THE STATESMAN
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[VII]
THE STATESMAN
Meantime, while Wood was carrying on his work in Cuba, events of importance to him and to his country were taking place in the United States. The popularity of his war record had made Roosevelt Governor of New York, and when the time came for him to run for a second term the Republican organization of the state forced him to take the nomination for Vice-President of the United States in order to keep him out of the gubernatorial field. He objected strongly and tried to remain in the state fight, but at the convention in Philadelphia upon a certain momentous occasion Thomas Platt, then head, of the state and national Republican organization, is said to have remarked to him:
"Mr. Roosevelt, if you do not desire the vice-presidential nomination, there is always the alternative of retirement to private life."
In other words party machinery was too strong {160} for him and much against his will he was forced to run as second on the McKinley-Roosevelt presidential ticket.
The Republicans were successful and Roosevelt, knowing that there was little for him to do in Washington, was planning an extended trip through the Southern states to make an exhaustive study of the negro question. He had indeed begun to accumulate material on this subject when on September 6, 1901, McKinley was shot at Buffalo. A few days later he died; and Theodore Roosevelt became President of the United States.
For Wood this meant much in the future--much of good and something of trouble. Roosevelt was his devoted friend and supporter, and upon his return to the United States in early 1902 he found this devoted friend the head of the nation, himself a Brigadier-General of the regular army scheduled to go into regular army work and to live on an army officer's pay. In this country there is no other procedure possible. In England such a man would have been given a title and a large sum of money to make it possible for him to keep up the position which a man of his abilities and {161} attainments should keep up. Here the case is different.
He had the alternative of going on, or retiring and entering commercial pursuits. Offers looking towards the latter contingency were not wanting. He was, in fact, asked to take a business position, which offered him forty thousand a year. Here was a large income for a man of forty-two, regular work of an interesting sort, security and a clear future for himself and his family. Instead, he accepted the appointment to the Philippines which meant and indeed, as the outcome showed, actually involved more than a hundred military engagements amongst the natives of the islands in many of which he risked his life.
Here again he took the road of service to his country as he had each time the ways divided since the day when as a young doctor he entered the army. No one but he himself can tell in detail just the reasons which led to this decision, but in the main they were the instinctive desire for action, for execution and for the open road, which then as now swayed him in all his actions and decisions. Then, too, he felt that since {162} Roosevelt was President, criticisms of their relations in political circles might readily arise, as indeed did occur later; and lest their friendship should be misunderstood he took the Philippine appointment--applied for it, even--in order that being thus out of the country, cause for any such occurrences might perhaps be avoided.
It is always interesting to look back through the career of such a man and speculate on the chance or wise decision which caused the choice of the right road or the left road at such a time. Neither Wood nor Roosevelt could possibly know or foresee that this decision would furnish the former with the material which eventually led to his doing more than all the rest of the United States put together to start preparation for the Great War. Neither of them could have guessed that his administration in the Philippines would bring out further qualities in Wood which showed the statesman as well as the administrator in him.
What might have happened otherwise is again a futile speculation--perhaps something to bring him still more before the people of his country, perhaps less--yet it may be safely said, judging {163} from history and biography the world over, that it is probable no road he might have taken would have suppressed Leonard Wood's executive and administrative qualities. Indeed the fact that for practically thirty years he has been in the army, that he is a soldier in every inch of his big body, has never even to this day made him a militarist. He is and always has been an administrator; and that quality with all that it means would in all likelihood have cropped out in whatever profession he might have chosen or been forced into by circumstances.
Men of ability are doubtless occasionally kept down; but not as a rule. They rise to the occasion. And conversely men of small minds, dreamers and theorists looking to the settlement of all problems on the instant seldom last long at the top although they rise to prominence here and there in times of excitement and hysteria such as we are passing through to-day. It is only the sound common sense of humanity coupled with great ability that stands the test. It is only they who keep ever before them the fact that {164} elemental laws do not change, cannot be changed, who stand the test and strain of emergency.
