But the Japanese had caught a vision of what Mr. Ishii was trying to do, and at great danger to themselves they continued to meet with him, and one day in January he told them gravely, and with the sadness that comes from seeing fine plans destroyed, “The managers will not listen to our demands. We shall have to strike.”
The next day Honolulu was marked by many pamphlets bearing the unmistakable touch of Mr. Ishii, his florid manner of expression and his hope: “Good men and ladies of Hawaii. We, the laborers who grow the sugar upon which you live, address you with humility and hope. Did you know, as you drive past our waving fields of cane, that the men who grow it receive only seventy-seven cents a day? On this money we raise our children and teach them good manners and teach them to be decent citizens. But on this money we also starve.
“We love Hawaii and consider it a great privilege and pride to live under the Stars and Stripes, which stands for freedom and justice. We are happy to be part of the great sugar industry and to keep the plantations running profitably.
“We love work. Thirty-five years ago when we first came to Hawaii the lands where we now work were covered with ohia and guava and wild grass. Day and night have we worked, cutting those parasites and burning the grass. Our work has made the plantations, but of course it is indisputable that we could not have succeeded were it not for the investments made by wealthy capitalists and the untiring efforts of the lunas and administrators. But Hawaii must not magnify the contributions of the capitalists and forget the equal contributions of the laborers who have served faithfully with sweat on their brows.
“Look at the silent tombstones in every locality. They are the last emblems of Hawaii’s pioneers in labor. Why should they die in poverty while others get rich from their labors? Why should hard-working men continue to get seventy-seven cents a day? The other day a plantation manager said, ‘I think of field hands as I do jute bags. Buy them, use them, buy others.’ We think of ourselves as human beings and as members of the great human family. We want $1.25 a day for an eight-hour day. And in the interests of common humanity we deserve it.”
This extraordinary preamble to the workers’ demands was received differently in four different quarters. When Kamejiro Sakagawa and his co-workers heard the flowery words read to them in Japanese, with lunas at hand to take down the names of everyone attending the meeting, Kamejiro listened with amazement that his friend Mr. Ishii should have caught so exactly the emotions that motivated the workers. With tears in his eyes he said, “Inoguchi-san? Have you ever heard a better piece of paper? He says that we are part of the great human family. Did you ever think of yourself that way before?”
“All I think,” Inoguchi-san replied, “is that there’s going to be trouble.”
To his wife Yoriko, Kamejiro said, “When I heard Ishii-san’s statement, I was glad for every dollar I ever loaned him. It looks as if we will get all we have asked for, because that is a very powerful bit of reasoning.”
His stolid wife was more of Inoguchi’s turn of mind. “We had better get ready to go hungry,” she warned. And that day the strike began.
When the manifesto reached Wild Whip Hoxworth, the head of the planters’ association gagged before he got to the end of it. “Mad Russian Bolshevism!” he bellowed. “Get the planters together!” When the leaders of the sugar industry were assembled, he went over the statement line by line. “ ‘We, the laborers,’ ” he read scornfully. “As if they had convened themselves into some kind of revolutionary tribunal. ‘On this money we starve.’ What a degrading, horrible play to the emotions. ‘Good men and ladies of Hawaii!’ As if by appealing to them they could by-pass those of us responsible for wages. By God, gentlemen, this document strikes at the very roots of society. It’s rampant, red, pillaging Russianism, and if there is any man in this room who breaks ranks to give those little yellow bastards an inch, I’ll personally knock him down and kick his weak-livered guts in. Is that understood?”
The other planters, who were perhaps more appalled by the Bolshevik-inspired manifesto than Wild Whip, for they had studied it in a calmer light and understood its implications better than he, showed no signs of disagreeing with their leader, and when he was satisfied on that point he passed to additional matters. “Now who in hell among you made that stupid statement about workmen and jute bags?” There was silence, and after a moment he slammed the paper on the table and growled, “It’s true, and everyone here knows it’s true. But don’t say such things. Shut up. It’s nobody’s business what you and I do or think. Shut up. There’s a dreadful spirit abroad in the world today, and I blame it all on Woodrow Wilson. Appealing to the people over the heads of their government. Just like this dirty sheet. From now on, I’ll do the talking.”
