<P> The Wilcox Rebellion of 1888 was a plot to overthrow King David Kalākaua and replace him with his sister in a coup d'état . This was in response to increased political tension between the legislature and the king under the 1887 constitution . Kalākaua's sister, Princess Lili ʻuokalani and wife, Queen Kapiolani returned from Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee immediately after news reached them in Great Britain . </P> <P> Kalākaua's distant cousin, a native Hawaiian officer and veteran of the Italian military, Robert William Wilcox returned to Hawaii at about the same time as Lili ʻuokalani in October 1887 when the funding for his study program stopped . Wilcox, Charles B. Wilson, Princess Lili ʻuokalani, and Sam Nowlein plotted to overthrow King Kalākaua and replace him with Lili ʻuokalani. 300 Hawaiian conspirators hid in Iolani Barracks and an alliance was formed with the Royal Guard, but the plot was accidentally discovered in January 1888, less than 48 hours before the revolt . No one was prosecuted, but Wilcox was exiled . On February 11, 1888 Wilcox left Hawaii for San Francisco, intending to return to Italy with his wife . </P> <P> Princess Lili ʻuokalani was offered the throne several times by the Missionary Party who had forced the Bayonet Constitution on her brother, but she believed she would become a powerless figurehead like her brother and rejected the offers . In January 1891, Kalākaua traveled to San Francisco for his health, staying at the Palace Hotel . He died there on January 20 . She then ascended the throne . Queen Lili ʻuokalani called her brother's reign "a golden age materially for Hawaii". </P> <P> Lili ʻuokalani assumed the throne in the middle of an economic crisis . The McKinley Act had crippled the Hawaiian sugar industry by removing the duties on sugar imports from other countries into the US, eliminating the previous Hawaiian advantage due to the Reciprocity Treaty of 1875 . Many Hawaii businesses and citizens lost revenue; in response Lili ʻuokalani proposed a lottery system to raise money for her government . Controversially, opium licensing was proposed . Her ministers and closest friends were all opposed to this plan; they unsuccessfully tried to dissuade her from pursuing these initiatives, both of which came to be used against her in the brewing constitutional crisis . </P>

What was hawaii before it became a state