The entire world since the Great War is filled with new theories, new plans, new outlooks for all of us. We cannot go back to the old status. Yet because we cannot go back there would seem to be no reason for our going mad. The wall paper has changed--must change. New decorations with wonderful and to American ears unpronounceable names have been displayed before the eyes of Europe and America by the advanced architects of the day. But that individual--not to mention nations--who becomes fascinated with the new colors and designs will suffer horribly in the end if, having forgotten to look to the beams of his house, he finds it shortly tumbling about his ears. Sane vision, clear thinking at critical times has saved and will save many times again those who would fall but for such guidance.
To-day in this land such men are needed. They must come forward, not in haste or with sudden panaceas, but with the same old sound common sense which has made us what we are and will keep {165} us from becoming what parts of the rest of the world have already become.
In 1902 the situation, while not as acute as to-day, had nevertheless its problems to be solved; and though we had just finished what in the light of history was a short and almost insignificant war the country was startled from end to end by the discovery of its unpreparedness. As has already been said our amazing lack of men and equipment for any such occasion had been impressed upon Wood's mind by personal experience and by his own native instinct for the reverse.
It was of great interest to him, therefore, to receive shortly the appointment to visit Germany as an American military observer of the German Army maneuvers. And out of this trip he learned more thoroughly the lack of foresight in military matters in this country and saw more clearly the position which we should be in, if such a machine as the German Army were pitted against us instead of the weak and decayed forces of Spain.
In the course of these maneuvers he met many of the greatest military men of Europe. He was received and entertained by the German Emperor {166} not only because of his position in the American army and as the representative of the United States, but as the man who in Cuba had treated with such kindness and courtesy German officers of a visiting training ship who were ill with the Island fevers. He witnessed the grand maneuvers of the greatest army the world has ever known. But, what in his own belief was of far more importance, he met and talked with European military experts of world-wide reputation.
Among these men the most congenial spirit was Lord Roberts. The little man of Kandahar, the great fighter of Britain's battles, the idol of the British public, was then striving to awaken the English people and the English government to their own unpreparedness. He sought even then to show them what an attack by a force like the German Army would mean to the British Empire. For years he kept at it, lecturing, speaking, crying aloud throughout England up to the very day when without warning in 1914 his countrymen found themselves with a scant two hundred thousand soldiers confronted by five millions of trained Germans.
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The great fighter, the great preacher, his little body filled with patriotism and a great heart, unbosomed to Wood and met a responsive assent in Wood's own nature. They discussed from all sides the right thing to do. They went over all the European systems together with the desire in their hearts to find something which should at the same time give a nation a force of great size that could be quickly put into action and still not turn that nation into a huge military machine. Neither of them was a militarist. Both felt that peace was best preserved by the power to preserve it.
Together they seem to have arrived at some adaptation of the Swiss system which provides that small country with a relatively enormous military force without causing the citizens to give up their commercial pursuits. At that time it is probable that Wood began to formulate the idea of universal military training of all male citizens between the ages of eighteen and twenty-one while they were finishing school and college and before they had settled upon their life work.
At all events the material upon the subject {168} which he managed to accumulate in the way of books, pamphlets, records and so on constitutes now one of the main portions of his extensive library. And the whole trip was an example in his case of what a man can do incidentally--or apparently incidentally--while occupied ostensibly with some other work. During his stay in Europe he met many statesmen in Germany, France and England and absorbed from them all he could on the subject that was fast becoming his greatest interest.
Upon his return to the United States the difficulties which Taft, the Governor of the Philippine Islands, was having in trying to bring order amongst the Moro, or Moslem, Islands and the half savage tribes which inhabited them led President Roosevelt to consider the advisability of sending some one to undertake this difficult and dangerous task. Speaking of it to Wood one day the latter said:
"Why not send me?"
Roosevelt immediately referred him to Mr. Root, then Secretary of War, with the result that he was appointed Governor of Moro Province to do {169} the work there amongst these new wards of the United States under different conditions which he had already done in Cuba.
