History

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50,000 B.C - 150 B.C, Negroid and Malay People migrate to the Philippines. 1150 - 1475, Islam reaches the Philippines via Borneo. 1521, Ferdinand Magellan lands on Samar. He brings the Catholicism to the archipelago and is killed in a battle with Lapu-lapu, cheftain of Mactan Island, Cebu. 1543, The archipelogo is named Las Philipinas in honor of King Philip II of Spain. 1565, Miguel Lopez de Legaspi arrives and 333 years of Spanish colonial rule begin. 1898, The U.S declares war against Spain and attacks Manila Bay with heavily armed ships. The American government collaborates with Emilio Aguinaldo and promises American support for Filipino independence. On June 12, the Philippines is proclaimed independent from Spain by Aguinaldo. Spain sells the Philippines to the U.S for $20 million. 1901, Aguinaldo is captured and takes an oath of allegiance to the U.S. A civil government is established with William Howard Taft as the first American Governor - General. 1907, The first congressional election is held. 1916, The Jones Law promises independence and the establishment of a stable government. Manuel Quezon is elected President of the Senate and Sergio Osmena, speaker of the House of Representative. 1917, The first Philippine cabinet under the American regime is organised. 1934, U.S President Roosevelt approves the Philippines Independence Law. It provides for the establishment of the Commonwealth of the Philippines under a constitution to be drafted by a constitution convention. 1935, The constitution is approved by the Constitutional Convention and Roosevelt and ratified by the Philippine electorate. Manuel Quezon is the Philippines first elected President. 1941, Quezon and Osmena are re-elected in the Philippines 2nd Presidental election. Japanese bombers attack the Philippines and force Douglas MacArthur, the Commander of the U.S Armed Forces in the Far East to retreat to Bataan. President Quezon moves to Corregidor. MacArthur declares Manila an open city, virtually capitulating to the Japanese 1942, The Japanese occupy the Philippines, impose martial law and install their educational system. President Quezon and the war cabinet leave for the U.S. The Hukbalahap, an anti-Japanese guerilla unit is formed. The cruel Death March of 36,000 American and Filipino soldiers follows the surrender of Bataan. 1943, A puppet government is inaugurated with Jose P.Laurel as president.

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1944, MacArthur, Osmeno and American troops lands in Leyte, redeeming his promise, " I shall return",. The Commonweath government is re-established. 1945, American troops regain Manila. MacArthur cedes Malacanang palace to Osmena and announces the liberation of the Philippines. 1946, The U.S administration declares the Philippines independent. Manuel Roxas becomes the first President of the Republic, Elpidio Quirino is elected the Vice President. 1965, Ferdinand Marcos wins the presidential election. 1972, Marcos declares Martial Law, Senator Benigo Aquino Jr. and other opposition leaders are arrested. A curfew is imposed and Congress is suspended. 1980, Aquino is released from jail and leaves for the US for heart surgery. 1983, Aquino is assassinated at the airport on August 21. Demonstrations and waves of protest roll over the country. 1986. Aquinos widow, Corazon runs in a "snap" election against Marcos. Corazon wins but Marcos tries to rig the vote counting. Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile and Deputy Chief of Staff of the Amred Forces, general Fidel Ramos stage a coup detat. The rebellion is given support by Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin and "people power". Marcos flees for Honolulu. 1989, The most serious coup detat against the Aquino administration is staged by rebel soldiers and fails. 1992, Fidel V. Ramos is elected the President.

Liberty, brought by the Americans? At the end of the nineteenth century, on April 25,1898, the United States declared war on Spain. The main reason was that the U.S. battle ship Main was blown up in the harbor of Havana. The United States thought Spain blew up this ship with a mine. (However, it was proved that the Main blew up due to coal dust). The American navy decided to attack the Spanish fleet in the Philippine waters. The battle took place in Manila Bay. On May 1 in 1898 the Spanish fleet was destroyed. After 327 years under Spanish rule, the Philippine people thought that they won independence at last. The Americans however, thought quit different about that at that time. The Philippines, sold for a amount of less than 20 million dollars After the end of the American-Spanish war in 1898, the Spaniards sold the Philippines and other colonial properties for 20 million dollar to the Americans. Aguinaldo didn't want to accept American rule and proclaimed the first Philippine Republic. The Americans decided that the Filipinos were not yet capable to be independent. A hostile period started. The United States needed more than

125.000 soldiers to subdue the Philippines. The Philippine rebels were forced to retreat and were driven into northern Luzon. From here they started a guerrilla. This "Philippine War of Independence" continued for two years and ended when Aguinaldo was captured on March 23, 1901. Only sporadic resistance continued until 1903.

