162 



CONGRESS. (THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS.) 



the courts as subservient tools for his suppres- 

 sion. Section 10 reads as follows: 



" ' SEC. 10. That all the property and rights 

 which may have been acquired in the Philippine 

 Islands by the United States under the treaty of 

 peace with Spain, 1898, are hereby placed under 

 the control of the government of the Philippine 

 Islands to be administered for the benefit of the 

 inhabitants of the islands, except as hereinafter 

 provided.' 



" The purpose of that is self-evident. I have 

 already made sufficient comment upon it. - The 

 next section is as follows: 



"'SEC. 11. That the government of the Philip- 

 pines, subject to the provisions of this act and ex- 

 cept as hereinafter provided, shall make rules 

 and regulations for the lease, sale, or other dis- 

 position of the public lands other than timber or 

 mineral lands, but such rules and regulations 

 shall not go into effect or have the force of law 

 until they have received the approval of the 

 President, by and through the Secretary of War, 

 and they shall also be submitted to Congress, 

 and unless disapproved or amended by Congress 

 at the next ensuing session after their submis- 

 sion they shall at the close of such session have 

 the force and effect of law in the Philippine Is- 

 lands, when they shall have received the approval 

 of the President, as hereinbefore provided. 



" Those two sections put together place lands 

 of every description within the islands subject 

 to these rules and regulations for lease, sale, or 

 other disposition. The power which this section 

 confers upon the President and the commission 

 may be employed to any conceivable iniquitous 

 end, depending wholly upon the honor, the dis- 



Eosition, or 1 the integrity of the men who may 

 appen to constitute the government. 



" We already know the ends really to which 

 these powers are to be employed. They have been 

 pointed out to us by the civil governor of the 

 islands. It is designed that leases may be made 

 to cover a period in the neighborhood of a hun- 

 dred years. The nature or terms of those leases 

 of course may be prescribed by the commission. 

 The tenure under which those lands may be held 

 may be of a feudal nature. The right to hold 

 the lands, the privilege of holding the lands, may 

 be made dependent upon the rendition of service 

 to the government, upon whom is conferred this 

 authority to make leases. 



" In other words, the Philippine Commission 

 is made the lord paramount of all the lands and 

 property in the islands, and they may be leased 

 or they may be sold or they may be otherwise 

 disposed of without any reference to the quantity 

 and without any reference to the purposes for 

 which they may be used. They may be turned 

 over to syndicates or to corporations, or it is 

 possible they may be confined to those who may 

 be seeking homes. But we know that the main 

 purpose of the commission, which seeks to have 

 conferred upon it this power, is to dispose of 

 those lands in large quantities, as large as 20,000 

 acres, if not more, to syndicates and corpora- 

 tions, with a view to their exploitation." 



Mr. Rawlins subsequently took up the origin 

 of the war in the Philippine Islands, which he 

 described as without justification, and he at- 

 tacked the method in which it had been carried 

 on as barbarous and cruel, citing general orders 

 and reported instances of military outrage to 

 sustain the charge. 



Mr. Lodge, of Massachusetts, who was in 

 charge of the measure, said, in the way of general 

 explanation and defense: 



" Mr. President, I think there has been a 



marked improvement in this debate over the last 

 debate which was held upon the question of Phil- 

 ippine affairs, because in this debate, so far as it 

 has proceeded, there has been more or less said 

 about the pending measure. I am aware that we 

 devoted one afternoon to a discussion of politics 

 and election methods in North Carolina, but pos- 

 sibly it was not amiss to consider the quality of 

 mercy exhibited in certain parts of our common 

 country as well as in the Philippines. It is true 

 also that we devoted one afternoon to trying to 

 decide whether Aguinaldo caused the assassina- 

 tion of Gen. Luna, whether he had him assas- 

 sinated in self-defense, or whether Luna was 

 merely killed by the guard because the guard 

 did not like his manners. But all these things, 

 Mr. President, have more connection with the 

 matter before us than the discussions about the 

 revolutionary history and the character of a 

 judge at Nome, in which we before indulged. I 

 think, Mr. President, I am not too optimistic, 

 therefore, if I express the hope and the belief 

 that the time will come, and come before long, 

 when we shall discuss measures in regard to the 

 Philippines as we discussed the Chinese-exclusion 

 bill, with a view to getting the best legislation 

 possible in the interests of the people of the 

 islands and the people of the United States, and 

 when we shall cease to make the affairs of the 

 Philippine Islands a field for the investment of 

 political capital by a party whose ventures in 

 other directions have not of late been very suc- 

 cessful. 



" The Senator from Tennessee, with the grace 

 of phrase characteristic of his eloquence, asked 

 if any one would have the effrontery to defend 

 the pending bill. In all humility, Mr. President, 

 I will say that I have the effrontery not only to 

 defend the bill, but in my feeble way to advocate 

 it. I believe it to be a well.-considered measure, 

 dealing with subjects of great difficulty, to which 

 the committee have given careful attention, over 

 which they have labored assiduously, and to 

 parts of which the minority of the committee 

 have made valuable contribution, for which I 

 am happy to make acknowledgment. 



" The minor provisions of this bill occupy 28 

 pages. The mining law on which the provisions 

 of the bill are founded was prepared by the Phil- 

 ippine Commission with great labor and atten- 

 tion. It has been revised by a subcommittee of 

 the Committee on the Philippines, and I believe, 

 speaking as a layman in regard to mining laws, 

 that we have embodied in this bill as excellent 

 a mining law as stands on any statute-book. I 

 think the obligation for it is due to the subcom- 

 mittee of the Committee on the Philippines, and. 

 in a large measure to the Senator from Utah, 

 who brought to the work an expert knowledge 

 which was of great value. I shall not detain th<! 

 Senate by discussing the details of those mining 

 provisions. That is a task which I leave to th<; 

 better instructed members who prepared it. 



" The coinage sections of the bill occupy <l 

 pages and provide for coinage in the Philippine 

 Islands. I will only say in regard to tlio ciiina.^ 

 provisions that the committee were satisfied afit r 

 a careful investigation of the subject, unani- 

 mously, with one possible exception, that no 

 greater mistake could be made than to changJ 

 the system of currency now in existence in th<>-3 

 islands and to alter the standard to which the 

 people have been accustomed for many years. It 

 is always a dangerous thing to change the money 

 standard of a people; and it seemed to the com- 

 mittee that at this time it would be exceedingly 

 perilous. They are now, and have long been, 



