Queen+Liliuokalani

U.S. expansionists had been after the Hawaiian islands for a long time and, in 1893, American settlers finally helped overthrow Queen Liliuokalani, the Hawaiian monarch. President Cleveland was against the annexation of Hawaii but, when McKinley was in office, the outbreak of war in the Philippines provided him and Congress the opportunity to completely annex the islands in June 1898. In 1900 the Hawaiian islands became a territory of the U.S, and in 1959, it because the 50th state.