[10] Tagalo, Ilocano, and Visayan are the three main dialects that have been evolved into written language by the patience of the Spanish priests in the last couple of hundred years or so. Probably five sixths of the people of the archipelago speak some one of these three dialects. In fact they can hardly be called “dialects,” for there are plenty of books—novels, plays, grammars, histories, dictionaries, etc.—written in Tagalo, Ilocano, or Visayan. Every educated Filipino of the well-to-do classes grows up speaking Spanish and the dialect of his native province, while the latter is the only language spoken by the less fortunate people of his neighborhood, the poorer classes.
[11] This report is numbered Report 606, 62d Cong., 2d Sess., and accompanies H. R. 22143 (the Jones Bill).
[12] According to the American Census of the Philippines, of 1903, the total population of Mindanao is 499,634 (see vol. ii., p. 126), of which 252,940 are Moros, and the rest civilized. In addition to said 252,940 Moros on Mindanao, the adjacent islets contain some 25,000 Moros.
[13] See Senate Document 331, 1902, p. 339.
Chapter XXIX
The Way Out
Respect for the perpetual neutrality of Switzerland has now taken such lodgment in the conscience of Europe that its violation would inevitably provoke a storm of indignation.
M. de Martens in the Revue des Deux Mondes.
On March 25, 1912, Honorable W. A. Jones, of Virginia, Chairman of the House Committee on Insular Affairs, introduced a resolution (H. J. 278) proposing the neutralization of the Philippines, to accompany his Philippine Independence Bill discussed in the preceding chapter. Such a resolution, accompanying such a bill, both introduced by one of the majority leaders in the House of Representatives, lifts the question of Philippine neutralization out of the region of the “academic,” and brings it forward as a thing which must, sooner or later, command the serious consideration both of Congress and the country. There have been many such resolutions before that of Mr. Jones. But they are all the same in principle. All contemplate our guaranteeing the Filipinos their independence until the treaties they propose shall be consummated. In 1911, there were at least nine such resolutions proposing neutralization of the Philippines, introduced by the following named gentlemen, the first a Republican, the rest Democrats: