(6) The collection and application of taxes and revenues will be put on a sound and honest economical basis. Public funds will be raised justly and collected honestly, and will be applied only in defraying the proper expenses of the establishment and maintenance of the Philippine Government, and such general improvements as public interests demand. Local funds collected for local purposes shall not be diverted to other ends. With such a prudent and honest fiscal administration it is believed that the needs of the Government will, in a short time, become compatible with a considerable reduction of taxation.
(7) The pure, speedy, and effective administration of justice, whereby the evils of delay, corruption, and exploitation will be effectually eradicated.
(8) The construction of roads, railways, and other means of communication and transportation, and other public works of manifest advantage to the people will be promoted.
(9) Domestic and foreign trade, commerce, agriculture, and other industrial pursuits, and the general development of the country and interest of the inhabitants will be the constant objects of the solicitude and fostering care of the Government.
(10) Effective provision will be made for the establishment of elementary schools, in which the children of the people shall be educated, and appropriate facilities will also be provided for their higher education.
(11) Reforms in all departments of the Government, all branches of the public service, and all corporations closely touching the common life of the people must be undertaken without delay, and effected conformably with right and justice in such a way as to satisfy the well-founded demands and the highest sentiments and aspirations of the Philippine people.
The above proclamation, no doubt, embodies the programme of what the American Government desired to carry out at the time of its publication.
The Americans resumed the aggressive against the insurgents, and an expedition of 1,509 men and two mountain-guns was fitted out under the command of General Lawton to proceed up the Pasig River into the Lake of Bay in order to capture Santa Cruz at the eastern extremity. The expedition presented a curious sight; it comprised 15 native barges or “cascoes” towed by seven tugs. Some of the craft ran aground at Napíndan, the entrance to the lake, and delayed the little flotilla until daylight. The barges ahead had to wait for the vessels lagging behind. Then a mist came over the shore, and there was another halt. A couple of miles off an insurgent steamer was sighted, but it passed on. Finally Santa Cruz was reached; 200 sharpshooters were landed under cover of the launch guns, and fighting continued all the afternoon until nightfall. Early in the morning the town was attacked, the church situated in the centre was captured, and the American loss was only six men wounded; the insurgents were driven far away, leaving 68 dead on the field, and a large number of wounded, whilst hundreds were taken prisoners.
On April 12, at the request of the Spanish General Rios,[3] the gunboat Yorktown was despatched to Baler, on the east coast of Luzon, to endeavour to rescue a party of 80 Spanish soldiers, three officers, and two priests who were holding out against 400 insurgents. These natives, who were all armed with Maüser rifles, laid in ambush, and surprised the landing-party under Lieutenant Gilmore. The whole party was captured by the insurgents, who were afterwards ordered to release them all. General Aguinaldo was always as humanely disposed as the circumstances of war would permit, and, at the request of the commissioners for the liberation of the Spanish prisoners, he gave this little band of 83 heroes and two priests their liberty under a decree so characteristic of Philippine imitative genius in its pompous allusion to the Spanish glorious past that it is well worth recording.[4]
General Lawton asserted that 100,000 men would be required to conquer the Philippines, but they were never sent, because there was always an influential group of optimists who expected an early collapse of the insurgent movement. General Otis sent frequent cablegrams to Washington expressing his belief that the war would soon come to an end. However, in April, 1899, 14,000 regular troops were despatched to the Islands to reinforce the Volunteer regiments. It was a wise measure taken not too soon, for it was clear that a certain amount of discontent had manifested itself among the Volunteers. Moreover, the whole management of the Philippine problem was much hampered by an anti-annexation movement in America which did not fail to have its influence on the Volunteers, many of whom were anxious to return home if they could. Senator Hoar and his partisans persistently opposed the retention of the Islands, claiming that it was contrary to the spirit of the American Constitution to impose a government upon a people against its will. American sentiment was indeed becoming more and more opposed to expansion of territorial possession beyond the continent, in view of the unsatisfactory operations in the Philippines—a feeling which was, however, greatly counterbalanced by a recognition of the political necessity of finishing an unpleasant task already begun, for the sake of national dignity.