366 The National Geographic Magazine 



native. He says that that makes too 

 many officers; that we would get along 

 a good deal better if we followed the 

 English custom of having one English 

 commissioner, who acts as judge, as 

 executive, as legislature, as everything 

 else, and has under him natives who are 

 intelligent enough to understand his 

 commands and carry them out. Now, 

 it is perfectly true that that government 

 there could be much more efficient if we 

 put an American in charge of every 

 province and made him absolute ruler 

 there. It would not be any trouble to 

 do it at all. We would have less taxes, 

 the work would be attended to with more 

 care, and, on the whole, for the next 

 ten or fifteen years it is probable that 

 the people would be in better condition, 

 but- they would not have any responsi- 

 bility about the government. They 

 would not be subject to scolding at every 

 mouth by the officers above them, they 

 would not find out what it is to be re- 

 sponsible for the government of others, 

 and they would not be enjoying the edu- 

 cation or partial education — or, rather, 

 an education in partial self-government — 

 which our system gives them. It adds 

 to the expense and it does not give them 

 so good a government, and therefore, if 

 our policy were only the best for the 

 time, I should yield to the criticism of 

 Mr Ireland. But what we are trying 

 to do is to teach these people by object 

 lessons, as well as by direct education 

 in the primary schools, what it is to be 

 a free people. 



The idea that freedom can be en- 

 joyed by a people without learning how 

 to enjoy it is something that belongs to 

 theory, not to practice. It may be 

 found in Boston, but nowhere else. 



I ought to add that this system of 

 government was most useful in bring- 

 ing about peace, in satisfying the natives 

 that we were there with the idea of giv- 

 ing them as much self-government as 

 we could. Mr Ireland and the others 

 who criticise ought in fairness, it seems 



to me, when they consider what is done 

 there, to put themselves more or less in 

 the position of those who had to do the 

 job and to take into consideration those 

 difficulties that present themselves on 

 every side. We said that we were there 

 for the benefit of the Filipino people ; 

 we said that we were there to give them 

 as much of self-government as they could 

 stand, and we did it. We may have 

 given them a little more, but it is a good 

 deal better to extend it a little beyond 

 what they can stand and teach them the 

 lesson and then say to them, " When 

 you do educate yourselves up to this we 

 will extend it a little more," as we have 

 had occasion to do in a number of prov- 

 inces, than it is to give them the im- 

 pression that we were deceiving them in 

 what we said we wished to do for them. 

 One of the chief characteristics of the 

 Orientals — indeed, one of the chief char- 

 acteristics of all nations that are igno- 

 rant — is suspicion and distrust, and the 

 primary rule of policy in dealing with 

 them is absolute honesty and straight- 

 forwardness. 



BUILDING ROADS 



Now, Mr Ireland says that there is 

 a woeful lack of improvements in the 

 Philippines, especially in the matter of 

 roads, and then he refers to the roads of 

 the Roman Empire. Those roads have 

 been made the basis for many an ora- 

 torical period, without knowledge as to 

 how many years, how many decades, 

 and how many centuries it took to con- 

 struct them. But it is true that roads 

 are a most important feature of civil- 

 ization. Intercommunication is what 

 helps, as much as education itself. We 

 began our career as legislators in the 

 Philippines by voting a million dollars 

 to be expended by General McArthur 

 in the construction of roads in the Phil- 

 ippines, and we have been trying to 

 build them ever since. Well, there are 

 3, 000 islands there. There are 140,000 

 square miles. A great many of the 



