Mindoro
Conditions in the important island of Mindoro may be inferred from the fact that it became necessary for its governor to issue a decree on November 10, 1898, which contained the following provisions among others:—
“2nd. The local presidentes of the pueblos will not permit any one belonging to their jurisdiction to pass from one pueblo to another nor to another province without the corresponding pass, with a certificate upon its back that the taxes of its holder have been paid.
“3rd. That from this date no one will be allowed to absent himself from his pueblo without previously informing its head who will give him an authorization on which will be noted the approval of the presidente of the pueblo....
“5th. Persons arriving from a neighboring town or province in any pueblo of this province will immediately present themselves before the presidente of said pueblo with their passes. He will without charge, stamp them with his official seal.”[21]
These are peculiar regulations for a province which is at peace, and as Major Taylor has truly remarked:—
“The form of liberty contemplated by the founders of the Philippine Republic was not considered incompatible with a very considerable absence of personal freedom.”[22]
Later, when travelling through Mindoro, I was told how an unfortunate legless Spaniard, who had been running a small shop in one of the towns and who was on good terms with his Filipino neighbors, was carried out into the plaza, seated in a chair, and then cut to pieces with bolos in the presence of his wife and children who were compelled to witness the horrible spectacle!
On this same trip Captain R.G. Offley, then the American Governor of Mindoro, told me while I was at Pinamalayan that the people there were greatly alarmed because a murderer, liberated under the amnesty, had returned and was prowling about in that vicinity. This man had a rather unique record. He had captured one of his enemies, and after stripping him completely had caused the top of an immense ant-hill to be dug off. The unfortunate victim was then tied, laid on it, and the earth and ants which had been removed were shovelled back over his body until only his head projected. The ants did the rest! Another rather unusual achievement of this interesting individual was to tie the feet of one of his enemies to a tree, fasten a rope around his neck, hitch a carabao to the rope, and start up the carabao, thus pulling off the head of his victim. Yet this man and others like him were set at liberty under the amnesty proclamation, in spite of the vigorous protests of the Philippine Commission, who thought that murderers of this type ought to be hanged.
And now I wish to discuss briefly an interesting and highly characteristic statement of Judge Blount. In referring to conditions in the Visayan Islands, he says:—
“Of course the Southern Islands were a little slower. But as Luzón goes, so go the rest. The rest of the archipelago is but the tail to the Luzón kite. Luzón contains 4,000,000 of the 8,000,000 people out there, and Manila is to the Filipino people what Paris is to the French and to France. Luzón is about the size of Ohio, and the other six islands that really matter, are in size mere little Connecticuts and Rhode Islands, and in population mere Arizonas or New Mexicos.”[23]
This paragraph is no exception to the general rule that the statements of this author will not bear analysis. One of the other six islands that he says really matters is Samar. Its area is 5031 square miles. The area of Rhode Island is 1250 square miles. The smallest of the six islands named is Bohol, with an area of 1411 square miles. It cannot be called a little Rhode Island.
As regards population, Arizona has 122,931. It is hardly proper to call either Panay with a population of 743,646, Cebu with 592,247, Negros with 460,776, Leyte with 357,641, Bohol with 243,148 or even Samar with only 222,690, a mere Arizona, and New Mexico with 195,310 is also a bit behind.
Luzón really has an area of 40,969 square miles and a population of 3,798,507.[24] What Blount is pleased to call “the tail to the Luzón kite,” is made up as follows:—
| Island | Area (Square Miles) | Population |
| Samar | 5,031 | 222,690 |
| Negros | 4,881 | 460,776 |
| Panay | 4,611 | 743,646 |
| Leyte | 2,722 | 357,641 |
| Cebu | 1,762 | 592,247 |
| Bohol | 1,411 | 243,148 |
| Totals | 20,419 | 2,620,148 |
Even so, the tail is a trifle long and heavy for the kite, but if we are going to compare Luzón with “the Southern Islands,” by which Blount can presumably only mean the rest of the archipelago, why not really do it? The process involves nothing more complicated than the subtraction of its area and population from those of the archipelago as a whole.
| Area (Square Miles) | Population | |
| Philippines | 115,026 | 7,635,426 |
| Luzón | 40,969 | 3,798,507 |
| Difference | 74,057 | 3,836,919 |
Performing this operation, we discover that the tail would fly away with the kite, as Luzón has less than half of the total population and only a little more than a third of the total area.