He summoned a secretary and dictated, while his astonished compatriots listened: “We have studied the statement of the Federation of Japanese Labor in Hawaii and are pleased to note its temperate tenor, its cautious manner of argument, and its refusal to stoop to violent or ill-founded reasoning. The men who wrote it are to be congratulated upon their restraint, which in previous similar disputes was not conspicuous.
“We regret, naturally, that a group of alien workmen, not citizens of this territory, should feel constrained to tell us how to manage the greatest industry in the islands, and it is our duty as loyal Americans to point out that in these years following a great war in which the principles of democracy were once more sustained against alien and unnatural enemies, the state of our economy, strained as it was by the war effort, simply cannot undertake any further aggravated expenses. A moment’s analysis of what is requested in these demands will satisfy any impartial …”
He went on and on in a tone of sweet reasonableness, and when the secretary had left he said to the sugar men, “That’s how we’ll handle the little bastards. This is a strike of alien Japanese Bolsheviks against the bulwarks of American freedom, and by God don’t let anybody forget … not for a minute. That’s the ground we’ll lick them on.”
At the offices of the Honolulu Mail the workers’ document had a staggering effect, for it was the first one in a long series of complaints to show any signs of mature composition. “Some fiendishly clever man wrote this!” the editor stormed. “Hell, if you didn’t know what it was all about you might think Thomas Jefferson or Tom Paine had done it. In my opinion, this is the most dangerous document ever to have appeared in Hawaii, and it’s got to be fought on that basis.”
The entire staff was summoned to analyze the inflammatory document, after which the editor retired to his sanctum. Carefully, and with much polishing, he wrote: “This morning the citizens of Hawaii were at last able to comprehend what has been going on in the Japanese-language schools, in the Buddhist temples, and in the murky confines of the Imperial consulate. The manifesto of the Bolshevik Japanese labor union at last drew the gauze from before our eyes. Citizens of Hawaii, we are faced by no less than an organized attempt to make these islands a subsidiary part of the Japanese empire. Already the first loops of the tentacles have been swept about Kauai and Maui and Oahu. There is afoot an evil design to remove from positions of leadership those noble and hard-working sons of American pioneers who made these islands great and to supplant them with crafty Orientals whose sole purpose is not the betterment of their people but the aggrandizement of a distant and alien empire.
“The Japanese plotters appeal to the people of Hawaii to support their cause. This newspaper appeals to the people of Hawaii to consider what it will mean to each and every one of us if the present strike should be successful. In place of far-seeing men like the Whipples, the Janderses, the Hales and the Hoxworths who have built these islands to their present position of magnificence, we would have aliens attempting to run our industries. Sugar and pineapple would languish. No cargoes would move to the mainland. Our schools would wither and our churches would be closed.
“We must fight this strike to the end. Not a single concession must be granted. The entire citizenship of Hawaii must un
ite against this alien threat. For the issue at stake is brutally clear: Do we wish Hawaii to be part of America or part of Japan? There is no point in expressing the question in any other terms, and every American who has a streak of decency in him will know how to answer the terrible challenge that has been thrown down before him. This strike must fail! There must be no wavering, for any who do waver are traitors to their nation, their homes and their God.
“Lest there be any misunderstanding as to the position of this newspaper at this time of grave crisis we wish to say this: If at any time in the process of this strike there is a choice between the total economic ruination of these islands and the turning of them over to the evil designs of the Japanese labor leaders, we unflinchingly declare that we will not only prefer but will encourage the former.”
