The Oahu College at the Sandwich Islands

by Punahou School

The charter recognizes the design of the institution to be "the training of youth in the various branches of a Christian education, teaching them sound and useful knowledge." It further states, that, "as it is reasonable that the Christian education should be in conformity to the general views of the founders and patrons of the institution, no course of instruction shall be deemed lawful in said institution, which is not accordant with the principles of Protestant Evangelical Christianity, as held by that body of Protestant Christians in the United States of America, which originated the Christian mission to the Islands, and to whose labors and benevolent contributions the people of these Islands are so greatly indebted." There is also an additional security for the institution in the following article, namely,—"Whenever a vacancy shall occur in said corporation, it shall be the duty of the Trustees to fill the same with all reasonable and convenient dispatch. And every new election shall be immediately made known to the Prudential Committee of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, and be subject to their approval or rejection, and this power of revision shall be continued to the American Board for twenty years from the date of this charter."

The Sandwich Islands Christianized.

The effort to christianize the Sandwich Islands was begun in the year 1820, and has succeeded beyond any similar efforts recorded in history. In the year 1853, a little more than thirty years from the commencement of the mission, the Board was able to make proclamation in the Annual Report, that the people of the Sandwich Islands had become a Christian nation. The proofs then adduced of this fact were beyond all controversy; such as entitled the Hawaiian nation to the Christian name, if any people on earth might claim it; though without that intellectual development and social culture, which enter so deeply into the modern idea of civilization. But even in respect to these things a vast work had been accomplished.

It was evident to the Prudential Committee, as early as the year 1848, that the time had come for a change of some sort in the relations of the missionaries to the people of the Islands and to the Board. They saw that new and additional motives must be presented to induce the married missionaries to remain at the Islands, or the greater part of them might feel constrained to return to this country within a few years, to make provision for their children. This was not owing simply, nor chiefly, to the number and age of their children, (for such a result was nowhere seen in the older missions elsewhere,) but to the novel and remarkable relations, at that time, of the mission to the people of the Sandwich Islands.

The problem, as then presented, was, how to give scope to the parental feelings in missionaries, without increasing burdens and expenses that could not be borne; though it soon appeared that there was really a higher problem to be solved, and one that was novel in missions, namely, how to bring the mission itself, as such, to a termination, dissolving its relations to the Board, and merging its members in the newly created Christian community. The first problem stated came first in the order of time, and it involved the solution of the other. It was, how to convert the Islands into the home of the missionaries, (which the peculiar relation of the Islands to the commercial world then rendered possible,) and the missionaries into citizens and pastors. This was effected, so far as the action of the Prudential Committee was concerned, by a series of resolutions made public in the Report of the Board for the year 1849. The response of the missionaries was in general favorable, though it required five years was complete the arrangement. The case was unprecedented; there was no experience; every step had to be considered in its principles, its equity, and its expediency. The transition was at length effected, and the mission was merged in the general Christian community of the Islands. The meeting of the mission in May, 1853, was its last meeting in its associated, corporate character as a mission,—responsible, as such, to the Board, controlling, as such, the operations of its members. The relations of the ministry and churches of the Sandwich Islands towards the Board and its patrons, and towards other foreign missions and the Christian church at large, then became those of an independent Christian community. The salaries of the native pastors, the cost of church buildings, and the greater part of the cost of schools, were to be met (as in fact they have been) by the natives. So was the support of Hawaiian missionaries, whether sent to Micronesia, or to the Marquesas Islands. It was only in part, however, that the natives could support their foreign pastors. The Board, in this new relation of things, would have to sustain to the new Christian community a relation like that, which the Home Missionary Society sustains to the Christian community in Oregon or California; and it might be necessary to continue this relation for some time.

Native College at Lahainaluna.

The first important step taken at the Islands after the mission had responded, in the year 1849, to the proposals of the Prudential Committee, was the transfer, by the Board, of the native Seminary or College at Lahainaluna to the Hawaiian Government. This is wholly for natives. The transfer was made on the condition, that the institution should continue to cultivate sound literature and science, and not allow to be taught religious doctrines contrary to those heretofore inculcated by the mission. In case of the non-fulfillment of the conditions, the whole property, with any additions and improvements made upon the premises, was to revert to the Board. The government have since sustained two clerical professors obtained from the company of missionaries, and the institution answers the purpose of a College for the native community. It is not adapted, however, nor can it be, to the wants of the foreign community.

Necessity for the College at Punahou.

The Oahu College is open to natives speaking the English language; but it is especially designed for pupils from that increasing and important portion of the Hawaiian community, which is of foreign origin. This of course includes those who have heretofore constituted the mission. These, with their families, must be regarded as in the highest degree essential to the religious welfare of the Islands. Their children, now at the Islands in a course of education, not including those too young for school, nor those in the colleges and schools of the United States, number one hundred and forty-five. To remove even a considerable portion of these for education to the United States, would be at great expense and inconvenience, and there is a growing conviction among the parents, that their children must be chiefly educated there. "They can there," says one of the most experienced of the parents, "be under parental guardianship and home influences; and this will help to retain both parents and children in the field. The education will be less perfect than in the United States, but it will fit them better, in some respects, to labor in the land of their birth, than an education in a foreign country. The parents will seek an education for their children elsewhere, if it be not provided for them at the Islands; but it is believed that most of them will retain their children there, if a college be there provided."

The number of foreign residents and their descendants is increasing at the Sandwich Islands. An intelligent glance at the future will show, that this enterprising community is destined to exert a very commanding influence in that increasingly important part of the world, and that the necessity of its being well educated cannot be over-estimated. The foreign community now springing up at the Sandwich Islands will inevitably shape the character and destiny of the whole northern Pacific. The missionary part of this community has now the vantage ground as regards all good influences, and with the divine blessing is able to mould the literary and religious institutions of the Hawaiian nation. Religion, just now, has a strong hold on those Islands. The present is, therefore, a favorable time to institute a College, and put it into a working condition.