When over 900 Hawaiʻi residents signed a petition calling on their Legislature to investigate a sitting lawmaker and restore public trust, they were doing something the people of Hawaiʻi have done since 1839 — exercising one of the most fundamental democratic rights in the history of these islands. And they expected their government to listen.
Instead, they were met with silence.
To date, the speaker of the House has not formally acknowledged the petition. The Senate “filed” the petition in the closing minutes of the opening day of the Legislature but without debate, comment or any meaningful opportunity for the public to be heard.
To my knowledge, it has always been the past practice of the Legislature to act on petitions in the first weeks of a session. Never has a petition not been “filed” or action delayed for this long a period of time.
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The actions of the Legislature, both in the House and Senate, in my analysis, violate the express right to petition contained in Article 1, Section 4 of the Hawaiʻi Constitution, a right with roots deep enough to reach the Hawaiian Kingdom itself.
It begins in 1839, when King Kamehameha III issued the Declaration of Rights, the first Hawaiian document to formally guarantee equal rights for both chiefs and commoners, and a precursor to Hawaiʻi’s first constitution the following year.
By 1864, the right was explicit and unambiguous. Article 4 of the Hawaiian Kingdom Constitution, promulgated by Kamehameha V, declared that “all men shall have the right, in an orderly and peaceable manner, to assemble, without arms, to consult upon the common good, and to petition the King or Legislative Assembly for redress of grievances.”
This was not ceremonial language. Under the Hawaiian Kingdom, petitioning was the primary mechanism through which the people communicated directly with their sovereign. It was how residents formally requested changes in law, protested injustices and held their government accountable. Most importantly, the monarch was expected to receive petitions and take them seriously.
This history matters enormously. The petition right in Hawaiʻi is not borrowed from the federal constitution. It is home-grown from Hawaiʻi’s own soil, formalized in Hawaiʻi’s own monarchy, and carried forward deliberately into statehood.
We are, in a very real sense, a legally unique state unlike any other in the Union. The right of citizens to petition their government is part of Hawaiʻi’s constitutional DNA.
The most dramatic proof of how seriously Hawaiians took this right came in 1897 and 1898, when the United States moved to annex the Hawaiian Islands. Native Hawaiians responded with what became known as the Kūʻē Petitions — a massive, organized petition drive that collected over 21,000 signatures, representing more than half of the entire Native Hawaiian population. Those petitions were formally submitted to the U.S. Senate, formally received, entered into the congressional record, and delayed the annexation treaty.
They did not ultimately prevent annexation. But they were heard. This constitutional right was honored even as the political outcome was lost.
The right of citizens to petition their government is part of Hawaiʻi’s constitutional DNA. (Kevin Fujii/Civil Beat/2025)
When Hawaiʻi became a state in 1959, the constitution carried this tradition forward deliberately, enshrining the right to petition in Article I, Section 4: no law shall be enacted abridging “the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
The 1978 Constitutional Convention further strengthened citizen participation mechanisms. Article I, Section 1 declares, without qualification, that “all political power of this State is inherent in the people.” The Legislature exists because of the people. Its authority derives from the people. It serves at the people’s pleasure — not the reverse.
Fast forward to Jan. 5, 2026, when a petition entitled “Restore Public Trust — Investigate the Unknown Hawaii Legislator” was submitted to both chambers of the Legislature. It carried the signatures of 929 Hawaiʻi residents — real people, with real names, from real communities across the state. It asked that pursuant to its authority vested in it by HRS 21-3, the Legislature convene an investigative committee to look into what occurred in 2022 when an unknown but influential legislator accepted $35,000 in a paper bag.
Let’s be clear about what this petition asks and what it does not ask. It does not ask the Legislature to conduct a criminal investigation — that is the attorney general’s job, and that investigation is proceeding.
The purpose of the petition is to hold open hearings to find out what happened and to determine whether new laws or ethical rules are needed to prevent this type of act from happening again if something nefarious is found to have occurred.
While the AG’s investigation is being conducted in complete secrecy, as required by law in criminal investigations, the legislative investigation being requested is its opposite: public by design, transparent by purpose. The two are not one and the same.
The petition right in Hawaiʻi is not borrowed from the federal constitution. It is home-grown from Hawaiʻi’s own soil, formalized in Hawaiʻi’s own monarchy, and carried forward deliberately into statehood.
What has happened since Jan. 5 when the petition was submitted to the Legislature?
The president of the Senate “filed” the petition in the final minutes of opening day. There was no committee referral, no hearing and no discussion of any kind. The petition was received into what can only be described as a procedural void: acknowledged just enough to say it existed, then quietly set aside to die.
The speaker of the House, on the other hand, has not formally “filed” the petition nor referred it to committee. For the purposes of the official record of the Hawaiʻi House of Representatives, the petition — and the 929 people who signed it — does not exist.
What makes the speaker’s inaction on the petition even more remarkable is the refusal to act despite receiving other similar requests.
At least one neighborhood board, an official unit of local democratic government, passed a formal resolution in support of the petition and submitted it to the Legislature.
A sitting member of the House of Representatives filed an independent resolution calling for the same action as the petition. And while this resolution was “filed” and referred to committee pursuant to House Rules, it sits without action being taken.