Wood felt very strongly that it would be far better for him to be there during the administration of Roosevelt in order that their personal relationship might not be misunderstood. This was the more forcibly brought in upon his consciousness by the occurrence at that time of what is known as the Rathbone affair.
Major Estes G. Rathbone, formerly an assistant postmaster-general and at this time detailed to duties in the newly organized Post Office in Cuba, had been charged with wastefulness of public moneys and unwarranted expenditure of public funds for personal expenses. He, with certain associates, was brought to trial and convicted. He was sentenced to a long term of imprisonment. It was one of the few cases of malfeasance in office which occurred in Cuba during Wood's administration and was dealt with by the regular courts in the regular manner.
Nothing further would have come of it in all probability had not the extraordinarily close {170} relations of Wood and Roosevelt furnished an excuse. The fact that Roosevelt was President of the United States and that as such he proposed the name of Wood for advancement to Major-General of Regulars from Brigadier-General added fuel to the flames. The fact that Wood was the senior Brigadier and that as such he would naturally become Major-General in regular seniority seems to have carried no weight at the time. Even then the Rathbone affair would have had no connection with the matter of this appointment had not Major Rathbone possessed personal friends high politically in the government of the time, and had not the regular army officers looked with disfavor upon the appointment even in regular order of a man who had been an army surgeon and who was not what is known as a line officer originally.
All these influences, however, coming together at the same time caused an uproar in Congress over his appointment which, while it cleared Wood entirely, still made a political scandal that hurt to the quick the man who had just accomplished what he had accomplished in Cuba.
Wood was charged with conduct unbecoming {171} an officer; that he made an intimate friend of an ex-convict in Santiago, and employed him as a newspaper correspondent to blacken the character of eminent American officers and advertise himself; that Rathbone was unjustly accused and convicted through Wood's direct agency; that Wood had been guilty of extravagance; that he had accepted while Governor-General presents from a gambling house in Havana, and so on.
All this evidence and much more was laid before the Committee of the Senate on Military Affairs and was most thoroughly aired. The result was the absolute vindication of Wood, his confirmation as Major-General of the Regular Army and a report which is a part of the records of the Senate in which it is written that:... "not one of them has a better claim, by reason of his past record and experience as a commander, than has General Wood; and in the opinion of the Committee no one has in view of his present rank equal claim to his on the ground of merit measured by the considerations suggested."
The whole episode thus ended in still greater credit to General Wood. It is only interesting {172} and in point here and now because it brings out the fact that the man himself never had the support of the Washington Army Department men until his service in the Philippines, except here and there amongst those officers who have served under him. Doubtless his extraordinary executive work in getting the Rough Riders ready for action and his methods which over-rode precedents and destroyed red tape throughout the whole of the War Department of that day had much to do with this. That there should follow in so few months his remarkable success in Santiago, his appointment as Governor-General of Cuba, his quick and successful organization and administration of the Island so that it could be turned over to the Cubans in such short order--all tended to fan the flames of prejudice. Hence when the opportunity of the Rathbone affair occurred the flames became a veritable conflagration, which, however, burned only those who brought the charges and touched the character of Wood himself not at all.
In the meantime early in 1903 he started upon his duties in the Philippines. Instead of proceeding by the usual route through California and {173} over the Pacific to Manila, Wood decided to make the voyage the other way round with a definite plan for acquiring data upon his new subject and relative to his new duties as he went along.
In Egypt he spent some time with Lord Cromer, then just preparing to give up his work there as Viceroy. Cromer, like all other persons in executive capacities throughout the world, knew well all that General Wood had done in Cuba. He had a very high appreciation of what had been accomplished in the time, because from his own experience he knew better than most men what the difficulties had been. He took a great liking for the quiet, stalwart American and told him that his administration in Cuba was one of the finest in Colonial history and the best in our generation. Later when Lord Cromer was asked to suggest some one to succeed himself in Egypt he said that unfortunately the best man was unavailable since he was an American citizen named Leonard Wood.