To compare the area or the population of one large island with those of individual small ones, in determining the relative importance of the former in the country of which it makes up a part, is like comparing the area and population of a great state with those of the individual counties going to make up other states.
Blount resorts to a similar questionable procedure in trying to show the insignificance of Mindoro and Palawan. There are an island of Mindoro and a province of Mindoro; an island of Palawan and a province of Palawan. In each case the province, which includes numerous small islands, as well as the large one from which it takes its name, is much larger and more populous than is the main island, and obviously it is the province with which we are concerned.
Even if Blount wished to limit discussion to the Christian natives commonly called Filipinos, his procedure is still wholly unfair. Of these there are 3,575,001 in Luzón and 3,412,685 in the other islands. In other words, the Filipino population is almost equally divided between the two regions.
As he would not have found it convenient to discuss the conditions which arose in Mindanao under Insurgent rule, he attempts to show that no political importance attaches to them. In the passage above quoted he does not so much as mention either Mindoro or Palawan (Paragua). Elsewhere, however, he attempts to justify his action by making the following statements:—
“The political or governmental problem being now reduced from 3141 islands to eleven, the last three[25] of the nine contained in the above table may also be eliminated as follows:[26]—
“Mindoro, the large island just south of the main bulk of Luzón, pierced by the 121st meridian of longitude east of Greenwich, is thick with densely wooded mountains and jungle over a large part of its area, has a reputation of being very unhealthy (malarious), is also very sparsely settled, and does not now, nor has it ever, cut any figure politically as a disturbing factor.”[27]
Apart from the fact that the political problem involved in the government of the important islands which Blount would thus leave out of consideration, is not solved by ignoring it, certain of his further statements cannot be allowed to go uncorrected.
The allegation that the island has never “cut any figure politically as a disturbing factor” is absurd. In the Spanish days its forests furnished a safe refuge for evildoers who were from time to time driven out of Cavite and Batangas. A large proportion of its Filipino inhabitants were criminals who not infrequently organized regular piratical expeditions and raided towns in Masbate, Romblon and Palawan. The people of the Cuyos and Calamianes groups lived in constant terror of the Mindoro pirates, and tulisanes,[28] who paid them frequent visits. I myself have been at Calapan, the capital of the province, when the Spanish officials did not dare to go without armed escort as far as the outskirts of the town for fear of being captured and held for ransom. During considerable periods they did not really pretend to exercise control over the criminal Filipinos inhabiting the west coast of the island. Conditions as to public order were worse in Mindoro than anywhere else in the archipelago north of Mindanao and Joló.
No less absurd are Blount’s suggestions as to the general worthlessness of the island. There are high mountains in its interior, and there are great stretches of the most fertile land in the world along its coast. Its northern and eastern portions have a very heavy and evenly distributed rainfall, and are admirably suited to the growing of cocoanuts, hemp, cacao, rubber and similar tropical products. In this region rice flourishes wonderfully without irrigation. There was a time in the past when Mindoro was known as “the granary of the Philippines.” Later its population was decimated by constant Moro attacks, and cattle disease destroyed its draft animals, with the result that the cultivated lands were abandoned to a considerable extent and again grew up to jungle, from which, however, it is easy to redeem them. The west coast has strongly marked wet and dry seasons similar to those at Manila. There is abundant water available for irrigation, furnished by streams which never run dry. Much of the soil is rich, and will grow the best of sugar in large quantity. The forests, which now cover extensive areas, abound in fine woods, and produce rubber and other valuable gums. There are outcroppings of lignite at numerous points on the island, and in the vicinity of Mt. Halcon is found the finest marble yet discovered in this part of the world. Gold is also present in some quantity at various places. In short, Mindoro is naturally one of the richest islands in the Archipelago. If its tillable lands were under high cultivation, it would support half the population of the Philippines.