Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 21, Number 3, 1 March 2004 — Defining Hānai [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Defining Hānai

In the wake of the controversial Kamehameha Schools case, a workshop encourages Hawaiians to examine the traditional adoption practice

By Sterling Kini Wong Pi'ilani Smith, a founding member of the Hawaiian rights political action group the 'īlio'ulaokalani Coalition, says she was furious when she heard that U.S. Judge David Ezra had cited laws from the Kingdom of Hawai'i to define the hānai adoption tradition during the MohieaCummings case against Kamehameha Schools' Hawaiian-preference admissions policy. The case was filed after the school rescinded its acceptance of seventh-grader Brayden Mohica-Cummings when it discovered that his mother's elaim to be Hawaiian was based not on biological bloodline, but on her adoption by a Hawaiian man. At a hearing to confirm a settlement deal that allowed the boy to attend the school, Ezra commented that, according to Kingdom law, a hānai rela-

tionship was like blood. "What is dangerous about something like that," Smith said, "is that the courts do not have the jurisdiction, the authority nor the expertise to be making such definitions and assertions. But when they say that within the context of the legal system, it makes it seem as though it is official." In response to the controversy generated by the judge's comments, on Jan. 24 'īlio'ulaokalani held the first of what it hopes will be a series of workshops designed to demystify the definitions and applications of hānai. The first priority of the workshop, Smith said, was to establish who has the authority to define hānai. "Discussion on the definition ean take years," she said. "All we want to do now is to be clear on who has the jurisdiction. It is not the role of any individual, but up to the Hawaiian people as a collective to decide." See HĀNAI on page 4

A student protests legal attacks on Kamehameha Schools' admission policy at the Kū i ka Pono march last September. Photo: steriing Kini wong