He gave him all the facilities for studying the government and administration of the British protectorate and helped him wherever and {174} whenever he could. Wood's great interest was the study of the way in which men of different and conflicting religious beliefs were handled, and he collected large quantities of books and documents to be studied later as he proceeded eastward. No man could have asked for higher appreciation than was accorded him voluntarily by the able and experienced administrator of Egyptian affairs.
From Cairo he proceeded to India and spent sufficient time to accumulate information there. He was to govern a Mohammedan population mixed up with Confucians, cannibals, headhunters and religions of twenty different varieties, and he studied as he went along all the methods employed in similar situations to preserve order without creating religious wars.
He even made a special journey to Java at the invitation of the Dutch government, where the Dutch governor gave him all the assistance in his power. Here he found the problem more closely allied to his own than elsewhere.
So that on his arrival in Manila he had gathered information upon most of the problems which would shortly confront him from sources {175} of unquestioned authenticity and from men of unquestioned ability. Some friend one night in Manila spoke of the large number of books that filled the walls of his house and wondered when he expected to get time to read them. Wood's answer was that he had read them all and only used them now as reference books to refresh his memory.
New as the problems were, therefore, he had by the time he began active work as Governor whatever preparation any one could secure for the work in hand.
The Spaniards had failed in their government in the Philippines as they had elsewhere. In Mindanao and Sulu--the country, or islands, inhabited by the Moros--they had failed signally because of their intolerance of the religious beliefs of the people and their careless impatience generally towards a colony which from its very nature could not produce much money. Furthermore they did not send sufficient military forces or sufficiently able officers to maintain their supremacy. And finally they did not deal with the people through the native clergy and priests. Consequently when the Americans came in the Moros were united only {176} in their hatred of the white race, placed no confidence in anything their rulers told them and only obeyed white-man-made laws as long as the white man was in sight.
After all a sultan or datu had his position and authority which had come down to him through generations and his religion which had been taught him from birth. He saw no reason why he should give up these without a struggle just because some other man arrived with a different religion and a different form of sultan government. The country was such that it was easy to avoid the new rulers. Transportation over large parts of the southern islands was through jungle and pathless forests where even riding a horse was impossible. Streams without bridges, settlements without approaches except a trail, tropical climates to which only the Moros themselves were accustomed spread over a land of almost impenetrable jungle. The Moros themselves understood such a situation and could easily move from one spot to another, one island to another, one settlement to another; while the army had to fight its way in and then fight its way out again.
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While the problem of administration was not unlike that in Cuba in so far as the organizing of courts, law, education, native officials and so on went, there were here in Moroland the infinitely more difficult and delicate tasks of dealing with many different religious laws and customs and the hereditary rank and rights of tribal rulers, none of which existed in Cuba.
The quality of statesmanship in Wood which dealt with these problems and settled them so that from a slave-holding, polygamous, headhunting land there arose a self-governing community is of the highest order.
It was put into force in the commander's usual, commonplace, thorough way without haste or excitement, but where necessary by force of arms which required more than a hundred engagements and many hard-fought battles. Wood first spent some time in Manila going over the situation with Mr. Taft. There he learned Taft's wishes and views and prepared his military forces. He was both military commander and civil governor of the Moroland and as such was again an absolute autocrat. When he was ready he started directly {178} into the jungle from Zamboanga. The journey took him and his staff through forests, over unfordable rivers, across mountain ranges on foot, across the straits that separated one island from another in dugouts, into forts, into towns, into villages and hamlets in a nerve-racking journey of over a month without a pause except for necessary sleep.
He wanted to see with his own eyes and hear with his own ears at first hand what was the condition of affairs, what was going on, what were the different and varying situations in order that he might the more correctly and certainly draw up plans for the reorganization of the colony. In one village he was a military commander issuing orders; in another he was a criminal or civil judge sitting in session; in another he was a listener to the advancement of the plans and the religious ceremonials of the sultans or datus of the place.
