Akaka Bill - Support

Support

Although the bill has changed substantially since some of these groups announced their support, supporters of the bill have included:

1. President Barack Obama
2. Hawai`i's Democratic congressional delegation Senators Daniel Akaka and Daniel K. Inouye and Representative Mazie Hirono.
3. Hawai`i's Democratic State Governor and former congressional Representative Neil Abercrombie.
4. Hawai`i's State legislature, which has unanimously passed at least three resolutions supporting federal recognition for Native Hawaiians.
5. The National Congress of American Indians, the oldest and largest national Native American organization.
6. The Alaska Federation of Natives, the largest organization representing the Native people of Alaska.
7. The National Indian Education Association.
8. The American Bar Association.
9. The Japanese American Citizens League.
10. Those who seek legislation to provide federal recognition for Native Hawaiians to ensure that the native (especially at-risk) population continues to receive services in health care, housing, education, job training, employment, culture, and the arts.

Supporters of the bill seek to protect the programs assisting Native Hawaiians, such as the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and the Kamehameha Schools, as well as health-care and housing for the Hawaiian population. Senator Akaka said, as he introduced the 2007 version on the Congressional floor,

"The legislation I introduce today seeks to build upon the foundation of reconciliation. It provides a structured process to bring together the people of Hawai`i, along a path of healing to a Hawai`i where its indigenous people are respected and culture is embraced. Through enactment of this legislation, we have the opportunity to demonstrate that our country does not just preach its ideas, but lives according to its founding principles. As it has for America's other indigenous peoples, I believe the United States must fulfill its responsibility to Native Hawaiians."

In response to opponents who state the bill is race-based, supporters of the bill - including other Congressional delegates, Governor Lingle, Hawai`i Attorney General Bennett, Native American groups, and Asian American groups - argue that rejecting the bill would be racially discriminatory. Supporters also argue that the State legislature, which has unanimously supported the bill, is bi-partisan, multiracial, and multicultural and, as Hawai`i residents, closely understand the needs of the Native Hawaiian community. In support of the bill, Senator Inouye responded that failing to pass the bill would discriminate against the Native Hawaiians, for Congress had already provided federal recognition of the other indigenous and aboriginal peoples of America. He also argued that the Rice v. Cayetano case cited by opponents was irrelevant to the Akaka Bill, reminding Congress that current Chief Justice John Roberts himself had written the State brief and had argued that Native Hawaiians were aboriginal and indigenous people and could be recognized as such by Congress. Senator Akaka had also asserted in his introduction of the bill:

This measure does not result in race discrimination. But discrimination will occur if this measure is not passed. It is undisputed that Native Hawaiians are the aboriginal, indigenous people of Hawaii. Yet some of my colleagues want to discriminate against them and treat them differently from other Native Americans -- the American Indian and the Alaska Native.

In response to opponents citing Congressional requirements for Native Americans and arguing that Native Hawaiians don’t meet such requirements, Governor Lingle and Hawai`i Attorney General Bennett responded that the bill did not authorize Native Hawaiian participation in American Indian programs, that Native Americans and Alaska Natives support the bill, that to suggest otherwise resulted in placing native groups against each other, that barring Native Hawaiians from programs that provided to other natives was offensive. In addition, they also wrote:

“The arguments against recognition for Native Hawaiians because Hawaiians cannot satisfy the requirements Congress set out for the recognition of Native Americans (in the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934) are simply not relevant because Congress has not and need not include those conditions in S. 147. Native Hawaiians have always had to rely on a separate bill for recognition because the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 was never intended to be the means of providing recognition for Native Hawaiians –- it literally only applies to the native people of the "continental United States." See 25 U.S.C. § 473; 25 C.F.R. § 83.3....

Rather than crack the "melting pot" that is Hawaii (an outcome opponents of S. 147 purport to fear), passage of S. 147 will finally give official and long overdue recognition to the losses Hawaiians have suffered -- the blurring, if not diminution, of Hawaiians’ native identity; the erosion of their confidence as a people; the destruction of any semblance of self-determination and self-governance; and, as the United States Supreme Court put it, the loss of a "culture and way of life." Finally, Native Hawaiians will have restored to them what they lost more than a hundred years ago -- status as a people and recognition of their roots.

In a 2005 interview, Senator Akaka said that the bill, "creates a government-to-government relationship with the United States” as it provides a legal parity similar to that of native tribal governments in the contiguous states and Alaska. When the reporter commented that the bill could potentially lead to independence, Senator Akaka replied "that could be" but that it would be up to future generations to decide. Some who oppose the bill cite this statement as indicative of its potential support of secession of a Native Hawaiian government from the United States. However, the 2007 version of the bill has specified that secession is not a provision of the bill.