Don Wildman

These were American businessmen who were threatening this?

The takeaway is they've stripped the monarchy of most of its power, much of its power, shifting that to the legislature, disenfranchising many native Hawaiians while empowering American and European residents.

Petitions, public meetings, political organizing was already taking place prior to this overthrow.

But this changes everything.

And so let's take a break.

And when we come back, we'll talk about the new legacy of the Bayonet Constitution and what happens towards the end of the century.

Welcome back.

We're speaking with Professor Noah Dolom of the University of Hawaii.

Noah, in the late 19th century, as events unfold, the monarch in power, what we're about to speak about, her name is Queen Liliuokalani, who has ascended the throne after the death of her brother.

Who was this queen and what were her goals?

So she basically wants to take back the power that the monarch used to have and so forth.

And this was a legal proposal, but it threatened the American and European elites who had benefited from the 1887 constitution.

1893, a small group of mainly American businessmen and plantation owners set up a committee of safety.

We know that from the American Revolution.

I mean, they're getting together to figure out what to do here.

January of 1893.

It's all comprised of descendants of missionaries, sugar planters.

They represent, this is important, a tiny fraction of the population.

And some members openly supported American annexation.

Yes.