Naturally all came to see him. He was the embodiment of the new conquerors and curiosity alone would have brought every one, to say nothing of policy which brought those who desired {179} to impress him in order that special favors might be expected for themselves. He was the Great White Sultan judged by the standards known to their other sultans.
And the problems were infinitely varied and in most cases entirely new ones to the "doctor from Boston."
But, as in other places, he used his own methods in each instance to settle the particular problem, always emphasizing the one great fact that if the Moros would deal fairly with the Government of the United States they would benefit as never before, secure fair and just treatment and be assured of their right to live in peace.
Yet when things became a little clogged he took immediate steps to clear the situation with force if necessary, but always with diplomacy if that could be made to do the job.
"In Jolo there was a mess. The puffed-up Sultan, with whom General Bates in 1899 had made a treaty by which the Sultan engaged to keep order, was away in Singapore having a 'time.' His brother, the Rajah Mudah, was acting as regent. The sub-chiefs and datus were in a great {180} row. The Moros were murdering and robbing, all over the island. General Wood led an expedition to find out what was the matter. It was not a punitive expedition, but rather one meant to let the natives see the stalwart soldiers of the United States and understand the futility of resisting them. The Rajah Mudah was sulky. The General sent him a polite invitation to visit him in camp near Maibun, the Rajah's town. Mudah returned word that he was ill. Another invitation failed to budge him. General Wood ordered Colonel Scott to pay a call upon the sick Rajah and to take along a company of infantry. Colonel Scott and Captain Howard found the Rajah lounging among his pillows. He greeted them in the languid accents of the sick. Solicitous inquiries about the nature of his malady were made. The Rajah had a boil. Colonel Scott was deeply sympathetic. Would the Rajah object to showing his boil. Perhaps the visitors might be able to suggest a remedy. The Rajah did not show his boil. Captain Howard put his company into line. The Rajah sat up with a jerk, and Moros came running from all directions to see what was {181} happening. Colonel Scott very quietly explained that the soldiers had been sent as a guard of honor to escort the Rajah to the General. If the Rajah was quite sure that he was feeling sufficiently strong to travel, they would go.
Peering through half shut eyes, the Rajah Mudah pondered for a moment. Then he announced that he felt greatly improved and that undoubtedly his condition would be immensely helped by a ride in the air.
"General Wood greeted him cordially and ceremoniously. He personally conducted him around the camp, pointing out what fine, big men our soldiers were, and especially directing his attention to the machine guns. Would the Rajah like to see the guns in operation?
"After the guns had mowed down a few trees the Rajah's face assumed a thoughtful expression. He became enthusiastically friendly." [Footnote: World's Work.]
Such methods in time made an impression. Even the Moro mind began to absorb the fact that it was much better to accept the invitation than to undergo what followed any failure to do so.
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Wood had also to add to his difficulties in the beginning the prejudice of army officers he found in the islands. The older men over whom he had been promoted by President McKinley had no love for him. They called him a doctor. He was not of the army fraternity. They had heard that he had done well, but not by established methods. The younger officers took their cue from their seniors and so did the enlisted men. It was a difficult problem, or series of problems, through which he had to steer a careful course. But he did it and turned the tide entirely in the other direction.
He did it by always taking his share of the hard work. Object lessons of this sort multiplied as time went on. When troops were sent out to an engagement Wood went with them and kept in the front line. When they camped for the night in the jungle he had the same bed--the ground. When they had little or nothing to eat, he had the same. Once when they came out upon the beach of one of the islands after a hard trip Wood's launch was reported a hundred yards off the surf ready with cooling fans, a good mattressed bed, excellent food and a bath. He told {183} the orderly that he would stay with the men and sent him back to the launch, taking no more notice of the matter except to scrape out a new hollow in the burning sand in the hope of finding a cooler spot to sleep.
