Basic Information

Emma Kaʻilikapuolono Metcalf Beckley Nakuina (1847 – 1929) was born to a Native Hawaiian noble mother, Chiefess Ka’ilikapuolono, and an elite American sugar planter father, Theophilus Metcalf. She was “neither queen nor a commoner, but somewhere in the middle” (Young, 2017). She is best known as Judge Emma Nakuina, the first female judge in Hawaii to serve under the United States flag.

Background Information

Nakuina was born in the independent country of Hawaii under a constitutional monarchy where women voted and held government office. In addition to studying Hawaii’s traditions and customs, she received a broad and liberal education and was fluent in Hawaiian, English, Greek, Latin, Hebrew, French, and German (Young, 2017). King Kamehameha IV also ordered Nakuina be schooled in Hawaiian water rights and laws (Young, 2017).

Nakuina’s first husband, Frederick William Kahapula Beckley, was a plantation owner who among other things, served as chamberlain in the royal households of King Kalakaua and the governor of Kauai (Young, 2017). They had seven children. In 1881, Beckley died at age 36. From 1882 to 1887, Nakuina served as the first woman curator of the Hawaiian National Museum and Library. In 1887, she married Reverend Moses Keaea Nakuina. Sources vary on the number of children they had together. There is agreement on one son who died shortly after birth and one daughter.

In 1892, Nakuina was recognized as the expert in aquatic organisms and natural resource management (Skwiot, 2010, p. 65). This recognition and her knowledge of Hawaiian water rights and laws resulted in her being named Commissioner of Private Ways and Water Rights for Honolulu until 1907. She was nicknamed “judge of the water court” (Skwiot, 2010, p. 65).

In 1893, Hawaiian Queen Lili’uokalani was overthrown by a small group of American and European businessmen and landowners who established a provisional government (McGreevy, 2020). Under this provisional government, women were not allowed to vote. Nakuina, a prominent Hawaiian judge, could no longer vote on territorial affairs (McGreevy, 2020).

Contributions to the First Wave

The overthrow of the constitutional monarchy marked the beginning of Nakuina’s quest for the women’s right to regain the vote in Hawaii. However, she (and other women) learned this was only one part of the bigger picture. At risk was the future of Hawaii’s self-government, the inherent rights of its people, and the preservation of the Native Hawaiian natural resources and way of life (McGreevy, 2020). Their rights, freedoms, and natural environment were in jeopardy.

In the wake of the overthrow and the establishment of the new provisional government, Nakuina had an important decision to make. Should she continue to serve as Commissioner or resign? If she continued, she would be required to work with the “colonizers” (National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum, 2019). If she resigned, there would be no one as qualified as her to represent Hawaiian water rights and laws. In the end, she chose to stay. She served throughout the provisional government, the following Republic of Hawaii, and into the United States territorial government. Her 1893 paper Ancient Hawaiian Water Rights and Some of the Customs Pertaining to Them serves today as a primary source on how water was managed before the overthrow (Hopkins, 2020).

Nakuina was the senior-ranking woman in the government after the overthrow (Hopkins, 2020) and played a leading and sustained role in regaining the women’s right to vote. She was a mentor to royal and scholar Wilhelmina Dowsett. Together, they organized a campaign that eventually led the two suffragists to form in 1912 the multi-ethnic National Women’s Equal Suffrage Association of Hawai’i (WESAH) (Kamehameha Schools Ho’okahua Cultural Vibrancy Group [KSHCVG], 2021). Nakuina hosted social functions that included well-known women suffragists (National Park Service [NPS], 2019) at Iolani Palace, home to the last monarchs. It was women like them, the Hawaiian nobility, who catapulted the masses to join in the political fight to regain the women’s right to vote (KSHCVG, 2021). The WESAH advocated for the women’s right to vote through public speaking, petitions, and newspaper articles. The WESAH was successful in that President Wilson signed a bill into effect in 1919 that allowed the Territory to decide for themselves the matter of the vote. While it passed in the Hawaiian Senate, it stalled in the House. Ultimately, the vote was granted when the 19th amendment became part of the United States Constitution in 1920. However, the vote was limited in Hawaii because it was still a territory (NPS, 2020).

