The politics of the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only state ...

typically take place within the framework of a

Democrat Democrat, Democrats, or Democratic may refer to: Politics *A proponent of democracy, or democratic government; a form of government involving rule by the people. *A member of a Democratic Party: **Democratic Party (United States) (D) **Democratic ...

-dominated

government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is ...

. The Democratic Party in Hawaii was formed in 1900, by supporters of Queen Liliʻuokalani. For the first half of the twentieth century, the Republican Party ruled comfortably, dominating local politics until the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. After the war, Honolulu police officer

John A. Burns John Anthony Burns (March 30, 1909 – April 5, 1975) was an American politician. Burns was born in Montana and became a resident of Hawaii in 1913. He served as the second governor of Hawaii from 1962 to 1974. Early life John Burns was ...

began organizing plantation laborers, including many Japanese Americans and Filipino Americans and built a coalition that gradually strengthened the Democratic Party in Hawaii. This culminated in the Hawaii Democratic Revolution of 1954, after which Republican political influence in the islands was greatly diminished. As a result, Hawaii's congressional politics are typically dominated by Democrats since statehood in 1959. The state has elected just one Republican U.S. senator, Hiram Fong, who served from 1959 to 1977, and two GOP House members. The rest have been Democrats. Only two Republicans have been elected governor, and

Linda Lingle Linda Lingle (''née'' Cutter; June 4, 1953) is an American politician, who was the sixth governor of Hawaii from 2002 until 2010. She was the first Republican governor of Hawaii since 1962. Lingle was also the state's first female and first J ...

was the only one to be re-elected, in 2006. Hawaii has supported Democrats in every presidential election in which it has participated, except

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using mean solar tim ...

and

1984 Events January * January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888. * January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeas ...

, when incumbent Republican candidates won 49-state landslides. In 2004,

John Kerry John Forbes Kerry (born December 11, 1943) is an American attorney, politician and diplomat who currently serves as the first United States special presidential envoy for climate. A member of the Forbes family and the Democratic Party, he ...

won the state's 4 electoral votes by a margin of 9 percentage points with 54% of the vote. Every county in the state supported the Democratic candidate. In

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the ...

won by an overwhelming 45-point lead: 72% for the Democrat and 27% for Republican John McCain. Hawaii is the only actual state that gave either candidate more than 70% of the vote. Obama again won Hawaii by a large margin in

2012 File:2012 Events Collage V3.png, From left, clockwise: The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia lies capsized after the Costa Concordia disaster; Damage to Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey as a result of Hurricane Sandy; People gat ...

, suffering only a small swing against him, winning 71% to 28% for Republican Mitt Romney. Hawaii once again gave a higher vote share to Obama than any of the 49 other states, though on this occasion, Obama's vote was not quite as high as his challenger's best state (

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

, where Mitt Romney polled 73%).

State government

The Hawaii state government is composed of a

bicameral system Bicameralism is a type of legislature, one divided into two separate assemblies, chambers, or houses, known as a bicameral legislature. Bicameralism is distinguished from unicameralism, in which all members deliberate and vote as a single grou ...

, with the

Hawaii senate The Hawaii Senate is the upper house of the Hawaii State Legislature. It consists of twenty-five members elected from an equal number of constituent districts across the islands and is led by the President of the Senate, elected from the membe ...

and the

Hawaii House of Representatives The Hawaii House of Representatives is the lower house of the Hawaii State Legislature. Pursuant to Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution of Hawaii, amended during the 1978 constitutional convention, the House of Representatives consists ...

making up the upper and lower houses. ,

Shan Tsutsui Shan S. Tsutsui (born August 9, 1971) is an American politician who was the 12th lieutenant governor of Hawaii from 2012 to 2018. A member of the Democratic Party, he was previously a member of the Hawaii Senate from 2003 to 2012, and he served ...

Lt. Governor of Hawaii
(Democrat)

Hawaii's Federal Representation

Hawaii is currently represented in the Senate by Democrats

Mazie Hirono Mazie Keiko Hirono (; Japanese name: , ; born November 3, 1947) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the junior United States senator from Hawaii since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party, Hirono previously served as a member of t ...

and Brian Schatz. In the House, Democrats

Ed Case Edward Espenett Case (born September 27, 1952) is an American lawyer and Democratic politician serving as the U.S. representative for Hawaii's 1st congressional district, which covers the urban core of Honolulu. He represented the 2nd distr ...