Such episodes repeated again and again soon made a vital change of views in regard to the new governor and commander. They occurred so regularly and so often that it appeared true--this taking what came along in the day's work with the others--not a case of trying to produce effect now and then. Mr. R. H. Murray, in his article written in 1912, quoted above, speaks of an officer who served under Wood at this time and as he says quotes him as literally as he can:
"When Wood first came out in 1903, the army in the Philippines didn't know him. There were plenty of officers who reviled him as a favorite of the White House, and cussed him out for it. Pretty soon the army began to realize that he was a hustler; that he knew a good deal about the soldier's game; that he did things and did them right; that, when reveille sounded before daybreak, he was usually up and dressed before {184} us; that, when a man was down and out, and he happened to be near, he'd get off his horse and see what the matter was and fix the fellow up, if he could; that when he gave an order it was a sensible one and that he didn't change it after it went out; and that he remembered a man who did a good piece of work and showed his appreciation at every chance.
"Well, the youngsters began to swear by Wood, and the old chaps followed, so that from 'cussing him out' they began to respect him and then to admire and love him. That's the word--love. It's the easiest thing in the world to pick a fight out there now by saying something against Wood. It is always the same when men come in contact with him. I don't honestly believe there is a man in the department now who wouldn't go to hell and back for Leonard Wood."
It was again much the same story as in Cuba. It was not only the personality of the man himself, his personal magnetism, but the quiet simplicity of his methods backed by knowledge and good judgment. It was the absence of doing anything for effect, anything of the personal {185} "ego;" the getting of things done quietly, without ferment or conversation. And back of it all the absolute certainty of every one who worked with or under him that Leonard Wood would do exactly what he said he would, even though he said it quite quietly only once and even though the doing of it meant a military expedition, a battle and the death of many a good man who perhaps knew nothing of the real reasons.
Here again space is too limited to permit of an account of the work done by Wood which made a group of pirates into a relatively law-abiding community. Yet some attempt to picture the situation is necessary in order to give a slight idea of what the problem was.
It should be borne in mind that the country over which he was made Governor-General consisted of two-thirds of the Island of Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago--a long chain of large and small islands extending almost to Borneo. The inhabitants were principally Mohammedans, known to the Spaniards as Moros. Along the coast of Mindanao were scattered small Philippine settlements--Christian Filipinos. Widely {186} separated back in the islands were numerous tribes speaking different dialects. In appearance they were not unlike the Diacs of Borneo. Some of them were headhunters. Among some of them cannibalism still existed in the form of religious ceremonies.
The Moros were the masters of all the seas in this vicinity. They were the old Malay pirates so well known in books of travel. The Spaniards had waged intermittent war against them since early in 1600, but they never effectively conquered them. They would send down a large expedition, win a victory and withdraw. This procedure, however, made little or no impression on the pirates, who shortly returned to their trade when the Spanish victors had returned home.
The Moros were all fanatical Mohammedans, intolerant of Christians or Christian influence, and when the Spaniards arrived in Manila about 1687 they dominated all the seas about the Philippine Islands. They were armed with all kinds of firearms, ranging from the old Queen Bess muzzle-loader to the most modern rifles. Their artillery ranged from the broadside guns of battleships of {187} the 18th Century to a smaller cannon of bronze, made principally in Borneo. They were bold, adventurous sailors, slave traders and slave hunters and successfully terrorized the hill tribes. Indeed, they were greatly feared along the coast of Mindanao.
Early in the American occupation a treaty had been made with the Sultan of Sulu, who claimed the headship of Moros from the Island of Sulu northward to the great Island of Mindanao. In Mindanao there were different sultans who claimed headships in their own districts, and foremost amongst these was Datu Ali, who had waged a long and successful war with the Spaniards.