The fourth place in Honolulu where the manifesto occasioned an unexpectedly violent reaction was in the Japanese consulate, on Nuuanu. There the second secretary got a copy at about eight o’clock, read it, felt the blood leave his face, and rushed in to see his superior, who studied it with quivering hands. “Those fools! Those fools!” the consul cried. He had not yet seen the editorial in the Honolulu Mail, but he could visualize what was going to be said. Throwing the document down, he strode back and forth in his carpeted room, then shouted at his assistant, “Why don’t those damned Japanese laborers learn to be content with what they have? The fools! Their wages here are twice what they’d be in Japan. And they get good treatment.” He continued fuming, then assembled his entire staff.
“You have severe orders,” he said coldly. “This consulate will do absolutely nothing to support the strikers. If a deputation marches on this consulate, as it has always done in the past, they are to be received with no warmth whatever. It is imperative that this strike be broken quickly.”
“Suppose the strikers seek repatriation?” an underling asked.
“Their job is to stay here, work here, and send their money back home,” the consul snapped.
“What shall we do if they appeal against police brutality?” the same underling pressed.
“Summon me. I’ll make the usual formal protests, but we must avoid seeming to be on the side of the workmen. Remember, workmen do not govern Hawaii, and our responsibility is to people like Whipple Hoxworth who do.”
“One more question, sir. Suppose the strikers ask for food?”
“Not to be granted. Gentlemen, this strike is a dangerous manifestation. If the phrases appearing in this document were to be used in Japan, those responsible would be jailed for life … or would be executed. I am appalled that decent Japanese field hands would dare to use such language. Our job is to force these men back to work. The strike must be broken, because if it isn’t, the newspapers will begin to accuse the emperor of having fomented it.”
The strike was broken, of course, but mainly by a series of adventitious developments, for on the day in February when the plantations evicted the Japanese laborers, telling them to live in the fields if necessary, by purest chance an influenza epidemic of the most virulent dimensions erupted, and in one crowded rural area where the strikers were living ten to a room or under trees, more than fifty of the workmen died. In all some five thousand strikers collapsed, many of them with no beds to sleep in and without hot food, and the subsequent death toll was interpreted by the superstitious as proof that the strike was against the will of God.
The Sakagawa family trudged twenty-six miles into Honolulu, hoping that Mr. Ishii could find them some place to stay, but he could not, and they at last took up residence with more than four hundred others in an abandoned sake brewery, where rats crawled over the children at night. There Reiko-chan caught the flu and it seemed that she was going to die. At first her mother was tempted to rail at Kamejiro for having supported the strike and having brought such misery upon his family, but when she saw with what passionate care he tended Reiko, even though she was a girl, the stolid woman forgave her husband and said, “Danna-san, we will win the strike this time, I am sure.”
But next day the Board of Health met and listened to Wild Whip Hoxworth as he pointed out: “We’re engaged in war, gentlemen, and in war you use every weapon you have. Every one. I passed by the old sake brewery last night, and it’s a health menace. I want the people in there evicted, and I want it closed.”
“Sir, there’s a lot of children in there with the flu,” a doctor protested.
“That’s why it’s got to be closed,” Hoxworth replied.
“But these people will have no place to go,” the doctor argued.
“I know. I want them to learn what it means to strike against the elements of law and order in a community.”
“But, sir, we’ve got to think …”
“Close that goddamned brewery!” Hoxworth bellowed, and it was closed.
The temperature in Hawaii never indulges in extremes, except on the tops of the volcanic mountains, where snows persist through much of the year, but February nights can be miserably chilling, and for two influenza-ridden nights the Sakagawas slept on the ground near Iwilei. Kamejiro held the sick girl Reiko in his arms and his wife cradled Shigeo, the baby, and the nights were bad, but on the third day Mr. Ishii found them and said, “I have found a but where an old woman died,” and they wolfed down the food that she would have eaten had she lived.
