SUNDAY, JANUARY 10, 2010 9:25:00 PM
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Schweitzer to headline again at national trial lawyer convention
BY CHRIS RIZO
WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline)- Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer will one of the featured speakers at the American Association for Justice's winter convention in Hawaii next month, the trial lawyer group said.
Schweitzer, a Democrat, made national headlines over a speech he gave to AAJ members at their 2008 summer convention in Philadelphia. There, Schweitzer suggested that he influenced the outcome of his state's 2006 U.S. Senate race in favor of fellow Democrat Jon Tester. In his speech, which wound up on the Internet, Schweitzer said he used his position as governor to "turn some dials" in that election. He claimed to have delayed the release of Butte-Silver Bow County's mid-term election results and talked of tribal police running off Republican poll watchers on reservations. After news of the speech emerged, Schweitzer said he was only kidding. The Montana attorney general at the time, fellow Democrat Mike McGrath, declined to investigate the matter. Also speaking at the AAJ convention on Feb. 1 is U.S. Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawaii, who's running for governor of the Aloha State this year, vying to succeed Republican Gov. Linda Lingle. AAJ's five-day convention is being held in Maui. The theme: "Networking in Paradise." Formerly known as the Association of Trial Lawyers of America, the Washington-based American Association for Justice supports efforts to expand civil liability and opposes tort reforms and efforts to streamline state laws, particularly as they relate to personal injury and consumer protection. From Legal Newsline: Reach staff reporter Chris Rizo at chrisrizo@legalnewsline.com. |
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I will return to up date and rewrite this posting!
Walking in a dirt lane in Kaimuki was the beginning from point A to B for Judge Richardson. The pathway to 'natural law' in Hawaii thanks to Former Judge William Shaw Richarson.
Filing for water--follower knew how to decide for our people
Use the American System and the Hawaiian system--trying to resolve..not reject the old ways nor the new ways.
Taking the good parts of the Hawaiian Nation and build from their. State own volcano..expand native Hawaiian rights...
Cases..held back by the former CJ...important ones set aside...water, beaches, plantation difference..general growth of Hawaii...English law...alii law of the monarchy...try to apply those to the extent of we could. For example, new lawa...beaches was needed ...(private property)...people should be able to use the beaches...to the way the Hawaiians did it! Rights of citizens to challenge ...use of private property... (native Hawaiian rights). Water rights was so important...how much water? Third one to the detriment to another...taro patches...streams ...rice patch owners...end of the line! What was best for our people!
Beach access..native Hawaiian gathering rights..access to property undeveloped ...allow cameras in the room...love...car.... Thank you for sharing your dad with us!
Posted on: Sunday, January 18, 2004
COMMENTARY
OHA trying to eliminate options
By Anne Keala Kelly
Given the relentless nature of the federal recognition juggernaut, considering some basic truths is an imperative for Hawaiians.
When I say Hawaiians, I am referring to kanaka/kanaka maoli/kanaka 'oiwi, the descendants of the original people of this place whose 'ohana signed the Ku'e Petitions of 1897. I realize there were non-kanaka who signed that petition, but I'm talking about Hawaiians in and out of Hawai'i who are eligible for federal recognition.
The Ku'e Petitions represent the voice of almost every one of the nearly 40,000 Hawaiians who were alive in 1897 and as a people and an independent nation-state rejected attempts by the United States to occupy and annex Hawai'i. They did not want federal recognition, federal money for healthcare and education ... they didn't want federal anything.
Anyone with some knowledge of Hawaiian culture and the sovereignty struggle knows that to Hawaiians, the Ku'e Petitions, more than 100 years later, offer some of the most compelling evidence of resistance. The petitions are free of the Americanized interpretation of Hawaiian history, and are experienced by many Hawaiians as something like a direct communication from kupuna (elders) to 'opio (the young).
Culturally speaking, what one's kupuna wants is usually not debatable, and in some ways is like a command. That is why most Hawaiians who have seen the petitions or know of them react so powerfully. This document has opened the hearts and minds of Hawaiians in a way that "enrolling" and "federalizing" them will never achieve. The tens of thousands who signed the petitions are no longer living, but they have more power in death than the state and federal government, and all the Hawaiians they've manipulated into promoting federal recognition have in life.
Whether or not you agree with my analysis of how the Ku'e Petitions influence the issue of federal recognition, it's only one of the many reasons I have for disagreeing with the "enrollment" the Office of Hawaiian Affairs began yesterday.
It was the 111th anniversary of the illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom and Queen Lili'uokalani. And OHA used it, while cloaked with illegal-overthrow indignation, to begin its enrollment. OHA attempted to co-opt the commemoration of an event that represents the opposite of federal recognition.
