ABSTRACT
Six years later in 1887, Lorrin A. Thurston, then Minister of the Interior and future architect of annexation, would play a significant role in drafting the Bayonet Constitution which abrogated the King's powers, forcing the King to sign the document at gunpoint. While the cabinet is conspiring to overthrow the King, Queen Kapi'olani and Lili'uokalani are in attendance at Queen Victoria's jubilee. They are allowed several interviews with Victoria whom Lili'u describes as 'one of the best of women and greatest of monarchs'. In Lili'uokalani's account, the Jubilee becomes a narrative occasion for reaffirming Hawaii's monarchical sovereignty that was acknowledged by Great Britain and the other European heads of state in attendance at the precise moment when its sovereign authority is being undermined by the Bayonet Constitution and subsequent Annexation. Victoria does not step in to protect this usurpation and recapitulate the Lord Paulet episode in which Great Britain briefly annexed the islands.
