"Notwithstanding assertions to the contrary, our opponents there constitute at least three-fourths of all the people of the islands; and they comprise, with a few isolated exceptions, the great mass of the more intelligent of the people."

Says Chaplain McQueen, after serving as chaplain with a regiment in active service,—

"There is not a Filipino in the islands that wants the American form of government."

John Foreman, a resident in the archipelago for eleven years, familiar with the people and the facts, especially summoned to Paris as an expert by our Peace Commissioners, an Englishman who is friendly to us and in no way concerned in our politics, writes in the National Review for September:

"The probability of the Americans ever gaining the sympathy and acquiescence of the natives is very remote. Unless the Americans are prepared to maintain a large permanent army in the islands, there seems to be no prospect of their ever being able to administer the interior of the archipelago. Their whole system of government, which might appear to the Anglo-Saxon mind reasonable enough in principle, clashes everywhere with the instincts, ideas, traditions, and aspirations of the Filipinos."

Mr. Bass, the correspondent of the New York Herald and Harper's Weekly, who went to the Philippines at the beginning, and is thoroughly conversant with the facts, writes after a trip in the southern part of the archipelago:

"The only friendly natives I found on my southern tour were those at Moros, who, so far, are unwilling that we should hold any territory except the single walled town of Iolo. Even the noncombatants hate us. In Manila the native feeling against us is growing stronger every day."

These gentlemen not only state the facts, but give the reasons, in a long catalogue of the injuries which we have done the Filipinos and of the abuses which have grown up under our rule.

Let us take a final bit of evidence in the despatch to the Associated Press of July 30, 1900, carefully "edited by the censor." This chronicles the attempt of some Filipinos to celebrate in Manila the proclamation of amnesty. Surely, in Manila, under the guns of our fleet and at the very headquarters of our army, our friends could show their loyalty. Here are no guerilla bands to terrify them, but ample protection on every side. But even the

censor says the attempt "resulted in a fiasco.

The people were

The provost's

passive, unenthusiastic, and not even interested. . . . precautions were extreme. The guards were doubled both days, and the authorities forbade the display of Filipino flags and of pictures of President McKinley and Aguinaldo fraternally framed." "Judge Taft and his colleagues of the commission felt constrained to decline to attend the banquet, as they had been informed that the speeches would favor independence under American protection. . . . The fiesta is generally considered to have been premature and unfortunate.'

...

...

If the censor, instructed to let nothing go that can hurt the administration, confesses all this, how much worse was the truth? What facts did his editing suppress ? Take his own statements, however, and where is the President's loyal majority? Even those who wished to praise his amnesty were going to demand their independence. Even in the centre of Manila, in the very heart of our army, the President's commissioners could not dine with their most loyal supporters, while the mass of the people, suppressed by doubled guards, were "passive and unenthusiastic." These are censor's words. They mean "sullen and hostile." This testimony might be multiplied; but is it necessary? This glimpse of Manila with its subject but unreconciled people is enough.

What can we expect? What have we done to inspire affection or confidence? The Filipinos are men; and as such they cannot but hate the invaders who have killed them by thousands, burned their towns, and laid waste their country. No Filipino can love us unless we have bought his love; and the claim that a majority of them are loyal- with no evidence to support it, and every probability, every fact, against it—is an audacious draft upon the ignorance, the credulity, the party spirit, of the American people.

But we cannot dismiss the President's statement here.

"We

are asked," he says, "to abandon the largest portion of the population, which has been loyal to us, to the cruelties of the guerilla insurgent bands." It is difficult to discuss with proper reserve this statement. We do not blame the President for refusing to turn peaceful men over to the mercies of robbers, but for doing it. In the summer of 1898 the people of the Philippine Islands, under the lead of Aguinaldo and his associates, established a republican government, which, until President McKinley overthrew it by military force, governed peacefully and well the whole archipelago out

side the city of Manila, the domains of the Sulu Sultan, and perhaps some remote and inconsiderable islands. I do not ask you to take my word for this. I quote from John Barrett, the thickand-thin supporter of the powers that be. On January 16, 1899, he wrote of Aguinaldo that he had "known him and most of his officers well, and watched him during the long period that elapsed since I saw him put aboard the United States despatch boat in Hong Kong Harbor last May, by permission of Admiral Dewey and Consul-general Wildman, for the direct purpose of going to Cavite to organize an army and temporary government and make war on the Spaniards, in co-operation with the American forces." And he then described his success in these words: "He organized an army out of nothing, which he has now gradually developed into a force of 30,000 men, armed with modern rifles. He captured all Spanish garrisons on the island of Luzon, outside of Manila. . . . Moreover, he has organized a government which has practically been administering the affairs of that great island since the American occupation of Manila, and which is certainly better than the former administration. He has a properly formed cabinet and congress, the members of which, in appearance and manners, would compare favorably with Japanese statesmen. He has among his advisers men of acknowledged ability as international lawyers, while his supporters include most of the prominent educated and wealthy natives." Of the Congress he wrote: "These men, whose sessions I repeatedly attended, conducted themselves with great decorum, and showed a knowledge of debate and parliamentary law that would not compare unfavorably with the Japanese Parliament. The executive portion of the government was made up of a ministry of bright men who seemed to understand their respective positions."

