The Philippines: Past and Present Volume II Part 23

That my charges were false, and without foundation.

That, if they were true, I myself was to blame for the continued existence of slavery.

That I published my report when I did in order to hold my position.

That I published it when I did in anger because I had lost my position.

That I had been removed because I published it.

In just one instance, so far as I know, has a Filipino considered the possibility that the motive which actuated me was a desire to help many thousands of unfortunate human beings.

Good old Arcadio del Rosario, at one time insurgent governor of Benguet, who has a kindly feeling for the wild-men and was glad to note certain immediate results which followed the publication of my report, has said: "Would that Sr. Osmena [81] might have had the glory of doing what Sr. Worcester has done."

What is needed to end slavery and peonage is congressional legislation enforced by Americans.

Without hesitation I a.s.sert that their existence in the Philippine Islands is the greatest single problem which there confronts the government of the United States, in its effort to build up a respectable and responsible electorate and establish representative government.

Is it reasonable to suppose that the hand which to-day crushes down the Filipino servant, the Filipino labourer, and the wild-man of the hills, will to-morrow raise them up and point them on the way to freedom?

CHAPTER XXVI

MURDER AS A GOVERNMENTAL AGENCY

In discussing the prevalence of slavery in the Philippine Islands, Sr. Manuel Quezon has stated that it has never existed there as an inst.i.tution. This is true, to the extent at least that it has never been recognized as a legal inst.i.tution, nor directed nor authorized by order of any competent governmental authority. The same statements cannot be truthfully made with reference to murder, as I shall conclusively show by the records of the Insurgent government.

I wish at the outset to draw a sharp line between acts of barbarity or ferocity, committed without authority by ignorant and irresponsible Insurgent officers or soldiers during the heat of battle or as the result of pa.s.sions aroused by armed strife, and those which I now discuss. The former must be regarded as breaches of military discipline. Aguinaldo sought to protect his government from their consequences by issuing endless orders in Spanish strictly forbidding them.

His troops were ordered again and again to respect American prisoners and treat them with humanity.

So far as concerns his own people, however, he displayed a very different spirit from the outset.

As we have already noted there exists among the Insurgent records a doc.u.ment written in Tagalog by him, and therefore obviously not intended for the information of Americans, which contains the following:--

"Any person who fights for his country has absolute power to kill any one not friendly to our cause." [82]

Aguinaldo armed not only ignorant and irresponsible people, but thieves, outlaws and murderers, and turned them loose on the common people with blanket authority to kill whomsoever they would, and they promptly proceeded to exercise it. "Dukut" [83] stretched out its b.l.o.o.d.y hand even in Manila, under the very eye of American officers, and as often as not struck down wholly innocent victims.

Aguinaldo was not alone in his views on the subject of murder. Felipe Agoncillo, long secretary of the Hongkong junta, and official representative of the Insurgent government in Europe and the United States, wrote him on August 1, 1898, from Hongkong, suggesting that he kill the Spanish prisoners "if the country requires" that this be done, and adding, "if you deem it wise you should secretly issue an order to kill the friars that they may capture." [84]

Obviously Aguinaldo did not deem it wise to order the murder of the Spanish prisoners as a whole, nor that of the friars as a whole.

The following letter, marked "confidential," addressed to his cousin Baldomero Aguinaldo, for a time the Insurgent secretary of war, tells a significant tale of the course finally decided upon:--

"Filipino Republic, "Office of the Military Governor, "Malolos, February 17, 1899.

"Senor Secretary of War:--

"Referring to your note in regard to an unhealthy town or place in the province of Nueva Ecija fit for the concentration there of the friars; beside the town of Bongabong there is no good place except the town of La Paz in the province of Tarlac, because, according to my observation, even the persons born there are attacked by malarial fever and ague and if they are strangers very few will escape death.

"Your always faithful subordinate,

(Signed) "Isidoro Torres.

"17th February, 1899." [85]

Evidently General Torres' recommendation was favourably acted upon, for among the papers of the Insurgent government is a memorandum, [86] apparently in Aguinaldo's handwriting, stating that--

"there were 297 Spanish friars held prisoners in Luzon, and that on February 17, 1899, those in Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, and Pampanga, 111 in all, had been ordered by him to be concentrated in La Paz"!

In many instances other prisoners were murdered outright. This hard fate befell three Spaniards, of whom one was a friar, and two were shipwrecked Englishmen, who were butchered in Zambales in December, 1899, upon the approach of the American troops, apparently by the order of the governor, Vicente Camara. [87]

On February 15, 1900, an expedition under the immediate command of Brigadier-General J. M. Bell sailed from Manila under the personal supervision of Major-General Bates. This was composed of troops detailed to take possession of North and South Camarines and Albay, to which provinces Insurgent troops, having many Spanish prisoners in their possession, had been forced to retire as a result of the operations in Tayabas Province. In compliance with these instructions the town of Daet was occupied after some resistance and the Insurgents in that quarter were driven to the northeast, taking with them a number of Spanish prisoners. A large proportion of these were murdered by command of the officer in charge of the guerilla band guarding them, probably because he was not able to force them to move as rapidly as his own men.

On November 15, 1900, Simeon Villa, of evil fame, issued a circular letter [88] to chiefs of guerillas in the Cagayan valley, recommending that they all "learn the verb 'Dukutar' [89] so as to put it into immediate effect," and adding "it is the most efficacious specific against every kind of evil-doer, and most salutary for our country." This, too, under the "Filipino Republic" before the outbreak of war with the United States, and at a time when we are a.s.sured that "profound peace and tranquillity" prevailed in this region.

This villanous order was approved and made general in its application by Aguinaldo himself, on November 15, 1900. [90]

Aguinaldo's orders were not always couched in such general terms as the one above quoted. Among the most interesting of the captured Insurgent doc.u.ments is the following:--

"Our Honourable President: We, the signers, who subscribe the declaration appended; by these presents protest against the American proclamation; we recognize no authority but that of G.o.d and the Revolutionary Government, and we offer our lives and property for the independence of our country.

"Manila, San Miguel, January 12, 1899.

"Feliciano Cruz "Severino Quitiongco."

(25 signatures follow.)

(On the back is written in the handwriting of E. Aguinaldo):

"Leberino Kitionko: "Feliciano de la Cruz: Commissioned to kill General Otis." [91]

The difference in the spelling of the name Severino Quitiongco is doubtless due to the fact that Aguinaldo wrote it down as it sounded to him.