Here then was a difficult problem: to establish civil government among these wandering hill tribes, Filipino settlements, and piratical Mohammedan groups, each fearing and hating the other. General Wood's first task as he conceived it was to stop slave-trading and establish relations of tolerance, if not friendship, between the Filipinos and the Moros on the one hand and between the Moros and the hill tribes on the other; to stop the Christian Filipinos from imposing {188} on the hill tribes; and to begin some method for substituting respect for law and order, for government and authority in the place of terror and hatred. The ending of the slave trade resulted in many heavy, long-drawn-out fights with the principal Moro bands. The Sultan of Sulu had not lived up to the Bates Treaty and he had to be deposed, therefore, as a sovereign in Sulu.
The next step was to organize some form of government that would fit the situation. To start this Wood divided the entire Moro area, including the islands, into districts and appointed American officers of experience and ability as governors of the districts.
He then visited Borneo and studied carefully the laws and regulations under which that chartered colony governed the Malays within its borders. The policy laid down by him for the district governors was to stop slave-trading and the taking of life and property at once; to establish next friendly relations between the people living on the coast and the timid tribes up in the hills; to build up commerce on a fair basis; to open up trails and lines of communication between {189} villages; to assure to every one, no matter what his religion, a fair deal. He also laid great stress on the necessity of bringing the headmen of the different tribes into contact with the district governors and of doing all that could be done to build up and increase commerce.
At the same time the new and energetic Governor-General instituted a strong policy to stop forever the inhuman practices and customs highly repugnant to what Americans considered humane conduct. Every effort was made to insure better treatment of women, who up to that time had been nothing more nor less than chattels. On the seacoast trading stations were built and put in charge of men who spoke the dialect of the wild people. At these stations there was always a provincial agent who had authority to see that the hill people got fair prices for their products and just treatment from the Malays. Little by little as a result of this wise and sane policy they were all induced to come to the stations and make their head-quarters there during the trading period. In former times they had been accustomed to bring down their heavy loads of jungle products on their {190} shoulders and rather than stay in the neighborhood of the pirates over night they would sell their goods for anything they could get and hurry up into the hills again before dark. Moro, Filipino and Chinese traders had for centuries systematically robbed them. Money was of little use to them and therefore all trading was by barter. It was a long campaign of education which Wood instituted to build up confidence amongst these timid people, and he sent young American officers among them, traveling often-times hundreds of miles on foot and practically without any protection to help them and give them confidence.
Little by little confidence was built up; great peace meetings were arranged among the different tribes; old grudges were wiped out; scores were balanced and old feuds settled. It took time and brains and painstaking patience, but it was done and done well.
At the same time, taking a leaf from his own Cuban notebook, Wood started schools in the Filipino villages and took steps to do the same among the Moros. It was very difficult to {191} find teachers who would be received by these Moslems. It was at first almost impossible to get them to send their children to school at all. Nothing but time and sound, honest methods in dealing with these people made all or any of this possible.
Patrol boats were put on duty in the waters about the islands. Simultaneous with this building up went the organization of the customs service, since the province had to be entirely self-supporting. Native people from among the Moros and Filipinos were organized into what was called the constabulary. Every effort was made to turn the attention of the people from irregular and piratical activities to the activities of commerce. School laws were put in force, written in terms to meet the situation. Increased cultivation of new land, cultivation of cocoanuts, cocoa, and various local products, including hemp, was encouraged by exempting it from taxation provided certain amounts of useful crops were planted thereon.
Communications by land and water were built up as fast as possible. After a time taxation was {192} imposed very gradually in the form of a cedula, or poll tax. The money so collected was spent so far as possible in the district where it was collected. The headmen of the tribes and sub-tribes were made officials of the province and given a baldric bearing a brass shield with the seal of the province. In time they were given certain police authority for the maintenance of order. If the local headman could not handle the situation, the local constabulary was called in. If they in turn were not sufficient, then the troops were sent into the area.
A free man's life was worth fifty-two dollars and a half in gold; a male slave one-half this amount; a free woman was worth as much as a male slave; a female slave half as much as a male slave, and a modern rifle about two hundred dollars in gold.