While a Territory, the colonizers reinterpreted Hawaiian history and weaved themselves into Hawaiian genealogies to legitimize their claims to Hawaii and “transform Hawaiians into assimilated, whitened U.S. citizens” (Skwiot, 2010, p. 60). The Hawaiian language was banned in education and public communications (Skwiot, 2010). Nakuina’s response to the mishmash of Native Hawaiian history was to preserve its history in writings “to and for them [her people]” (Skwiot, 2010, p. 62). In her 1904 book Hawaii, Its People, Their Legends, she translated histories and stories into English to create “useable pasts for Hawaiians in presents rerouted but not erased by death and dispossession, colonialism and conversion” (Skwiot, 2010, pp. 63 – 64). Hopkins (2020) notes that Nakuina did not originally write for the Hawaiians in her time as they already knew Native Hawaii history and folklore. She wrote for the foreigners. Natives understood the deeper meaning of her words, while the foreigners she was criticizing only read the surface. It is likely she also wrote for Native Hawaii descendants. Today, most are not raised Hawaiian but “are reintroduced to ourselves through her stories because they were accessible to us in English” (Hopkins, 2020). Author Christina Bacchilega has similar thoughts, stating “while I felt included…and invited to learn from her, I also believe those she wrote for – rather than simply to – were first of all Hawaiians, in her past, present and future…to give justice, aloha, and Native ways of life more of a chance in the future” (Hawai’i Council for the Humanities, 2020).

The Hawaiian people, as a whole, never felt particularly grateful to Captain Cook for discovering them to the European civilized world, nor do they hold his memory in any very great esteem.

~ Emma Metcalf Nakuina (Nakuina, 1904)

Analysis and Conclusion

As Commissioner, Nakuina chose to stay on in her position and work directly with the American and European newcomers. This was likely a difficult personal decision. The easier course of action for her would have been to resign, thereby avoiding the unwelcome newcomers. However, she recognized that by remaining in the position, she was able to best serve her now defunct constitutional monarchy, its citizens, and the future of her beloved Hawaii with its abundant natural resources.

Nakuina was a historian, teacher, cultural translator, and author. Her professional paper Ancient Hawaiian Water Rights and Some of the Customs Pertaining to Them is still relevant today as a primary source for water rights and laws before the overthrow of the constitutional monarchy. Her book on Hawaiian culture, Hawaii, Its People, Their Legends, continues to inform respective audiences today, descendants and non-descendants alike.

As suffragist, she fought to regain the women’s right to vote during a time of changing governments and changing times. She used her position to her advantage in mobilizing the masses to advocate for themselves and other women. The WESAH was known to United States suffragists, a testimony to the tremendous group efforts.

References

Bacchilega, Christina. (2020). Emma Nakuina (1847-1929) continues to make history today. Hawaii Council for the Humanities. Retrieved January 29, 2022 from https://hihumanities.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Cristina-Emma-Nakuina-1847-1929-Continues-To-Make-History-Today.pdf

Hopkins, Uluwehi. (2020, May 21). Emma Nakuina & the preservation of Hawaiian culture. Historic Hawaii Foundation. Retrieved January 29, 2022 from https://historichawaii.org/2020/05/30/emmanakuinatalk/

Kamehameha Schools Ho’okahua Cultural Vibrancy Group. (2021, March 8). Women’s history month: Nā me‘e wāhine o Hawai‘i – Women heroes of Hawai‘i. Retrieved
January 30, 2022 from https://www.ksbe.edu/article/womens-history-month-na-mee-wahine-o-hawaii-women-heroes-of-hawaii/

McGreevy, Nora. (2020, August 13). How the 19th amendment complicated the status and role of women in Hawai’i. Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved January 30, 2022 from https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/how-19th-amendment-complicated-status-and-role-women-hawaii-180975551/

Nakuina, Emma Metcalf. (1904). Hawaii: Its people, their legends. Donch.com. Retrieved February 2, 2022 from http://www.donch.com/lulhppl.htm

National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum. (2019, March 2). Emma Kaʻilikapuolono Nakuina. Retrieved January 30, 2022 from https://www.napawf.org/womens-history-month/2019/3/2/emma-kailikapuolono-nakuina

National Park Service. (2019, August 22). Hawai’i and the 19th amendment. Retrieved January 30, 2022 from https://www.nps.gov/articles/hawaii-and-the-19th-amendment.htm

National Park Service. (2020, August 5). Wilhelmina Kekelaokalaninui Widemann Dowsett. Retrieved January 30, 2022 from https://www.nps.gov/people/wilhelmina-kekelaokalaninui-widemann-dowsett.htm

Skwiot, Christine. (2010). The purpose of paradise: U.S. tourism and empire in Cuba and Hawai’i. University of Pennsylvania Press. Retrieved January 29, 2022 from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/washington/detail.action?docID=3441635

Young, Peter T. (2017, March 5). Emma Kaili Metcalf Beckley Nakuina. Images of Old Hawai’i. Retrieved January 30, 2022 from https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/emma-kaili-metcalf-beckley-nakuina/

Wikimedia.org. (2021, April 7). Emma Kaili Metcalf Beckley Nakuina. [Photograph, circa 1904, credited to Hawai’i State Archives] Retrieved February 17, 2002 from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Emma_Kaili_Metcalf_Beckley_Nakuina.jpg