For three weeks the epidemic raged and the deaths of exposed workmen reached toward the hundred mark. At the end of this time, Mr. Ishii, Kamejiro and Inoguchi-san organized a committee of sixteen who marched lawfully up Nuuanu to the Japanese consulate, seeking help in that quarter. They were met by an official in black-rimmed glasses, cutaway coat and nervous grin. Allowing Mr. Ishii to do their speaking, the men said, “We are being very poorly treated by the Americans, and we must come to the Imperial government for help.”
“The Imperial government is protecting Japanese interests with studious care,” the official assured the deputation. “Only yesterday His Excellency protested to the Chief of Police against keeping the Japanese from holding legal meetings.”
“But they are throwing us out of our homes, and our men are dying in the fields,” Mr. Ishii said quietly.
With equal calmness the spokesman explained, “His Excellency only last week looked into the law and found that the plantations have the right to expel you … if you strike.”
“But there is a great sickness in these islands,” Mr. Ishii protested.
“Then perhaps the strike ought to terminate,” the spokesman suggested.
“But we can’t live on seventy-seven cents a day.”
“In Japan your brothers surely live on much less,” the official assured the strikers, and the fruitless interview was concluded.
Another accident which worked against the strikers was the discovery, in early May, of a schoolbook used in the Japanese schools which had a long passage explaining what was meant by the phrase used by Japan’s first emperor, “All the world under a roof of eight poles.” Quite obviously, the book explained to the children of Japan—and it was never intended for use in Hawaii but had somehow got into the islands by mistake—it was the Emperor Jimmu Tenno’s idea that all the world must some day be united into one great family paying homage to the sun goddess and obedience to the emperor, her lineal descendant. Cried the Honolulu Mail: “If anyone has wanted proof of the contentions of this newspaper that Japan intends one day to conquer the world, with Hawaii as the first step in the conquest, this evil little book proves the fact beyond contention. All the world under one roof! The local Japanese Bolsheviks have already taken the first step in that domination, and unless we remain steadfast and defeat their foul aspirations, we shall be the first foreign territory to be submerged beneath the Japanese roof.” If sugar men were growing faint-hearted as the long strike headed for its sixth harrowing month, this timely discovery of what was being taught in Japan fortified them.
Finally, there was the disgraceful affair of dynamiting the home in which Inoguchi-san of Malama Sug
ar was living. No one was killed, fortunately, but when the Honolulu Mail disclosed that Inoguchi had been dynamited because he had been in secret negotiations with the sugar planters, telling them nightly what Mr. Ishii and the committee were planning next, the community had to acknowledge that the Japanese labor leaders really were a group of determined Bolsheviks. Swift police raids swept up nineteen of the leaders, including Mr. Ishii, and threw them into jail on charges of criminal conspiracy. Wild Whip Hoxworth visited the judges involved and pointed out that the charges might better be criminal syndicalism, and they thanked him for his interest in the case.
But now the question arose as to who had taught the committee how to handle dynamite, and a reporter remembered that Kamejiro Sakagawa, who had not yet been arrested, had learned the trade while working on the tunnel. He was known to be a friend of Mr. Ishii’s, and so the police arrested him. He was thrown into jail, even though he had had nothing to do with the dynamiting, whereupon his wife Yoriko proved to the police that he had been at home caring for his sick children. The sugar committee, who were advising the district attorney as to how he should handle the case, refused to accept this alibi, pointing out: “A clever man like Sakagawa didn’t have to be actually at the scene of the crime. He could well have prepared the sticks in advance and shown his fellow conspirators how to explode them. He is obviously guilty.” And he was kept in jail.
Then the strike ended, with the workmen having gained little, and sugar was once more produced by some of the cheapest labor in America. H & H made millions carrying fresh cargoes to California, and J & W made more millions managing the plantations in the good old way. The conspirators were brought to trial and Mr. Ishii was sentenced to ten years in jail. He sagged when the words were thrown at him, falling backwards as if they had actually struck him, and from that day on he was never much of a man again. He grew to mumble and imagine things, and no one took much account of him.
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