Changes in the American period

Consequences of the American colonial rule During the Spanish period the Spaniards had given enormous land properties to the Catholic church. One of the first things the Americans did was to take care for the redistribution of these land properties. To do so they first had to pay an amount of US $7.2 million to the Vatican in 1904. The small farmers or tenants didn't get any land however. The land became property of some large landowners. Most of the small farmers couldn't pay the asked price or couldn't prove that they were the former owners of the land. The economic development during the 'American period' was rather typical colonial. The Philippine economy was strongly related to and depending on the United States. The Philippine economy was focused on mining and exporting crops. Industrial growth didn't take place. Quezon, the first Philippine president The Philippines was controlled by the Americans from 1900-1942. In 1934 an act was established, which made it possible that the Philippines could have a "Commonwealth of the Philippines". The first president of this Commonwealth was Manuel Quezon. The first president was given certain power for some internal affairs.

The Japanese occupation The Americans were still in the Philippines when the next foreign ruler came. Japan. The Japanese army and rulers occupied the Philippines from 1942 - 1944. This was the first step in the total liberation of the country. With 700 vessels and 174,000 army and navy servicemen, McArthur arrived in the Philippines. In December 1944, In October 1944 the American generalDouglas Mac Arthur landed the islands of Leyte and Mindoro were cleared of the Japanese army. with his troops at the east coast of Leyte, one of the bigger islands in the central part of the Philippines. Many casualties The first step to liberation The casualties of the Americans in this operation is estimated 4000 - 6000. Filipino casualties: estimated about one million! Freedom at last! The Philippines was granted it's independence in

1946. Freedom at last, 148 years later than the freedom which was written down by Julian Felipe in the Philippine anthem called "Lupang Hinirang". The Republic of the Philippines was proclaimed on July 4, 1946.

Philippine-American War (1898 - 1946)

In Feb., 1899, Aguinaldo led a new revolt, this time against U.S. rule. Defeated on the battlefield, the Filipinos turned to guerrilla warfare, and their defeat became a mammoth project for the United States Thus began the Philippine-American War, one that cost far more money and took far more lives than the Spanish-American War. Fighting broke out on February 4, 1899, after two American privates on patrol killed three Filipino soldiers in San Juan, Metro Manila. Some 126,000 American soldiers would be committed to the conflict; 4,234 American and 16,000 Filipino soldiers, part of a nationwide guerrilla movement of indeterminate numbers, died. Estimates on civilian deaths during the war range between 250,000 and 1,000,000, largely because of famine and disease. Atrocities were committed by both sides. The poorly equipped Filipino troops were handily overpowered by American troops in open combat, but they were frightening opponents in guerrilla warfare. Malolos, the revolutionary capital, was captured on March 31, 1899. Aguinaldo and his government escaped, however, establishing a new capital at San Isidro, Nueva Ecija. Antonio Luna, Aguinaldo's most capable military commander, was murdered in June. With his best commander dead and his troops suffering continued defeats as American forces pushed into northern Luzon, Aguinaldo dissolved the regular army in November 1899 and ordered the establishment of decentralized guerrilla commands in each of several military zones. The general population, caught between Americans and rebels, suffered significantly. The revolution was effectively ended with the capture (1901) of Aguinaldo by Gen. Frederick Funston at Palanan, Isabela on March 23, 1901 and was brought to Manila, but the question of Philippine independence remained a burning issue in the politics of both the United States and the islands. The matter was complex by the growing economic ties between the two countries. Although moderately little American capital was invested in island industries, U.S. trade bulked larger and larger until the Philippines became almost entirely dependent upon the American market. Free trade, established by an act of 1909, was expanded in 1913. Influenced of the uselessness of further resistance, he swore allegiance to the United States and issued a proclamation calling on his compatriots to lay down their arms, officially bringing an end to the war. However, sporadic insurgent resistance continued in various parts of the Philippines, especially in the Muslim south, until 1913.

