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Civil Beat sat down with both the Republican and Democratic governor candidates to capture their perspective on a range of issues and influences. We requested 30-minute one-on-one interviews with each.

• Read James “Duke” Aiona’s Q&A.

On the morning of Oct. 10 when we met with former Congressman Neil Abercrombie, the candidate was running late and it turned into a 12-minute-window.

Abercrombie apologized to Civil Beat, saying he had overslept that morning (due to sinus problems) and was also torn over his commitments because Sundays are the day he visits his elderly mother-in-law. A campaign aide explained that traffic was bad that morning, too, delaying Abercrombie’s arrival at a campaign stop and shortening his availability before he had to catch a flight to Kauai.

Brief as it was, the interview, done as the candidate was driven between campaign spots in Honolulu, proved fruitful. He touched on the Civil Rights movement, the estate tax, and explained why his support for the military isn’t a contradiction.

Chad Blair Not too many academics make the shift to politics. Why did you decided to switch to politics from an academic background?

Neil Abercrombie Well, in my academic work, it was all politics right straight through — principally because, I think of the civil rights era that I was a part of from the real time of my graduation from undergraduate school. It was the time when the civil rights movement was getting underway in most “Man In The Gray Flannel Suit” Eisenhower years kind of idea where there was a kind of conformity. Pre “Mad Men” if you will, and then there had been a revolution in Cuba that I don’t think everybody fully appreciates these days in terms of the effect that it had — the combination of the Cuban revolution and the civil rights movement, and then the complete wrong turn on Vietnam, created it all.

So — I mean created that atmosphere — so academically we were immersed in civil rights activities and pro-peace activities, and it led naturally into electoral politics. And of course in 1970 as a graduate student I would run for the U.S. Senate. So it was a natural progression as I finished my Ph.D. to — in fact, I defended my Ph.D. in September, nominated in October and elected in November to the state House.

In ’74.

Yeah.

Speaking of the Vietnam War, I’ve been looking over your record in support of the military. The base housing, obviously, but also a number of other accomplishments. And I wonder if you might speak a little bit about how some say it is a bit of a contradiction that —

Well, then they’re not paying attention.

Tell me why.

It’s superficial. They forget, or they never knew because they’ve got their own stereotype categories. In 1970 when I ran for the U.S. Senate as a graduate student I made my announcement at the gates of Punchbowl Cemetery — specifically to symbolize as graphically as I could that this was a pro-peace, anti-U.S. imperialist policy. In other words, I thought the last country on earth that should be taking an imperial path is the United States of America. We had even been a symbol, ironically enough, to the Vietnamese during World War II of trying to move in an anti-colonial direction.

Ho Chi Minh wrote Roosevelt, if I remember correctly.

Yeah. He had gotten a lot of his ideas from Jefferson and so on. I shouldn’t say he got his ideas from him, but I meant he was well aware of the origin of American democracy in historic terms, particularly of course because of the French occupation of Vietnam and the relationship of the French to the American Revolution and all of that. He was well aware of it intellectually.

My point is is that in the beginning we never intended to be anti-military, or I didn’t. I thought that was foolish. It’s like people arguing right now over at Kulani over about the Youth ChalleNGe Program coming, of which I’m sure your research showed I am a principal supporter, to reclaim youth because they’re military. (Editor’s note: The program helps Guard members develop leadership skills and guide as-risk youth. Abercrombie supported the program while in Congress.) It’s the National Guard! These are citizen soldiers, what are you taking about! There’s a twisted logic operating there.

So it’s not a contradiction.

No! It’s not a contradiction in the least. And the whole idea was to make sure we didn’t find ourselves going off on a foreign policy that actually undermined and contradicted what American democracy is all about. The military is constitutionally under the jurisdiction of the Congress — in terms of provision for it and all the rest. And I never wanted to see the support for troops — who, after all, are under the command of the president and the jurisdiction of the Congress — suffer for political policy. I never wanted to let political implications and ramifications interfere with support for troops either in the field or in preparation for carrying out their duties.

Tell me: Do you still feel the same way about the estate tax, that it’s an unfair burden to small businesses?

Well, when it is. When it isn’t, then obviously they should be taxed. My principal orientation there is to try to keep family-owned businesses together. And when they’re not family-owned anymore, then they’re just a regular corporate enterprise and should be subject to the taxes that anybody else is expected to pay.

You didn’t support repealing it all they way?

Well, the problem for these things is they tend to get presented in absolute terms. And my principal orientation was to protect family owned businesses. I’ll give you an example: Here in Hawaii especially — we’re passing automobile owners or dealers right now — now, I have (Abercrombie supporters) in the automobile business that not only is it third generation family business, but they not only paid their franchise fees and so on but they bought the land that they had their dealership on. Which was of course a real struggle. They were paying a mortgage and paying franchise requirements and all the rest. So they found themselves in a situation in which they were asset rich — land rich, if you will — and dollar poor. So, if they had to pay the estate tax they would essentially have to sell the business. It’s Catch 22 — go out of business to stay alive, right? So that seemed to me a complete contradiction, particularly in the light of the multinational corporation and the ultra-rich family business that were not really family businesses at all any longer but gigantic corporations in which they family as an enterprise and a controlling agent was minimal or nonexistent.

That’s always been my orientation. It’s just like the military and so on. I don’t fit into categories so easily.

Is there any vote in your 20 years in Congress, you look back and think, gee, I wish I had gone the other way?

Yeah, I think — I was always a very strong supporter of everybody staying in their lane, you know, insurance companies should sell insurance, real estate companies sell real estate, banks do banking. And when they begin to get into … tear down these walls between them, on the whole I voted against ever doing that. But getting rid of the Glass-Steagal, I ended up I think — I cast some votes that was against it, and when the final vote came out of the Senate I thought, well, OK, maybe this can work. And I think it might have, had there been real supervision and regulation the way it was indicated in there. But I honestly feel that that didn’t happen. I mean, I was much too optimistic that we would really fund and that there would be hard-nosed enforcement of the reforms that came out of the Clinton administration. And it didn’t work that way. And in retrospect I thought to myself, come on, you should have known better.

We’ve just got a couple more … two issues important to Civil Beat, government transparency and human trafficking. We published all the salaries of public employees … where do you stand on government transparency?

Well, I guess my record is as transparent as anybody’s has ever been, on everything. Obviously if it’s the taxpayer’s money, people ought to know where it’s going, although I have participated — I presume you are talking principally about money? Personnel issues don’t strike me as that pertinent. I have participated in so-called black box budget operations in armed services over the 20 years. Some of that had to do with making sure that people didn’t get an idea of where things were going.

For national security reasons.

Yeah. And you have to be careful with that always because that can become a blanket excuse for all kinds of skullduggery.

And on human trafficking, it may be a judicial issue —

No. Well, it’s not with me, if only for personal reasons, because my wife has been associated with for all her academic and professional life. And I was particularly aware of it because of — even when I was a probation officer. Narcotics trade and so on. And then on the armed services committee, terrorism, because they could use the raw data — routes, if you will, of trafficking for prostitution, for child labor, for narcotics. They’re for sale, and those routes are for sale.

Neil, I got enough, It wasn’t as long as I’d like, but let’s get your photo, I know you have a tight schedule. Thank you for your time.

Sure, it’s a pleasure.