As the simple processes of law came to be better understood natives were encouraged to appeal from the tribal to the district court, consisting of the district governor and the local priests or headmen, who advised the former upon tribal {193} customs and scales of punishment, in order that no injustice should be done to any one.
Gradually appeals were taken from the district courts to the regular insular courts, which were represented by itinerant judges of the first instance. The latter belonged to the regular Philippine judiciary and were at this time all Americans. Women were given equal status before the law and the rights of property were safeguarded.
After the first hard fighting the need for the use of troops gradually diminished and more and more of the policing work was done by the native constabulary. The wildest regions became practically safe.
After the districts were in working order municipalities and townships were established and the framework of civic organization begun. The Mohammedan religion was left undisturbed. Religious freedom was guaranteed to both Mohammedans and Christians. In addition to the Catholic missionaries who had been working there for hundreds of years, missionaries of other denominations commenced to take active interest in the situation. The revenue was sufficient to maintain {194} the province in good shape and there was a considerable amount of money in reserve.
Thus in three years, with the knowledge he had acquired in Cuba supplemented by his visits and study amongst the colonies of other nations where similar problems existed, with his extraordinary energy and capacity for working through innumerable subordinates, Leonard Wood again built up a community out of nothing but land and human beings. But in the Philippine instance he built up a community largely governing itself upon a system of laws still in force--though three governors have succeeded him--from a hopeless mass of Christian Filipinos, Chinese traders, Malay pirates, Mohammedans, cannibals and feudal tribes.
It was a remarkable instance of state building, which following upon the Cuban episodes, stands out as the greatest achievement any man has accomplished in Colonial history.
It is impossible to state the relative importance of this work without appearing to overdo it. Yet if we could but collect the tributes that have been paid to Wood upon its accomplishment they {195} would make a volume, Richard Olney wrote: "... to congratulate you personally on the most successful and deservedly successful career, whether as soldier or public man of any sort, that the Spanish War and its consequences have brought to the front." John Hay, then Secretary of State, wrote Wood a note "with sincere congratulations on the approaching fruition of all your splendid work for the regeneration of Cuba," and Senator Platt, of Connecticut, wrote of his "admiration for your administration under difficulties greater I think than have ever had to be encountered by any one man in reconstruction work." So the record of two statesmenlike and administrative works stands to this day as a witness of Wood's qualities.
In 1905 after a visit to the United States he returned to the islands and became commander-in-chief of the American forces in the Philippines, General Bliss taking his place as Governor of the Moros, who were now established under a basic form of government and procedure which Wood had inaugurated.
By 1908 this work was practically completed {196} and the procedure laid out for the future rule of that part of the Philippines. At that time General Wood was transferred to Governor's Island in New York Harbor as Commander of the Department of the East, strangely enough the first command he had held within the United States since the Geronimo days in the Southwest.
There followed in the next six years a diplomatic mission as special Ambassador to the Argentine Republic upon the occasion of the centenary of Argentina, where he met and talked with General von der Groltz, the German officer, who had so much to do with the Great War later. From this meeting Wood absorbed more of the necessity for universal military training and more of the aversion to a standing army such as existed in Germany. After this mission he became the head of the American military forces under the President of the United States and for four years held the position of Chief of Staff.
Thus beginning his army life in 1886 as an army surgeon he rose in twenty-two years to the highest position in the regular army that any one can hold. That, in a sense, closes a certain {197} period in General Wood's career. For when in 1914 he was again made Commander of the Department of the East he had already started upon his campaign of national preparation which had been growing and growing in his mind as he lived and served his own nation and observed and studied other nations. The knowledge he had acquired in the four quarters of the earth showed to him conclusively that a nation must be ready to resist attack in order to live in peace, and yet that that nation must not spend all its wealth and time and brains in building up a military machine. In a strange way the attitude of this New England "Mayflower" descendant resembled the attitude of his own native Cape Cod, which stands at the outposts of New England with its clenched fist ready and prepared, yet which lives on quietly in the lives of its inhabitants who proceed in peace with their commercial occupations and their family existence.
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