( HI-1) and Jill Tokuda ( HI-2) represent the state. File:Brian Schatz, official portrait, 113th Congress 2.jpg, Brian Schatz
U.S. Senior Senator
(Democrat) File:Mazie Hirono, official portrait, 113th Congress.jpg,

U.S. Junior Senator
(Democrat) File:Ed Case, official portrait, 117th Congress.jpg ,

U.S. Representative HI-01
(Democrat) File:Rep. Jill Tokuda official photo, 118th Congress (1).jpg, Jill Tokuda
U.S. Representative HI-02
(Democrat) Hawaii is part of the

United States District Court for the District of Hawaii The United States District Court for the District of Hawaii (in case citations, D. Haw.) is the principal trial court of the United States Federal Court System in the state of Hawaii. The court's territorial jurisdiction encompasses the sta ...

in the federal judiciary. The district's cases are appealed to the San Francisco-based

United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (in case citations, 9th Cir.) is the U.S. federal court of appeals that has appellate jurisdiction over the U.S. district courts in the following federal judicial districts: * District ...

County government

Each of Hawaii's four counties is governed by a mayor as follows: City and County of Honolulu -

Rick Blangiardi Rick Blangiardi (born September 15, 1946) is an American television executive and politician from the state of Hawaii. Blangiardi was elected mayor of Honolulu in the 2020 mayoral election, and took office on January 2, 2021. He previously worke ...

County of Hawaii - Mitch Roth
County of Maui - Richard Bissen
County of Kauai - Derek Kawakami

Hawaiian nationalism

Hawaiian nationalism is focused on producing a national identity. Most Hawaiian nationalists have argued that the Hawaiian race and their descendants should govern the islands as a

constitutional monarchy A constitutional monarchy, parliamentary monarchy, or democratic monarchy is a form of monarchy in which the monarch exercises their authority in accordance with a constitution and is not alone in decision making. Constitutional monarchies dif ...

. It is also important to note that Hawaiian nationalism is not limited to Native Hawaiians but have included other groups including

whites White is a racialized classification of people and a skin color specifier, generally used for people of European origin, although the definition can vary depending on context, nationality, and point of view. Description of populations as ...

and Asians such as Walter M. Gibson. The popular green, red and yellow flag, the ''Kanaka Maoli'' flag was designed around the 1990s, probably by Gene Simeona. According to Dr. David Keanu Sai of the

University of Hawaiʻi The University of Hawaiʻi System, formally the University of Hawaiʻi and popularly known as UH, is a public college and university system that confers associate, bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees through three universities, seven com ...

, it had no historical significance before the 1990s, after which it was reported (and widely believed) to be an "original" flag of the Kingdom of Hawaii destroyed by the British. Dr. Sai stated that it was in fact a modern design, part of a "reawakening" of awareness of the Kingdom's history; he added that the present-day Hawaiian

state flag In vexillology, a state flag is either the flag of the government of a sovereign state, or the flag of an individual federated state (subnational administrative division). Government flag A state flag is a variant of a national flag (or occasi ...

was also the Kingdom's flag (in the 19th century), designed by King

Kamehameha I Kamehameha I (; Kalani Paiea Wohi o Kaleikini Kealiikui Kamehameha o Iolani i Kaiwikapu kaui Ka Liholiho Kūnuiākea; – May 8 or 14, 1819), also known as Kamehameha the Great, was the conqueror and first ruler of the Kingdom of Hawaii. Th ...

. File:Flag of Hawaii Hawaiian sovereignty.svg, '' Ka Hae Hawaiʻi'' flown upside down, symbolizing distress, used by Hawaiian separatists File:Kanaka Maoli flag.svg, ''Kanaka Maoli'' flag, popular in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement since the 1990s Most citizens of Hawaii do not share the same sentiments of the sovereignty movement with public opinion seemly be in favor of remaining part of the United States. As of 2014 a poll by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser found that only 6% of respondents supported the creation of a Native Hawaiian nation with 63% being against it.

References

External links