Born of a desire to shed "second-class" status as a U.S. territory (and with it the social, economic and political encumbrances it perpetuated) and shaped by governmental and popular responses to the larger forces of history, the statehood era in Hawai'i has seen equal measures of good and bad from a half-century of rapid development, political awakening and social upheaval.

Hawai'i's first congressional delegate, Robert Wilcox, was elected largely on his pledge to seek statehood for Hawai'i. And in 1919, Prince Jonah Kuhio introduced the first Hawai'i statehood bill to Congress. But it would take another 40 years of advocacy from local politicians, territorial delegates and others with compelling (if at times competing) motivations before both houses of Congress and the president would extend an official invitation to join the union.

Statehood proponents had much to overcome: lingering questions about the loyalty of its multi-ethnic populations, fears of Communist infiltration of its organized labor movement, and the concern of Southern Democrats that official representation from a liberal state might tip the scales in favor of impending civil rights legislation, as well as the ambivalence of Native Hawaiians old enough to recall the loss of their political independence.

It was a daring political gambit facilitated by territorial representative John Burns — in which the Alaska and Hawai'i statehood bids were joined, with Alaska entering first and Hawai'i following the year after — that finally resulted in a decision on Hawai'i statehood reaching the desk of President Dwight Eisenhower and ultimately Hawai'i polling stations.

Only 35 percent of eligible voters turned out for what was widely viewed as a rubber-stamp vote of approval in the June 27, 1959, statehood plebiscite. Of those who voted, 94.3 percent chose immediate statehood.

Historians note that statehood became an option only by virtue of the illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy (so deemed by the 1993 Apology Resolution) in 1893 and the United States' subsequent annexation of Hawai'i in 1898.

The promise of statehood so often proffered was that it would directly remediate many of the problems Hawai'i experienced as a territory.

Hawai'i as a territory did not have a vote in Congress, its governor and judges were appointed by the president, and voting rights were restricted. Statehood, it was exhaustively argued, would allow the population to partake in the liberties and opportunities guaranteed to full citizens of the United States while benefiting from an influx of federal investment that would help to assure future growth and prosperity.

The timing of statehood would prove significant for Hawai'i's political future, coming just five years after the so-called Democratic Revolution in which returning nisei war veterans led an election-day takeover of the territorial house and senate.

NEW STATUS, NEW TECHNOLOGY

Nisei war hero Daniel Inouye was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1959 and to the Senate in 1962. Inouye helped raise Hawai'i's political profile through his involvement as keynote speaker at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, member of the Senate Watergate Committee and first chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Now the third-highest-ranking Senate member and chairman of the powerful Senate Committee on Appropriations and subcommittee on defense, Inouye continues to exert his influence to the economic benefit of his home state, particularly with regard to federal defense spending (the second-biggest revenue generator in the state).

Yet it was technology more than political will that sparked the most immediate and dramatic change in Hawai'i's fortunes after statehood.

Hawai'i's entry to the union coincided with the dawn of commercial jet travel, which allowed for faster, high-volume air travel at reduced fares.

On Aug., 1959, just three days after Eisenhower officially welcomed Hawai'i as a full member of the United States, Pan American Airways started Boeing 707 jet service between the Mainland and Honolulu, taking advantage of the new Honolulu International Airport, which was built specifically for jet travel in February of that year.

As tourism quickly overtook military spending and agriculture as the state's leading economic driver, Hawai'i experienced rapid population growth (spurred in part by a massive in-migration of workers to meet labor demand) and a subsequent boom in development.

In 1960, Hawai'i's population stood at 633,000. A decade later, it had grown to 770,000, and by 1980 it had reached 965,000.

The explosive growth of the tourism industry had immediate benefits to the overall economy.

Prior to statehood, Hawai'i workers made roughly 20 percent less than their Mainland counterparts; by 1970, they had bridged the gap, as noted by University of Hawai'i economics professor James Mak.

STRUGGLE TO ADJUST

With growth, however, came growing pains as conflicts erupted over land development, infrastructure and other concerns.

Native Hawaiians, in particular, seemed to suffer the most in the shift from agriculture to a tourism-based economy and amid the resulting increased demands for land and other resources.

The Hawaiian sense of disassociation was exacerbated by a continued slide in overall well-being. As Hawaiian scholars point out, Native Hawaiians still fare poorly in significant demographic measures like infant mortality; incidence of diabetes, heart disease and other ailments; level of education; imprisonment; substance abuse and others.

The displacement of entire communities of Native Hawaiians from lands newly designated for commercial and residential development helped to spur the emergence of modern Hawaiian activism and the re-examination of native arts, culture and politics known as the second Hawaiian Renaissance.

Starting in the 1960s, renewed Hawaiian scholarship and cultural exploration led to a blossoming of Hawaiian music, hula, language studies and other cultural practices.

Inspired by the civil rights movement and other struggles for social justice, Hawaiian activists engaged in a series of protests against development projects, military land use and other issues. Their success in convincing the military to return control of Kaho'olawe was a watershed moment that helped to provide momentum for the nascent Hawaiian sovereignty movement.

In 2009, Hawai'i is radically different than it was at the dawn of statehood. The population has nearly doubled at 1.2 million, placing increased stress on an aging infrastructure. Agriculture has been replaced by tourism, which in turn has reshaped the physical, social and political landscapes of the Islands. An already ethnically diverse community has continued to evolve with mass influxes of Filipinos, Koreans, Vietnamese, Samoans, Tongans, Micronesians and other peoples. Native Hawaiians, once punished for practicing their culture, have found new pride in their ethnic identity and new motivation to seek self-determination.

And as residents pause to reflect on a most dynamic 50 years of statehood, the question remains:

Where do we go from here?