UPDATE. U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, on behalf of Federal Defendants Clinton, Gates and Willard, filed a Motion to Dismiss on September 13, 2010. The U.S. Attorney is joining the same defense made by Defendant Lingle and relying on the political question doctrine that the issue of Hawai`i’s legal status is committed to Congress under Congress’ constitutional authority to admit new States into the Federal Union, which therefore prevents the Court from hearing the case. An interesting note is that neither the State of Hawai`i nor the U.S. Attorney is relying on the 1898 Congressional joint resolution of annexation. Instead they are relying on the 1959 Statehood Act whereby Hawai`i was transformed from a U.S. Territory into a State of the Union. In my Plaintiff’s Opposition to Defendant Lingle’s Motion to Dismiss I addresses this issue in detail. To download Federal Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss go to http://hawaiiankingdom.org/sai-obama.shtml under “Court Docket Filings.” I will be periodically updating “Court Docket Filings” as documents are being filed with the Federal District Court in Washington, D.C.

Recently, I’ve been asked by some of you explain the case as some may not be familiar with the legal jargon and what exactly is the approach I’m taking regarding this case.

Whenever a civil tort (injury suffered) case is filed in the U.S. District Court, the Plaintiff (or the party who instituted the case) has to specifically establish his claim he’s seeking a remedy under or in other words “a claim upon which relief can be granted” by the District Court where the complaint was filed. The Federal District courts have limited jurisdiction (authority) to hear certain cases, which means a person can’t file any case in the Federal court, because it may be a matter for the State courts to hear. This is because the United States is a federal government (two-tier governance) with the National government at the top and the State governments below. The Alien Tort Statute, 28 United States Code §1350, is a federal statute that allows aliens (non-U.S. citizens) to file a complaint for injuries (torts) suffered because the National government violated a treaty or international law whereby the alien’s rights were protected and secured. Under this statute, the U.S. District Courts have jurisdiction to hear these cases brought by aliens. So I filed my lawsuit under the Alien Tort Statute whereby my rights as a Hawaiian subject (alien under U.S. law) secured under the 1893 Lili`uokalani assignment were violated when I was maliciously prosecuted and convicted under U.S. law, when I should have been prosecuted under Hawaiian Kingdom law. So my “claim upon which relief can be granted” by the District Court, is the Lili`uokalani assignment (being a treaty), and the Alien Tort Statute gives the court jurisdiction to hear this type of case. My alien standing is also based upon the legal standing of Hawai`i being an independent and sovereign state and not a State of the Federal Union.

In my amended complaint, there were defendants Clinton, Gates and Willard, and nominal (name only) defendant Lingle, but I didn’t make that clear in the amended complaint. The real defendants, being National (Federal) government executive officers are the ones that can be sued under the Alien Tort Statute, but the nominal defendant Lingle cannot because she’s not a federal government executive officer, but rather a State government executive officer. This is why Lingle was not served with a summons in the original complaint. As a nominal defendant, she’s only a defendant in name only because I needed to list her in the complaint because my prosecution and conviction, which is the evidence of the violation (tort) took place under State of Hawai`i law and not Federal law, so as she is a successor to Governor Cayetano, Lingle was a necessary party to join with the real defendants. The real defendants are represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Christian Natiello from the District of Columbia.

When a complaint has been filed, the defendants have to respond in one of two ways. They can “answer” the complaint under Rule 8 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, whereby they accept or deny the allegations, but if they “answer” they would accept the jurisdictional basis of the complaint, which is that I’m an alien and Hawai`i is not part of the United States. The other alternative is to challenge the substance of the complaint by proving to the court that something in my complaint is defective and the case should be thrown out. This is done by a “motion to dismiss” under rule 12 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. I fully expected the defendants to not “answer” but rather challenge the substance of the complaint, which is my standing and therefore the jurisdiction of the court.

In Lingle’s “motion to dismiss” they tried to argue, among other things, that she wasn’t served correctly with a summons and that the court cannot have jurisdiction to hear the case because the question of the legal status of the State of Hawai`i was committed to Congress who admitted Hawai`i as a State in 1959. The problem with this is that I’m not asserting the jurisdiction of the court under the Alien Tort Statute to challenge the legal status of the State of Hawai`i, but rather my rights as an alien under the 1893 Lili`uokalani assignment. To argue Congress’ authority to admit new states, would assume that the 1893 executive agreement (assignment) was superseded or repealed, but the problem is that Lingle did not even address the 1893 assignment, which is the basis of the lawsuit, and how it was superseded in order to allow Congress to admit a new State in 1959. An interesting note also, is that Lingle’s motion mentioned nothing about Hawai`i being annexed by a Congressional joint resolution in 1898, but rather relied on Congress’ authority to admit Hawai`i as a State.

In other words Lingle’s motion to dismiss did not effectively challenge my standing as an alien under the Alien Tort Statute, and if she was the real and only defendant, I would have followed up with a motion for partial summary judgment regarding count 1 of my amended complaint. Count 1 states: “the PLAINTIFF requests the Court declare that the Joint Resolution to provide for annexing the Hawaiian Islands to the United States is unconstitutional and void.” Counts 2 and 3 deal with my prosecution and conviction. A partial summary judgment is where a judge determines that an element of the complaint is not disputed, which in this case would be the Lili`uokalani assignment, so there’s no need for trial on this particular issue. Because the defendant did not dispute the assignment of executive power or show that it was lawfully superseded, the Congressional joint resolution of annexation would stand in direct violation of the assignment, which is a treaty under U.S. law. In other words, the joint resolution would be in direct violation of the President’s authority in foreign relations by virtue of Article II of the U.S. Constitution. U.S. foreign relations law also states that “there is an obligation to repeal a law illegally annexing a foreign territory.” (paragraph 69 of the Amended Complaint). The U.S. Attorney has to file their response, which will probably also be a “motion to dismiss,” by Monday (Sep. 13th). In its motion, it will have to show that I’m not an alien and that Hawai`i was lawfully annexed, which superseded the 1893 Lili`uokalani assignment and the Agreement of restoration, both being sole executive agreements.

Keanu.