Obviously, Agoncillo was somewhat impressed by this cablegram, for on August 1 in a letter to Aguinaldo he made the following statements and inquiries:—
“If the American troops leave us alone there, the questions which will arise are these: Have we sufficient arms to maintain the war against Spain in order to secure our independence? If the other nations are opposed to our independence and wish that we should continue under the Spanish sovereignty, have we sufficient strength to wage a war and obtain victory over Spain and over them in the future? If you think that we have not sufficient strength to fight against them, should we accept independence under the American protectorate? And if so, what conditions or advantages should we give to the United States? You should carefully consider the preceding questions, and I suggest that you should, in a confidential manner, consult them with your cabinet-in-banc, as well as with your private secretary and military chiefs of rank; and your decision be notified to our representatives abroad in order that they may know what they must do in their negotiations. You will see from the telegram addressed to me by Regidor that he suggests to me to send a message to MacKinley requesting him not to abandon us, and to submit to them [the U. S.] unconditionally. As I do not agree with him and as I cannot take any action which is against the instructions of the government, I replied to him that the only desire of our government is independence. This may be seen from the enclosed telegram. On account of this reply, he was, I think, somewhat offended, as he afterwards sent a telegram to Joviales [Basa] instead of to me. The latter, upon receiving the telegram, convened all the boastful patriots, and they adopted a resolution to send a message to MacKinley requesting annexation. Fortunately, in the meeting there was present Dr. Justo Lucban, who protested against such measure. In view of this protest, they again agreed that I should be present in the meeting, since I am the representative of our government. At the meeting where I was present, I pointed out the inadvisability of their resolution, stating, as one of the reasons, that we should await your instructions in regard to the matter before sending any message of that character. So the message was not sent; but I was later informed that Basa had, after all, sent it yesterday, because he believed that it would not injure our cause. Upon learning this, I was carried away by passion and went so far as to say to Basa the following: ‘Many of us, especially myself, think ourselves to be wise, without being so; politicians for what we hear from others; we claim to be patriots, but we are only so in words; we wish to be chiefs, but none of us act in a way worthy of a chief.’ To this he did not reply. Perhaps his conscience accused him of an act of treachery, since we agreed in the meeting to await your letter. What union can you expect from this people?”[13]
Note that the Basa here referred to is the man whose initials were forged on the letter quoted on [page 67].
The Second Philippine Commission
From left to right: General Luke E. Wright, Professor Dean C. Worcester, Professor Bernard Moses, Judge William H. Taft, and Judge Henry C. Ide.
In the course of the above-mentioned letter Agoncillo came back once more to the question of independence under a protectorate and made it very clear that at this late day he did not know whether this was or was not what the Filipinos desired.[14]
On August 21, Apacible obviously did not think that it would be an easy matter to escape from Spanish domination, much less that the islands were already rid of it, for he wrote to Mabini that the United States were likely again to deliver the Filipinos into the hands of Spain. He said that “if events will be what their telegrams indicate, we have a dark and bloody future before us. To be again in the hands of Spain will mean a long and bloody war, and it is doubtful whether the end will be favourable to us... Spain free from Cuba and her other colonies will employ her energy to crush us and will send here the 150,000 men she has in Cuba.”[15] Apacible thought that the best thing was independence under an American protectorate.
On August 7, 1898, Aguinaldo warned Agoncillo that in the United States he should “not accept any contracts or give any promises respecting protection or annexation, because we will see first if we can obtain independence.”[16]
Even annexation to the United States was not excluded by Aguinaldo from the possible accepted solutions, for in outlining the policy of the Philippine government to Sandico on August 10, 1898, he wrote:—