LAXITY OF LAW

Hokitika Guardian, 9 March 1932, Page 8

LAXITY OF LAW

VICE IN HONOLULU. WHITE WOMEN BLAMED. The Hawaiian murder sensation which stirred to the depths .the racial hatreds of the, Pacific Islands and shocked, the .whole United States, reached a climax when Mrs Fortescue, the central figure and three naval men, faced a grand jury, accused of killing a native who uas recently acquitted of an attack on. Mrs Fortescue’s twenty-year-old daugh,..The following is a frank statejnenfyof the, mixed race , evils of this supposed Pacific Paradise which comes in the form of a letter written to a friend by Mrs Fortescue: — “All I ask from my many friends in Britain and Europe is patience and fair play. I am shocked to learn the versions of this affair that have reached Europe. At the proper time I will say all we have to say, and I am confident wo have nothing to fear. We have expressed our readiness to go before any tribunal they care to name, so.convinced are w e that we have justice on our side. All that has happened is due to laxity of the law. 1 “There has been far too much leniency shown to natives obviously guilty in sex offences, and in consequence the natives, particularly the half-castes, think they can attack white women with impunity. Impudent Boasts. “It has become something to boast about among tlieir friends, and in some parts of the town a native who has one or ,more of such crimes to his discredit ' is, looked upon as a hero and envied by his fellows.' I cannot acquit m.V own race and sex of a heavy share in bringing 'about the terrible state of affairs | that made possible the outrage of which my daughter was the victim. i.The curse of Honolulu to-day is the j half-caste ‘beach boys,’ those pam- | XK?red pets- of the neurotic women who I demean themselves and let down their j rnce by chasing after ‘sheiks’ and gi* | g.oloß because of the absurd Sheik Cult I created by melodramatic movie produc-

“To the lasting sliame of our race, be it said, one sees'these women running after the half-caste openly 'and shamelessly, petting them, pampering them, -and lavishing presents on them. Is ft any wonder that after this the halfcaste type should lose all sense of proportion' and think ‘that every white woman is fair game for the lustful scum of society ? I ask those who are mothers to put thpmselves in my place when I learned of the diabolical outrage to which my child had been subjected. My mother’s heart was wrung, as that of any normal woman would be. My blood seethed when T found the natives Laughing at the lejgal proceedings taken against the fiends' suspected of the attack on my daughter. “Whatever .my fate and the fate of those associated with me, we shall think lit of little account if it serve* to h-”’" before the publib the iniquities that flourish in. these islands and lead to the law being enforced. The natives of the type I mention laugh at the law. In tiie native quarters white women are jeered at as the playthings of the commonest half-caste types. Indignant as we may feel at this, we cannot E 6 * away from the terrible fact that our own race and sex have contributed to creating this reproach.’’