On January 29, 1891, in the presence of the cabinet ministers and the supreme court justices, Liliʻuokalani took the oath of office to uphold the constitution, and became the first and only queen of the Hawaiian Kingdom. The first few weeks of her reign were obscured by the funeral of her brother. After the end of the period of mourning, one of her first acts was to request the formal resignation of the holdover cabinet from her brother's reign. These ministers refused, and asked for a ruling by the Hawaii Supreme Court. All the justices but one ruled in favor of the Queen's decision, and the ministers resigned. Liliʻuokalani appointed Samuel Parker, Hermann A. Widemann, and William A. Whiting, and reappointed Charles N. Spencer (from the hold-over cabinet), as her new cabinet ministers. On March 9, with the approval of the House of Nobles, as required by the Hawaiian constitution, she named as successor her niece Kaʻiulani, the only daughter of Archibald Scott Cleghorn and her sister Princess Likelike, who had died in 1887. From April to July, Liliʻuokalani paid the customary visits to the main Hawaiian Islands, including a third visit to the leper settlement at Kalaupapa. Historian Ralph Simpson Kuykendall noted, "Everywhere she was accorded the homage traditionally paid by the Hawaiian people to their "alii"."