When it comes to knowledge about U.S. territories, most people in the United States know very little. This even holds true for how much people in each territory know about other territories. There is also a desire by many in each territory to learn more about their own history. That is the goal of Right to Democracy’s “Building Understanding Series”: to gather in-depth information on the political, legal, and cultural development of each territory as a tool to share knowledge within each territory, across the territories, and throughout the United States as a whole.

Right to Democracy’s Building Understanding Series is hosted by RtD Co-Directors Adi Martínez-Román and Neil Weare, and features special guests and experts from each of the territories.

Fa’a Samoa, Sovereignty, and Self-Determination in American Samoa: Past and Present.

 

Join Radio Samoa host Ken Aiono and American Samoan Attorney Charles Ala’ilima for a probing conversation in Fa’a Samoa, Sovereignty, and Self-Determination in American Samoa: Past and Present. The video presentation is divided into two parts.

 

 

Watch Part 1 here!

  • Part I Addresses American Samoa’s history prior to Western contact, contested understandings of the 1899 Tripartite Treaty and the 1900/1904 Deeds of Cession, the legal framework established by the U.S. Supreme Court in the Insular Cases, the Mau Movement’s push for self-government and U.S. citizenship during the 1920s-40s, Navy rule from 1900-1951, and more. 

  • Read the Transcript here

Watch Part 2 here!

  • Part II  Examines the post World War II decolonization movement, the transition from Navy rule to appointed civilian government, developments in local self-government, the American Samoan Constitution, and what this all means for the nature of American Samoa’s relationship with the United States. Turning to the present, it focuses on how American Samoa’s history informs current debates around the imposition of seabed mining and Alaska’s prosecution of American Samoans based on their designation as so-called “non-citizen” U.S. nationals.

  • Read the Transcript here

More historical resources focused on American Samoa will be posted in the future.

The Building Understand Series will expand to include featured segments on each of the five U.S. territories.