A coalition of approximately 50 good government organizations — including the League of Women Voters of Hawaiʻi, Common Cause Hawaiʻi, Our Hawaiʻi, and HAPA — issued a public press release calling for action on the petition.
No action whatsoever has been taken in response to any of these resolutions or statements in support of the petition. A democracy speaking through every channel available to it, all received with silence.
The Legislature’s own rules make the speaker’s action in not formally “filing” the petition not only politically indefensible, but legally untenable under Hawaiʻi’s constitution.
House Rule 46.2 states: “The Speaker shall order all petitions and communications filed or referred to a committee without any motion or vote, unless there is objection from the members.” In legal interpretation, “shall” creates a mandatory, non-discretionary duty. There is no version of Rule 46.2 under which the speaker has the option of simply doing nothing.
Senate Rule 67 contains similarly mandatory language. And while the Senate filed the petition, by simply filing the petition into the record without a referral to a committee, without a public hearing, and without any discussion on the matter, raises its own constitutional questions. Filing a petition into a void is not honoring the constitutional right to petition. It only honors its form while destroying its substance.
While federal law holds that even though citizens have the right to file a petition under the United States constitution, the government is not required to respond. I submit, however, that is not true under Hawaiʻi’s constitution for the following reasons.
Hawaiʻi courts interpret the state constitution first, independently of how the U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted the federal equivalent. Pictured is the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court building in Honolulu. (Cory Lum/Civil Beat/2022)
In 2021, the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court decided League of Women Voters of Honolulu v. State of Hawaiʻi. In that case, involving the practice of “gut and replace,” the Legislature argued that its own internal rules of procedure permitted this practice. The court disagreed, forcefully and unanimously. The Court stated that the “Legislature’s rules of procedure do not trump constitutional provisions.”
A legislative body, the court continued, “cannot make a rule that evades or avoids the effect of a rule prescribed by the constitution governing it, and it cannot do by indirection what it cannot directly do.”
At the heart of the court’s ruling was its recognition that the Hawaiʻi constitution’s three-readings requirement exists to ensure a deliberative legislative process where “the public has notice and a meaningful opportunity to provide input.”
That purpose — public notice and meaningful opportunity for input — is inseparable from the right to petition contained in Article 1, Section 4. They are two expressions of the same constitutional value. If the Legislature cannot evade constitutional rights through procedural manipulation of bills, it cannot evade it through procedural silence on petitions.
Under the Hawaiian Kingdom, petitions were not filed and forgotten. They were the primary mechanism of democratic accountability. The entire constitutional tradition of the petition right in Hawaiʻi is one of substantive engagement, not bureaucratic formalism.
Recognizing Hawaiʻi’s unique laws and traditions, the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court established what legal scholars call a “primacy” approach to constitutional interpretation. When state constitutional rights are at issue, Hawaiʻi courts interpret the state constitution first, independently of how the U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted the federal equivalent. This matters because Hawaiʻi’s constitution is not based solely upon Anglo-Saxon laws and traditions. It is also grounded upon the laws and traditions of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi.
The response from the Legislature has been complete, sustained, deliberate indifference.
While the Hawaiʻi constitution certainly does not require the Legislature to grant every petitioner a full hearing or adopt every petition’s proposed remedy, there is a constitutional floor, and both chambers have fallen beneath it.
At a minimum, we should expect that the right to petition requires that petitions be formally acknowledged by both chambers, directed through a transparent process, and have the structural possibility of genuine consideration. Neither the House nor Senate rules satisfy these limited requirements.
Stepping back from the legal arguments for a moment, let’s consider what is actually happening here. It bears emphasis that the petition is not asking for anything extraordinary. HRS 21-3 grants the Legislature express statutory authority to convene investigatory committees. The petitioners are simply asking the Legislature to use a power it already has, in service of the transparency the public deserves.
Nine hundred twenty-nine Hawaiʻi residents asked their government to investigate a sitting lawmaker and restore public trust. At least one neighborhood board, a sitting representative, and 50 good government organizations joined in this request. Yet the response from the Legislature has been complete, sustained, deliberate indifference.
This is not how constitutional democracy is supposed to work.
A petition calling for investigation of a possibly sitting legislator is, by definition, uncomfortable for the Legislature. That is exactly why the constitutional guarantee of reception and process matters most in precisely this situation. The constitution does not protect only the petitions that government officials find convenient. It protects all of them, and most urgently the ones that powerful people would prefer to ignore.
The legislative session closes on May 8. When that happens, the window for meaningful action closes with it. The constitutional injury will be complete and for all intents and purposes irreversible for this year, unless the speaker decides to convene an investigative committee during recess, which is highly unlikely.
If the speaker continues to do nothing or deliberately chooses to file the petition at the end of session claiming compliance with the law, and if the Senate continues to treat the petition as a document to be filed and forgotten, legal action may well be the only remedy remaining.
History is watching and the end of the legislative session is fast approaching. Apart from legal action, the upcoming elections provide the public with the opportunity to voice your opinion. Let’s not miss this opportunity. Change can happen if we fight for it.
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