I wonder what American statesman or soldier with American citizens could have done more than Aguinaldo did in so short a time. Let me quote a passage from the report of Messrs. Sargent and Wilcox, who, with Admiral Dewey's permission, spent the greater part of October and November, 1898, in a journey through the western and northern part of Luzon, and of whose report Admiral Dewey said that it contained, in his opinion, "the most complete and reliable information obtainable in regard to the present state of the northern part of Luzon Island."

Mr. Sargent writes, " As a tribute to the efficiency of Aguinaldo's

government and the law-abiding character of his subjects, I offer the fact that Mr. Wilcox and I pursued our journey through in perfect security, and returned to Manila with only the most pleasing recollections of the quiet and orderly life which we found the natives to be leading under their new régime," Mr. Sargent testifies freely to the intelligence and refinement of the natives,- to their education, their hospitality, their temperance, their patriotism, and adds this interesting statement:

“There is a variety of feeling among the Philippines in regard to the debt of gratitude they owe the United States. In every town we found men who said that our nation had saved them from slavery, and others who claimed that without our interference their independence would have been recognized before this time. On one point they were united, however; viz., that, whatever our government may have done for them, it has not gained the right to annex them.”

It is this government, resting upon the cordial assent of the people and fulfilling all the functions of government, that the President brutally overthrew. It is for this that his opponents blame him. It is such a government as this that the Filipinos would restore, were it not for his army. And to call such a government "a guerilla band" is as deceptive as it is to compare the civilized and Christian Filipinos with "Apaches and Boxers."

This government is destroyed; some of the prosperous cities which it ruled, like Pasig, the second city in Luzon, are in ashes; many of its prominent members and supporters are dead or in hiding; thousands of the men who loved it have been slain. And what is the result? Let John Foreman answer:

"The total area of the archipelago is computed at 52,500 square miles, of which the Americans barely occupy one five-hundredth part in places inaccessible by water. Small detachments are stationed here and there, but the troops so employed do not dominate a radius larger than the range of their muskets. They are constantly watched by armed natives. And troopers who have ventured alone a mile outside the village have seldom returned alive."

Let the Associated Press despatches, censored as they are, tell as much of the truth as the censor dares to pass:

"MANILA, July 26. At Oroquieta, in northern Mindanao, two soldiers entered a native store to buy some food. While there,

one of them was killed by a bolo, and his head severed from his body. The other escaped, and gave the alarm. A company of the Fortieth Infantry stationed at Cagayan proceeded to Oroquieta, and killed eighty-nine natives. Subsequently the gunboat, Callao, commanded by Lieutenant George B. Bradshaw, shelled Oroquieta, burning the warehouses. One of the crew was killed."

What led to the attack on the soldier is not stated; but in revenge eighty-nine persons were killed by the army, and the town was shelled and partly destroyed by the navy. It was in March, 1900, that the President instructed his commissioners that " upon every department and branch of the government of the Philippines must be imposed these inviolable rules,— that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law." This summary massacre by our forces in revenge for the death of one man is a practical comment on these high-sounding instructions. What "guerilla insurgent band" could have visited greater "cruelties on the people of this town than the forces of the United States in their work of "benevolent assimilation "? Some men close their ears to all that reflects upon our soldiers. What say they to the report of General MacArthur, returning the finding of a court-martial, that a captain was guilty of torturing two and a lieutenant of torturing five Filipino prisoners, "by causing them to be hanged by their necks for about ten seconds each"? What was their punishment? They were reprimanded by reminding them "that by reckless defiance of the ethics of their profession they have inflicted incalculable injury upon the interests of their country, and have also cast an unwarranted *aspersion upon the reputation of the United States army for sentiments of honor and humanity." I find in this report no word of sympathy for the victims or real indignation at the cruelty. It is the injury to the United States that alone is regarded.

I could fill my speech with such cases, which are proofs of the only anarchy that has existed in the islands since the surrender of Manila,—the anarchy for which President McKinley and his advisers are directly responsible. To quote again from John Barrett, would it not have been "far better for the United States to treat this leader and his people with caution and consideration, eventually obtaining the end to be desired without serious loss of life and great expense, rather than peremptorily demand his absolute surrender, be forced into a most unhappy conflict, which would