The revulsion was complete. Before the proclamation was issued, it is true, there had been growing among the Filipinos a feeling of distrust of the Americans, and of doubt whether, after all, they were to be conceded their independence. For, at the surrender of Manila, although its capture had been impossible without the aid of the insurgents, they were studiously excluded from any share of the honor, and thus given the first intimation of the final treachery of the administration. Later the Filipinos were refused a hearing at Washington, and again before the Peace Commission which was to dispose of them like chattels.
Actual hostilities broke out February 4, 1899, and are thus referred to by President McKinley in his message to Congress December 4, 1899: “The aggression of the Filipinos continually increased, until finally, just before the time set by the Senate of the United States for a vote upon the treaty, an attack, evidently prepared in advance, was made all along the American lines, which resulted in a terribly destructive and sanguinary repulse of the insurgents.”
The report of General Otis, reads as follows (page [96]): “The battle of Manila commenced at half past eight o’clock, on the evening of February 4 (1899), and continued until five o’clock the next evening. The engagement was strictly defensive on the part of the insurgents, and one of vigorous attack by our forces.”
Senator Hoar, of Massachusetts, in a letter to the Springfield (Mass.) Republican, January 11, 1900, is responsible for this statement regarding the first battle: “The outbreak of hostilities was not their fault, but ours. We fired upon them first. The fire was returned from their lines. Thereupon it was returned again from us, and several Filipinos were killed. As soon as Aguinaldo heard of it he sent a message to General Otis saying that the firing was without his knowledge and against his will; that he deplored it, and that he desired hostilities to cease, and would withdraw his troops to any distance General Otis should desire. To which the American general replied that, as the firing had begun, it must go on.”
Thus began the War in the Philippine Islands. It has cost thousands of lives and millions of treasure. It has burned the homes and uprooted the fields of a frugal, intelligent, and industrious people in whose minds and hearts have been seared the ringing words of Patrick Henry: “Give me liberty or give me death!” It has not brought to the United States either riches or glory, but, on the contrary, lost to us much in taxes on our people, more in the death of our youth, and most of all in the sullying of the noble and lofty ideals which animated the Fathers of the Republic and made their lives sublime. An American soldier writing to the Minneapolis Times, in describing a captured city, thus simply sets forth the enormity of our national offense:
“Every inhabitant had left Norzagaray, and no article of value remained behind. The place had probably been the home of fifteen hundred or two thousand people, and was pleasantly situated on a clear mountain stream in which a bath was most refreshing. It was not a city of apparent wealth, but in many houses were found evidences of education. In a building which probably had been used as a schoolhouse were found a number of books, and a variety of exercises written by childish hands. Pinned to a crucifix was a paper upon which was written the following in Spanish: ‘American soldiers—How can you hope mercy from Him when you are slaughtering a people fighting for their liberty, and driving us from the homes which are justly ours?’ On a table was a large globe which did not give Minneapolis, but had San Pablo (St. Paul) as the capital of Minnesota. On a rude blackboard were a number of sentences, which indicated that the teacher had recently been giving lessons in the history of the American revolution.”
The demoralizing effect of this war against liberty on the American conscience became early apparent. If it were permissible to make war on the Filipinos because they would not yield to our government, it was no far cry to withhold from the Porto Ricans the protecting aegis of the Constitution, to levy a discriminating tariff against them, and to tax them without their consent. And it of course became impossible for the United States to express sympathy for the Boers in their war against British aggression, or even to maintain neutrality between the two. As a consequence horses, mules, arms, and ammunition were permitted to be freely shipped from our ports for the use of British soldiers, while British ships were permitted to intercept and capture American ships laden with American breadstuffs, when consigned to the Boers. In fact, an “Anglo-Saxon alliance” was more than hinted at by John Hay, then United States Ambassador to Great Britain, and later Secretary of State, when he said at London, on April 20, 1898, speaking of England and the United States:
“The good understanding between us is based on something deeper than mere expediency. All who think can not but see that there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world. We are bound by ties we did not forge, and that we can not break. We are joint ministers in the sacred work of freedom and progress, charged with duties we can not evade by the imposition of irresistible hands.”
To this sentiment Joseph Chamberlain, the British Secretary of the Colonies, replied in kind on May 13, at Birmingham, saying:
“I would go so far as to say that, terrible as war may be, even war itself would be cheaply purchased if, in a great and noble cause, the Stars and Stripes and the Union Jack should wave together over an Anglo-Saxon alliance. At the present time these two great nations understand each other better than they ever have done, since, over a century ago, they were separated by the blunder of a British government.”