Land Division In The Great Mahele Of 1848

The Great Mahele of 1848 was a foreign concept of land division that was specifically designed to allow the maka’ainana or the Hawaiian commoners to own land. Kauikeaouli, also known as Kamehameha III, created the Mahele due to foreign pressure. The foreigners wanted more control of the land that they lived on, being unsatisfied with granted long-term leases of land. "The missionaries for their part persisted in a curious argument which held that only the private ownership of lands would save the Hawaiian race from extinction," (Kame’elehiwa as cited in Borreca). He heard about these complaints and the foreign way of doing things, such as their belief of being able to “own land” and thought it would be beneficial for the Hawaiian community.

While the Hawaiians were losing their land, the foreigners were gaining land, as they were the ones who bought all of the land that the Hawaiians gave up or sold. “I was grieved for the loss of my crops and my foreigner who made the survey listened to the lying claim of that foreigner, the foreigner did not buy the place in dispute which was my kuleana” (Puamana). This gives an example of an economic impact because Puamana had lost all of his crops, and wasn’t able to make any money from selling produce, because it was all gone. Several maka’ainana had similar experiences to Puamana, possibly having to resort to selling their properties to pay their land taxes. As a result, that is one of the main reasons why the Great Mahele ended with only 1% of Native Hawaiians owning land property or their Kuleana (Lâm pp.

The Great Mahele introduced lots of foreign influence to Hawai’i, stressing the value of things. It changed the mindset of many Hawaiians, especially those with power. As the konohiki mentioned in the statement by Hio et al., people no longer offered resources to help one another and instead expected something in return. This caused the maka’ainana to suffer negative social impacts because they were deprived of the basic necessities needed to survive. The letter states that “the children are eating raw potato because of no firewood, the mouths of the children are swollen from having eaten raw taro” (Hio et al.). All of the children's suffering could have motivated Hawaiians to resort to stealing resources, or becoming angry and start protesting against the konohiki. The sense of balance and harmony throughout the communities weakened and created unfavorable views of the leaders who seemed to care more about their wealth than the