First Session and Special Session of 1908

Assembly Bill 23 provided for the appointment of jurors in courts of first instance and justice of the peace courts. Under it the provincial boards were to select the eligibles from a list of names submitted by the municipal councils of the provincial capitals. This would in effect have put the administration of justice in the hands of the political party in power.

Assembly Bill 104 was entitled “An Act amending Act numbered fifteen hundred and thirty-seven of the Philippine Commission on horse-races in the Philippine Islands.”

Gambling is the besetting sin of the Filipinos, and in the city of Manila gambling in connection with horse racing had grown to be such a scandal that the commission had been compelled to take action limiting the days on which it was permitted to legal holidays and one Sunday per month. The evil had reached large dimensions. Several race-tracks were maintained in one small city, and the money that went through the totalizer, or gambling machine, had reached the enormous sum of $3,500,000 per year. Even poorly paid clerks were leaving their work to bet on the races, and then stealing in order to recoup themselves for their losses. The morals of the community were being rapidly undermined. The act passed by the commission interfered with the business of conducting daily crooked races. It certainly left plenty of opportunity to indulge in horse-racing as a legitimate sport. The amendment proposed by the assembly permitted horse-racing on all Sundays, on three days prior to Lent and on all legal holidays except Memorial Day, Rizal Day and Thursday and Friday of Holy Week. If passed it would have protected certain vicious interests and opened the way to a prompt extension of the gambling business.

Assembly Bill 134 reduced the tax on distilled intoxicating liquors one-fourth. The tax was already low. The rate proposed by the assembly was a concession to the demand of powerful interests and its attitude was worthy of severe condemnation.

Assembly Bill 136 abolished provincial boards of health, substituted therefor district health officers and took important powers away from the director of health and gave them to provincial boards. Substantial progress had been made in improving provincial sanitary conditions through provincial boards of health, under the control of the director of health. As was to be anticipated in a country like the Philippines, many necessary health measures were unpopular. This bill, vitally affecting one of the most imperative needs of the islands, would if concurred in by the commission have resulted in widespread disaster.

Assembly Bill 148 provided for the teaching of the local native dialects in the public schools. This would have had the effect of doing away with the teaching of English, or preventing its inauguration, in many places; would have emphasized and perpetuated the different native dialects; would have helped to keep the people speaking these several dialects apart, and would thus seriously have hampered progress toward national unity. One of the most important and useful things that the American government is doing is to generalize the knowledge of the English language, which not only gives the several peoples of the archipelago a common means of communication, but opens up new fields of knowledge to them and makes it easy for them to travel. Even during the days of the Filipino “republic” Mabini advocated making English the official language.[5]

Assembly Bill 197 abolished the Bureau of Civil Service and organized in its stead a division attached to the Bureau of Audits. This bill, ostensibly an economy measure, was designed to minimize the usefulness of one of the most important bureaus of the government. In the early days of the American régime Filipinos who had served the government were often deeply offended that appointments were not given to members of their families or to their near relatives, absolutely irrespective of their fitness for office. Naturally they disapproved of the civil service law when they found that it prevented such appointments.

Second Session

Assembly Bill 201 prohibited the employment of foreigners as engineers or as assistant engineers on vessels in the Philippine Islands. There were at this time an extremely limited number of Filipinos capable of filling such positions, which were largely held by Spaniards and other Europeans who had married native women and had lived in the islands for years. This measure would have crippled shipping companies and would have been a grave injustice to the men above referred to.