U.S. colony
Civil government was established by the Americans in 1901, with William Howard Taft as the first American Governor-General of the Philippines. English was declared the official language. Six hundred American teachers were imported aboard the USS Thomas. Also, the Catholic Church was disestablished, and a substantial amount of church land was purchased and redistributed. Some measures of Filipino self-rule were allowed, however. An elected Filipino legislature was established in 1907. When Woodrow Wilson became U.S. President in 1913, there was a major change in official American policy concerning the Philippines. While the previous Republican administrations had predicted the Philippines as a perpetual American colony, the Wilson administration decided to start a process that would slowly lead to Philippine independence. U.S. administration of the Philippines was declared to be temporary and aimed to develop institutions that would permit and encourage the eventual establishment of a free and democratic government. Therefore, U.S. officials concentrated on the creation of such practical supports for democratic government as public education and a sound legal system. The Philippines were granted free trade status, with the U.S. In 1916, the Philippine Autonomy Act, widely known as the Jones Law, was passed by the U.S. Congress. The law which served as the new organic act (or constitution) for the Philippines, stated in its preamble that the ultimate independence of the Philippines would be American policy, subject to the establishment of a stable government. The law placed executive power in the Governor General of the Philippines, appointed by the President of the United States, but established a bicameral Philippine Legislature to replace the elected Philippine Assembly (lower house) and appointive Philippine Commission (upper house) previously in place. The Filipino House of Representatives would be purely elected, while the new Philippine Senate would have the majority of its members elected by senatorial district with senators representing non-Christian areas appointed by the Governor-General. The 1920s saw alternating periods of cooperation and confrontation with American governors-general, depending on how intent the official who holds an office was on exercising his powers vis--vis the Philippine legislature. Members to the elected legislature lost no time in lobbying for immediate and complete independence from the United States. Several independence missions were sent to Washington, D.C. A civil service was formed and was regularly taken over by Filipinos, who had effectively gained control by the end of World War I. When the Republicans regained power in 1921, the trend toward bringing Filipinos into the government was inverted. Gen. Leonard Wood, who was appointed governor-general, largely replaced Filipino activities with a semi military rule. However, the advent of the Great Depression in the United States in the 1930s and the first aggressive moves by Japan in Asia (1931) shifted U.S. sentiment sharply toward the granting of immediate independence to the Philippines. In 1934, the United States Congress, having originally passed the Hare-Hawes-Cutting Act as a Philippine Independence Act over President Hoover's refusal, only to have the law rejected by the Philippine legislature, finally passed a new Philippine Independence Act, popularly known as the TydingsMcDuffie Act. The law provided for the granting of Philippine independence by 1946. U.S. rule was accompanied by improvements in the education and health systems of the Philippines; school enrollment rates multiplied fivefold. By the 1930s, literacy rates had reached 50%. Several

diseases were virtually eliminated. However, the Philippines remained economically backward. U.S. trade policies encouraged the export of cash crops and the importation of manufactured goods; little industrial development occurred. Meanwhile, landlessness became a serious problem in rural areas; peasants were often reduced to the status of serfs.

Commonwealth
The period 19351946 would ideally be dedicated to the final adjustments required for a peaceful transition to full independence, great latitude in autonomy being granted in the meantime. The Hare-Hawes Cutting Act, passed by Congress in 1932, provided for complete independence of the islands in 1945 after 10 years of self-government under U.S. supervision. The bill had been drawn up with the aid of a commission from the Philippines, but Manuel L. Quezon, the leader of the leading Nationalist party, opposed it, partially because of its threat of American tariffs against Philippine products but principally because of the provisions leaving naval bases in U.S. hands. Under his influence, the Philippine legislature rejected the bill. The Tydings-McDuffie Independence Act (1934) closely looks like the Hare-Hawes Cutting Act, but struck the provisions for American bases and carried a promise of further study to correct imperfections or inequalities. The Philippine legislature approved the bill; a constitution, approved by President Roosevelt (Mar., 1935) was accepted by the Philippine people in a vote by the electorate determining public opinion on a question of national importance (May); and Quezon was elected the first president (Sept.). On May 14, 1935, an election to fill the newly created office of President of the Commonwealth of the Philippines was won by Manuel L. Quezon (Nacionalista Party) and a Filipino government was formed on the basis of principles apparently similar to the US Constitution. (See: Philippine National Assembly). When Quezon was inaugurated on Nov. 15, 1935, the Commonwealth was formally established in 1935, featured a very strong executive, a unicameral National Assembly, and a Supreme Court composed entirely of Filipinos for the first time since 1901. The new government embarked on an ambitious agenda of establishing the basis for national defense, greater control over the economy, reforms in education, improvement of transport, the colonization of the island of Mindanao, and the promotion of local capital and industrialization. The Commonwealth however, was also faced with agrarian unrest, an uncertain diplomatic and military situation in South East Asia, and uncertainty about the level of United States commitment to the future Republic of the Philippines. In 1939-40, the Philippine Constitution was revised to restore a bicameral Congress, and permit the reelection of President Quezon, previously restricted to a single, six-year term. Quezon was reelected in Nov., 1941. To develop defensive forces against possible aggression, Gen. Douglas MacArthur was brought to the islands as military adviser in 1935, and the following year he became field marshal of the Commonwealth army. During the Commonwealth years, Philippines sent one elected Resident Commissioner to the United States House of Representatives, as Puerto Rico currently does today.