

1920 O’ahu Strike

• January 19, 1920 - Filipino Labor Union goes on strike
• January 23 - Federation of Japanese Labor joins the strike
• Newspapers again verbally attack the strikers and claim that the Filipinos are being used by the Japanese
• February - Over 12,000 Japanese and Filipinos are evicted from their plantation homes and march into Honolulu

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Pablo Manlapit, founder of the Filipino Labor Union

1920 O’ahu Strike

• Japanese had over $900,000 saved up in a fund to support the strike, but the Filipinos were out of money after a month. Japanese ended up using their fund to help the Filipinos to keep the strike going.
• Strike ended on July 1 with a compromise between the workers and the plantation owners.

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Pablo Manlapit, founder of the Filipino Labor Union

1920 O’ahu Strike

Results

• HSPA lost around $12,000,000 during the strike
• Wages increased from $20 to $23 a month
• Benefits increased as well, with improved housing, sanitation and water systems for the workers.

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Pablo Manlapit, founder of the Filipino Labor Union

1924 Kaua’i Strike

• Filipino workers led by Manlapit demanded $2 a day in wages and reducing the work day from 10 to 8 hours.
• April 1924 - Filipinos on Kaua’i plantations go on strike
• Again strikebreakers of other ethnicities are called in to work on plantations

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Pablo Manlapit, founder of the Filipino Labor Union

1924 Kaua’i Strike

• On September 9th workers on strike grabbed two strikebreakers to prevent them from going to work at the McBryde Plantation in Hanapēpē
• The Police, armed with clubs and guns, come to “rescue” the workers and a battle starts between the workers on strike and the police
• 16 Filipino workers and 4 police die in the fight. 101 Filipino workers are arrested.

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Pablo Manlapit, founder of the Filipino Labor Union

1924 Kaua’i Strike

• The strike breaks apart by the end of 1924
• Manlapit was arrested and essentially exiled from the Territory of Hawaii (he briefly returns in 1933, but was deported again in 1935)

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The Labor Union movement in Hawaii dies down for the next 10-15 years.

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Pablo Manlapit, founder of the Filipino Labor Union

Things Start to Change

Two major events helped to increase the power of unions in Hawai'i:

1. The arrival of Jack Hall to Hawai'i
2. The passage of the Hawai'i Employment Relations Act

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Jack Hall Arrives in Hawai'i

• Jack Hall came to Hawai’i in 1935
• Leadership helped Hawai'i’s ethnic groups create multi-ethnic unions
• In 1944 he became the leader of the ILWU (International Longshore and Warehouse Union) in Hawai’i.

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Hawai'i Employment Relations Act

1945 - Hawai'i territorial legislature passed a law giving agricultural workers right to organize.

• Gave workers in Hawai'i legal right to organize into large multi-ethnic unions
• Made it illegal to fire workers simply for organizing into unions to improve their working conditions

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1946 ILWU Strike

• Labor Union movements in the US, especially with dock workers (longshoremen) picks up in the 1930s.
• Longshoremen in Hawai’i created and joined multi-ethnic unions and achieved the 1st written labor contract on June 12, 1941
• Pearl Harbor and WWII stops the labor movement as martial law (rule by the military) is declared in the Islands and everyone is required to report to work or be imprisoned.

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1946 ILWU Strike

• ILWU (International Longshore and Warehouse Union) actively started recruiting plantation workers to join their union.
• Unlike previous labor unions, the ILWU recruited workers from all ethnicities.
• By 1946, over 28,000 plantation workers had joined the union.

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1946 ILWU Strike

• September 1, 1946 26,000+ workers go on strike, completely shutting down 33 out of the 34 sugar plantations in Hawai’i.
• The strike was organized with everyone having a job to do and all ethnicities represented in leadership positions in the union.

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1946 ILWU Strike

• No one was evicted from their plantation houses as the workers threatened to march to city hall and live there.
• The strike ended after 79 days on November 17, 1946 with an agreement between the ILWU and the HSPA.

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1946 ILWU Strike

Results

• Wages increase by 19 cents per hour (20-40%)
• Perquisite system converted into increased pay
• Hours reduced to 46 per week
• ILWU workers join the Democratic Party and help end the HSPA controlled Republican Party rule of Hawai’i

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The End of the Plantations

The last plantation, HC&S at Pu‘unene, Maui officially closed in 2016. Ending 181 years of sugar production in Hawai’i.

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The Sugar Industry, more than anything else, shaped what Hawai’i has become since it first started at Koloa back in 1835.

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Effect Types

Social - People and their relationships. Culture.

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Economic - Money, Trade, Business, Resources

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Political - Government, Laws, Leaders.

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Plantation Social Effects

Social - People and their relationships. Culture.

• Pidgin (Hawai’i Creole English) develops as a means of communication between workers of different ethnicities on the plantation.

Example:

English - I’m trying to think

Pidgin - I tryin fo tink

English - When I was little

Pidgin - small kid time

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Plantation Social Effects

Social - People and their relationships. Culture.

• Pidgin is the unofficial language of Hawai’i (especially in the outer islands and outside Honolulu)
• A new local culture developed from the mix of cultures on the plantations becomes the dominant culture of Hawai’i

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Plantation Social Effects

Social - People and their relationships. Culture.

• Before 1920 there were only 4 public high schools in Hawai’i. Most children out of school by the 8th grade.
• Plantation owners didn’t want the children of plantation workers highly educated, because then they wouldn’t want to work on plantations

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Plantation Social Effects

Social - People and their relationships. Culture.

• Federal Survey of 1920 spurred the creation of more public high schools across the Islands, giving more children access to a high school education
• Ethnic Language Schools and English Standard Schools were separated until after World War II.

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Farrington is founded in 1936.

Plantation Economic Effects

Economic - Money, Trade, Business, Resources

• Unions (like the ILWU) form and earn higher wages, less hours, and other benefits for plantation workers
• Sugarcane production declines starting in the 1970s as production costs increase and competition from other countries increases.
• Tourism starts to develop as an industry in the 1960s. Tourism increases land values which further hurts plantations that now have to pay higher property taxes.

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Plantation Economic Effects

Economic - Money, Trade, Business, Resources

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Plantation Economic Effects

Economic - Money, Trade, Business, Resources

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Plantation Economic Effects

Economic - Money, Trade, Business, Resources

In 2017

• A total of over 9.2 million people visited Hawai’i.
• On average, there were 228,775 visitors here each day.
• Visitors spent over $16.78 Billion, of which $1.96 Billion went to the State Government in taxes.
• Over 204,000 people worked in the tourism industry.

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Plantation Political Effects

Political - Government, Laws, Leaders.

• Big Five / HSPA control the Republican Party and the Territorial Government of Hawai’i until 1954
• Unions and other groups led by John A. Burns, join the Democratic Party and win control of the government in 1954.
• After the 1954 Democratic Revolution, workers not plantation owners control the government.

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