Civilized Population, Classified by Birth
According to the Census of 1903
| Born in the Philippine Islands | 6,931,548 |
| Born in China | 41,035 |
| Born in United States | 8,135 |
| Born in Spain | 3,888 |
| Born in Japan | 921 |
| Born in Great Britain | 667 |
| Born in Germany | 368 |
| Born in East Indies | 241 |
| Born in France | 121 |
| Born in Other countries of Europe | 487 |
| Born in All other countries | 275 |
| 6,987,686 |
The regulations affecting Chinese immigration are explained at p. [633]. Other foreigners are permitted to enter the Philippines (conditionally), but all are required to pay an entrance fee (I had to pay $5.30 Mex.) before embarking (abroad) for a Philippine port, and make a declaration of 19 items,[24] of which the following are the most interesting to the traveller:—(1) Sex; (2) whether married or single; (3) who paid the passage-money; (4) whether in possession of $30 upward or less; (5) whether ever in prison; (6) whether a polygamist. The master or an officer of the vessel carrying the passenger is required to make oath before the United States Consul at the port of embarkation that he has made a “personal examination” of his passenger, and does not believe him (or her) to be either an idiot, or insane person, or a pauper, or suffering from a loathsome disease, or an ex-convict, or guilty of infamous crime involving moral turpitude, or a polygamist, etc. The shipʼs doctor has to state on oath that he has also made a “personal examination” of the passenger. If the vessel safely arrives in port, say Manila, she will be boarded by a numerous staff of Customsʼ officials. In the meantime the passenger will have been supplied with declaration-forms and a printed notice, stating that an “Act provides a fine of not exceeding $2,000 or imprisonment at hard labour, for not more than five years, or both, for offering a gratuity to an officer of the Customs in consideration of any illegal act in connexion with the examination of baggage.” The baggage-declaration must be ready for the officers, and, at intervals during an hour and a half, he (or she) has to sign six different declarations as to whether he (or she) brings fire-arms. The baggage is then taken to the Custom-house in a steam-launch for examination, which is not unduly rigid. Under a Philippine Commission Act, dated October 15, 1901, the Collector of Customs, or his deputy, may, at his will, also require the passenger to take an oath of allegiance in such terms that, in the event of war between the passengerʼs country and America, he who takes the oath would necessarily have to forfeit his claim for protection from his own country, unless he violated that oath. No foreigner is permitted to land if he comes “under a contract expressed, or implied, to perform labour in the Philippine Islands.” In 1903 this prohibition to foreigners was disputed by a British bank-clerk who arrived in Manila for a foreign bank. The case was carried to court, with the result that the prohibition was maintained in principle, although the foreigner in question was permitted to remain in the Islands as an act of grace. But in February, 1905, a singular case occurred, exactly the reverse of the one just mentioned. A young Englishman who had been brought out to Manila on a four yearsʼ agreement, after four or five months of irregular conduct towards the firm employing him, presented himself to the Collector of Customs (as Immigration Agent), informed against himself, and begged to be deported from the Colony. The incentive for this strange proceeding was to secure the informerʼs reward of $1,000. It was probably the first case in Philippine history of a person voluntarily seeking compulsory expulsion from the Islands. The Government, acting on the information, shipped him off to Hong-Kong, the nearest British port, in the following month, with a through passage to Europe.
Since the American advent the Administration of Justice has been greatly accelerated, and Municipal Court cases, which in Spanish times would have caused more worry to the parties than they were worth, or, for the same reason, would have been settled out of court violently, are now despatched at the same speed as in the London Police Courts. On the other hand, quick despatch rather feeds the nativeʼs innate love for litigation, so that an agglomeration of lawsuits is still one of the Governmentʼs undesirable but inevitable burdens. There is a complaint that the fines imposed in petty cases are excessive, and attention was drawn to this by the Municipality of Manila.[25] After stating that the fines imposed on 2,185 persons averaged $5 per capita, and that they had to go to prison for non-payment, the Municipality adds: “It shows an excessive rigour on the part of the judges in the imposition of fines, a rigour which ought to be modified, inasmuch as the majority of the persons accused before the Court are extremely poor and ignorant of the ordinances and the laws for the violation of which they are so severely punished.” Sentences of imprisonment and fines for high crimes are justly severe. During the governorship of Mr. W. H. Taft, 17 American provincial treasurers were each condemned to 25 yearsʼ imprisonment for embezzlement of public funds. In February, 1905, an army major, found guilty of misappropriation of public moneys, had his sentence computed at 60 years, which term the court reduced to 40 yearsʼ hard labour. The penalties imposed on some rioters at Vigan in April, 1904, were death for two, 40 yearsʼ imprisonment and $10,000 fine each for twelve, 30 yearsʼ imprisonment for thirty-one, and 10 yearsʼ imprisonment for twenty-five.
The American law commonly spoken of in the Philippines as the “Law of Divorce” is nothing more than judicial separation in its local application, as it does not annul the marriage and the parties cannot marry again as a consequence of the action. The same could be obtained under the Spanish law called the Siete Partídas, with the only difference that before the decree nisi was made absolute the parties might have had to wait for years, and even appeal to Home.
On May 26,1900, the Military Governor authorized the solemnization of marriages by any judge of a court inferior to the Supreme Court, a justice of the peace, or a minister of any denomination. For the first time in the history of the Islands, habeas corpus proceedings were heard before the Supreme Court on May 19, 1900. Besides the lower courts established in many provincial centres, sessions are held in circuit, each usually comprising two or three provinces. The provinces are grouped into 16 judicial districts, in each of which there is a Court of First Instance; and there is, moreover, one additional “Court of First Instance at large.” The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, some of his assistant judges, several provincial judges, the Attorney-General, and many other high legal functionaries, are Filipinos. The provincial justices of the peace are also natives, and necessarily so because their office requires an intimate knowledge of native character and dialect. Their reward is the local prestige which they enjoy and the litigantsʼ fees, and happily their services are not in daily request. At times the findings of these local luminaries are somewhat quaint, and have to be overruled by the more enlightened judicial authorities in the superior courts. Manila and all the judicial centres are amply supplied with American lawyers who have come to establish themselves in the Islands, where the custom obtains for professional men to advertise in the daily newspapers. So far there has been only one American lady lawyer, who, in 1904, held the position of Assistant-Attorney in the Attorney-Generalʼs office.
[1] “No teacher or other person shall teach or criticize the doctrine of any Church, religious sect, or denomination, or shall attempt to influence the pupils for or against any Church or religious sect in any public school established under this Act. If any teacher shall intentionally violate this section, he or she shall, after due hearing, be dismissed from the public service. Provided, however, that it shall be lawful for the priest, or minister of any church established in the town where a public school is situated ... to teach religion for one half an hour three times a week in the school building to those public school pupils whose parents or guardians desire it,” etc.—Section 16 of the Public School Act, No. 74.
[2] Placido Louis Chapelle, Archbishop of New Orleans, was born in France in 1842, and, at the age of seventeen years, emigrated to America, where he entered the priesthood. In 1894 he received the mitre of Santa Fé, and in 1897 that of New Orleans. In 1898 he was appointed Apostolic Delegate to Cuba, Porto Rico, and the Philippine Islands. His mission ended, he returned to New Orleans, where he died of yellow fever in August, 1905.