The hero of the Filipinos

by Charles Edward Russell; Eulogio Balan Rodriguez

THE RIZAL MONUMENT AT THE LUNETA DECORATED FOR RIZAL DAY, DECEMBER 30

On March 12, 1897, seven months after the Katipunan explosion, a convention of the revolutionists met to establish a Provisional Government. No doubt Bonifacio, still head of the Katipunan, expected to be made president of the Provisional Republic, also; but the convention’s choice was Aguinaldo. Intrigue may have played some part in this dénouement; but the impulse to it was Aguinaldo’s brilliant operations in the field—Napoleon and the Directoire again. Bonifacio was offered the place of secretary of the interior. He angrily refused it and took to the mountains with his brothers. In trying to arrest him a party of soldiers wounded him to death.

For months the war was fought with varying chances. Sometimes the Filipinos routed the Spaniards;[1] sometimes they were driven back. Fresh [[322]]troops came from Spain; gradually the revolutionists retired into the mountains; but it was evident that no forces the Spaniards were likely to gather would be enough to suppress this uprising. What Spain faced was such years of wearying warfare as had drained her treasury and brought her shame in Cuba. It was a prospect the Government viewed with no satisfaction. Another governor-general, Primo de Rivera, came out to take the place of Polavieja, the foolish man that had led the mad hunt after Katipunanists. Once before de Rivera had been governor-general; by some extravagance he was believed to understand the Filipinos and to be their friend. He now sought to end a strife so unpromising of any result except deficits. A meeting was arranged with the insurgent chiefs, at which a treaty[2] was patched together whereby the Filipinos were to have all the reforms and rights they had demanded and had fought for, except actual independence. When we come to look to-day at these sweeping changes we should note that prominent among them was the triumph of the people so long delayed over the orders. These were to be expelled or secularized.[3] Complete religious freedom was explicitly [[323]]guaranteed—and no more friars, no more System. By this token it would seem, then, that Rizal had already conquered. He exposed the orders; the orders killed him, but apparently wrought thereby their own ruin.

Amnesty for all that had taken part in the revolution was promised, with momentous changes in the methods of government. There was to be no longer an irresponsible oligarchy ruling as it pleased; the Philippines were to have representation in the Spanish Parliament; they were to emerge from the darkness that fostered iniquity and dwell in the critical spotlights of civilization. There was to be a free press, free speech, free assembly; there were to be radical reforms in the courts and other desirable novelties. A sum of money was to be deposited by the Spanish Government to guarantee the fulfilment of these pledges and to provide for the families of the revolutionists killed in the war. Aguinaldo and his commanders were to retire from the country.

This was signed December 14, 1897. In two months it was evident that the Spanish Government had no intention to keep any of the pledges thus made. The orders abated nothing of their power and insolence; the captured revolutionists were rigorously punished and often horribly mishandled; there was no free speech, no free press; no improvements were made in the courts; only a part of the guarantee fund was deposited. The revolution was resumed with new fury. Again the Filipinos drove the Spanish regulars before them until the noise of their guns was heard in Manila itself, when the blowing up of the American [[324]]battle-ship Maine in the harbor of Havana gave to the relations between Spain and the United States a new and startling aspect.

Soon after the declaration of war between these nations and before the battle of Manila Bay, Commodore Dewey invited Aguinaldo to join him. On May 11, 1898, the Filipino leader landed at Cavite and took command of the insurgent army. From that time the Spanish troops met with nothing but disaster. Step by step they were driven (by native troops and these only) out of every stronghold, not only in Luzon but in the other Islands, until August when they were shut up in Manila and completely surrounded with Filipino trenches, while Dewey’s ships held the sea approaches. On August 10, Aguinaldo captured the Manila waterworks, and had the city at his mercy. On August 13 it surrendered, not to him that really had reduced it, but to the American naval and land forces; although of such land forces there was but a handful.

Aguinaldo had made Mabini the president of his council and secretary of foreign affairs. Mabini now bent himself to organize a constitutional government, and if the achievement that followed had been staged nearer to the center of the world’s attention it would have been hailed as a triumph of constructive statesmanship. On September 15, the first Philippine Congress met at Malolos, about twenty-five miles north of Manila, and proceeded to draft for the Philippine Republic a constitution that for wisdom and sound democratic philosophy may be compared with any other similar chart by which any government ever was steered. On November 29, 1898, the Congress adopted [[325]]this constitution, and on the following January 21, the Philippine Republic, complete and functioning, was installed in place of the Provisional Government. Mabini was chief justice of the Supreme Court.

The United States refused to recognize the new republic, but, in accordance with the absurd treaty of Paris, insisted upon its own sovereignty over all the Philippines. For twenty million dollars it had bought of Spain a title that Spain did not possess. We need not dwell long on the deplorable strife that now ensued between the American and Filipino forces.[4] On February 4, the Americans advanced into territory held by the Filipino army, and for the next two years war raged. The Filipinos, although badly armed and always outnumbered, showed a tenacity, a courage, and a military prowess that continually astonished the Americans and won their candid and reiterated praise. Much of the credit for the skilful handling of the Filipino forces was due to General Antonio Luna, Aguinaldo’s chief of staff, whose natural aptitude for arms had been developed by study in the best schools of Europe. When he lost his life in June, 1899, the Filipino cause suffered a heavy blow, but not so heavy as its enemies expected. For the singular fact was to be noted that out of the body of natives once despised and scornfully classed as “brethren of the water-buffalo” arose men capable of inspiring the soldiers of a hopeless cause and of leading them well in desperately fought battles. If for the moment we can lay aside nationalistic consciousness, the dauntless strivings [[326]]of the Filipinos against the Americans will appear worthy of a place in best records of the struggles of the weak against the strong.

On March 23, 1901, President Aguinaldo was captured, and thereafter the war slowly subsided until on July 4, 1902, President Roosevelt issued a proclamation of amnesty and the American Government took up the work of reconstruction, of which the first purpose was to prepare the natives for the independence repeatedly promised them.