So threatened with irrelevance, OHA became political vandals, in a way, committing a kind of sacrilege. Strong language? Consider it this way: If OHA, the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement (CNHA) and others have their way, the 112th anniversary of the illegal overthrow will become the first anniversary of the day Hawaiians signed up to acquiesce to the U.S. takeover of the Hawaiian kingdom.
OHA's elected trustees work for the state. They were elected by natives and non-natives, and are paid by all the taxpayers. I don't like what Freddie Rice and his cohorts did. It was white supremacy, using the judicial system to create a metaphor for cross-burning. Instead of burning it in front of a house or a church belonging to black people, they burned it in front of a distressed state agency that looks like it belongs to Hawaiians.
But still, OHA was told by the Supreme Court that conducting elections for Hawaiians only is unconstitutional. Therefore, wouldn't it stand to reason that the Rice v. Cayetano decision that invalidates Hawaiian-only elections conducted by a state agency extends its reach to include OHA's enrollment of Hawaiians for the purposes of electing delegates?
Also, OHA has spent into the millions of dollars to convince Hawaiians and lawmakers to ignore other legal and political options and to go along with federal recognition legislation that requires an election.
Even if OHA manages to separate itself from the physical process by hiring the CNHA to conduct the enrollment and/or the convention, isn't OHA still setting up an election? It's as if OHA believes the ends justify the means — that fixing the primary will have nothing to do with the election's outcome.
Pro-federal recognition entities insist Hawaiians can be a tribe that equates "self-determination" with voluntarily giving the ever-changing U.S. Congress plenary power over them as a people, and that doing so won't affect independence claims in the international courts. They've fully embraced the "corporate model" that Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawai'i, has been trying to establish since Alaska Native tribes signed a land claims settlement act in 1972. Simultaneously, they deny being opposed to Hawaiian independence.
OHA represents the interests of the state and federal governments. Both want to end Hawaiian claims to the nearly 2 million acres of crown and government land, aka "ceded lands." And yet OHA insists it represents the Hawaiian people, even though it has not given independence advocates even a fraction of the money it has spent on lawyers and lobbying and "educational" programs that promote federal recognition.
There is no place for OHA in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement. Discourse about sovereignty includes independence. The Ku'e Petitions have galvanized that.
Messy as it may seem to people who are too inconvenienced by that fact, or who have no imagination for a Hawai'i where America isn't running the show, Hawaiians are talking independence and looking for ways to live it, create it and reclaim it.
Where is OHA? Leading a congressionally driven rush to solidify power over the Hawaiian people.
Anne Keala Kelly is a historian and writer based in Honolulu.
December 23, 2010
January 13-14, 2011: Fifth Hawaii Land Use Conference
Posted on: Friday, August 4, 2006
Thousands of lawyers in Hawai'i for national convention
By Audrey McAvoy
Associated Press
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The legality of written exceptions that President Bush attaches to some bills he signs into law tops the agenda for the American Bar Association as the nation's largest lawyers group opened its convention in Hawai'i yesterday.
Some 5,000 lawyers had registered in advance for the six days of meetings at the Hawai'i Convention Center.
ABA lawyers also planned to discuss how the United States should protect civil liberties while fighting a war on terror. There will be other sessions on healthcare, immigration and entertainment law.
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy and former Philippines Chief Justice Helario Davide Jr. are being honored tomorrow at an International Rule of Law Luncheon.
But the issue of whether Bush has the power to attach so-called signing statements to legislation he signs may grab the most attention.
A bar association task force said in a report last month that the president overstepped his authority in attaching negating challenges to hundreds of new laws rather than simply vetoing them. The statements suggest Bush will decline to enforce some laws, the task force said.
ABA policymakers are expected to decide during the meeting — which ends Tuesday — whether to adopt the report denouncing the signing statements and whether to challenge Bush's actions in court.
The association says Bush has made more than 800 signing statement challenges compared with about 600 such statements for all other presidents combined.
Legal issues involving the war on terror also are expected to be prominent at the convention.
A panel discussion entitled "Liberty and Security" features John Yoo, a former Justice Department lawyer who in 2002 helped write internal memos designed to give the government more leeway to aggressively question terror suspects.
Yoo is now a law professor at the University of California-Berkeley. A former Central Intelligence Agency lawyer is scheduled to join Yoo on that panel on Monday.
Some of the lawyers also plan to enjoy Hawai'i's famed surf, with about 60 expected to sign up for the National Lawyers on Longboards Surfing Contest.
The ABA declined to sponsor the surfing event. Organizers said the group didn't want to be sued in case of accidents.
Local Hawai'i lawyers didn't let that stop them. They plan to host the contest and a lu'au on the convention's last day anyway, though they will require all participants to sign a liability waiver.
Lifeguards also will be on duty in case anyone has trouble in the water.