Chapter 10 Revolution and Nationhood

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Chapter 10 Revolution and Nationhood

Nationhood had its earlier roots in scattered and fragmentary uprisings against Spaniards. But these could not weld people into one

because material basis for a nation was absent. Lack of communications facilities and colonial policy of keeping people in state ofignorance delayed growth of national consciousness.

After the faint outlines of a national market and national economy had become visible, corresponding national consciousness began to

take form as articulators. Through this, common denominators of resentments and expectations were crystallized and disseminated onscale sufficient to create a sense of nationality separate and distinct, and a counter-consciousness that provided a set of alternatives to

colonial oppression.

These articulators were the ilustrados. They belonged to classes that arose as a result of developing national economy. They also were

able to take advantage of educational opportunities that a liberalized Spanish colonial policy offered at that time.

Their consciousness was the product of objective reality, of their status within reality, but the articulation of their ideas would help

mobilize forces that would effect changes in emerging nation and people, changes which would in many ways be more far-reachingthan ilustrados. Ilustrados served to project a consciousness of nationhood among people.

The New Filipinos

Growth of nationhood was coterminous with Filipino. The 1 st Filipinos were the Espaoles-Filipinos or creoles Spaniards born in

Philis. Filipino had a racial and elitist connotation.

Chinese mestizos and urbanized natives who together eventually dominated ranks of new principalia became considered as Filipinos

because of their essentially Hispanized cultural background and inclinations.

The term Filipino was growing in scope, although its application was still limited by property, education and Spanish culture. Later, the

term was also used to refer to Spanish mestizos who could pass for pure Spaniards, was being appropriated by Chinese mestizos andnative elite.

Drive for individual economic expansion fostered among local elite a keener perception of the restrictions imposed by Spanish

colonialism on their own development. This aggravated the feeling of oppression caused by colonial policies, by abuses and arrogance

of individual officers and friars and by general lack of civil liberties that the new liberal concepts led them to aspire for.

Grievances of masses and self-interest of principalia therefore became ingredients in development of new consciousness of interests

distinct and separate from those of Spain.

Ilustrados first shared, then wrested the term Filipino from creoles and infused it with national meaning which later included entire

people. The term thus finally embraced the entire nation and became a means of national identification. It referred to the inhabitants ofPhilippine archipelago regardless of racial strain or economic status.

The Reform Movement

Nuclear form of nationhood first found expression in agitation for reforms. In Spain, those who agitated for reforms could more freely

express themselves. Logical place for agitation was in the mother country. The hope was that if Spanish government could be madeaware of what was really happening in the colony, some reforms might be forthcoming.

Three groups formed the nucleus of movement for reforms which has come to be known as Propaganda Movement.

1) Filibusteros including Espaoles-Filipinos and Spanish mestizos who had been banished to Marianas during the crack-down onliberals in the wake ofCavite Mutiny of 1872. Majority of these men congregated in Barcelona and Madrid.

2) Young men who had been sent to Spain for their studies. These two groups were augmented by refugees who left the islands to

escape persecution. Among the latter, most prominent were Graciano Lopez Jaena and Marcelo del Pilar.

Jaena had written a tale whose principal character was Fray Botod. Botodin Lopez Jaenas native dialect, Hiligaynon, means full-bellied, reference to the greed of friars was clear. The story depicted all the vices and abuses of Spanish priests.

Del Pilars reputation as propagandist was already established before an order for his arrest forced him to flee the country in 1880. A

fact which cut him off from most Filipinos who did not know the language, Del Pilar wrote his propaganda pamphlets in simpleTagalog lucid, direct and forceful.

Jose Rizal was to emerge as a highly respected leader. His prestige was derived from his considerable and varied intellectual gifts and

was greatly enhanced by publication in 1887 of his novel, Noli Me Tangere, an incisive study of Phil. society which earned him the

enmity of friars and was promptly banned in the Philippines.

They counteract the La Politica de Espaa en Filipinas and refute anti-Filipino writers as Wenceslao E. Retana, Pablo Feced and

Vicente Barrantes.

El Eco Filipino a fortnightly magazine published in Spain. The magazine was banned after 1872.

Juan Atayde Spaniard born in Manila, founded the Circulo Hispano-Filipino in Madrid. Society died due to shortage of funds.

Miguel Morayta formedAsociacion Hispano-Filipino. On Jan. 12, 1889, they lobbied for the passage of some laws such as Maura

Law (law provifing for compulsory teaching of Spanish) and another for judicial reform. But, they failed to secure support of many

Filipinos. These were mainly Espaoles-Filipinos, an older group of retired officers, merchants and landowners living in Spain. Desire to from a purely Filipino organization was fulfilled in Barcelona on Dec. 13, 1888 ofLa Solidaridad. This organization was a

sort of rival of Moraytas Madrid group although they merged in a petition to Minister of Colonies asking for representation in Cortes,abolition of censorship of press and prohibition of practice of deporting citizens.

Galicano Apacible president of La Solidaridad and Rizals cousin; G. Lopez Jaena Vice president; Mariano Ponce treasurer;

Rizal honorary president.The Propaganda Movement

Cause of failures to publish propaganda lack of funds and unity, differences of opinion, petty jealousies and personal ambitions.

La Solidaridad existed for 5 years and became the principal organ of propaganda movement

- founded in Feb. 15, 1889 and ended in Nov. 15, 1895- a political propaganda paper with liberal reformist orientation of fighting reaction in all formsObjectives:

1) to fight all forms of reaction


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2) to impede all retrogression3) to hail and accept all liberal ideas4) to defend all progress

5) in short, to be one more propagandist of all ideals of democracy - demanded for press freedom, speech and assembly, equality before law, social and political freedom- also asked for promotion of education, stop to abuses of Guardia Civil, end to arbitrary deportation of citizens

Assimilation and Representation

Propagandists goal was still assimilation.

Preoccupation with education was also part of drive for cultural Hispanization .

Spain was still their mother country.

Masonry was an integral part of reform movement. This movement was essentially anti-friar attracted Filipino propagandists who saw

friars as pillars of reaction.Reformist Demands

Primary aim of most leaders was to secure for their class participation in political rule and greater share in economic benefits. Their

cultural demand would be for Filipinos to be accorded the right to Spanish culture. They were for cultural assimilation and

transformation of Phils. into a province of Spain.

It was only when people had adopted a clearly separatist goal that continued advocacy of reforms became reactionary.

Several factors did undermine the effectiveness of propaganda movement, among them the perennial lack of funds and bickerings

among propagandists themselves.

An important factor limiting the influence of propagandists was the fact they wrote in Spanish, a language virtually unknown among

the masses. Censorship limited inflow of reading matter and made possession of it very risky.

Fund raising efforts of local committees and Masonic lodges involved more individuals in campaign for reforms.

The articulation of propagandists feelings of oppression heightened the ferment of people and herein lay the continuity between

reformism and revolution despite their diametrically opposed means and goals.Rizals Liga

In July 1892, Rizal organizedLiga Filipina. This constituted a forward step in reformist ideas of times in sense that new group sought

to involve the people directly in reform movement. Andres Bonifacio became one of the founders of the organization.

Ligas aims:

1) to unite the whole archipelago into one compact, vigorous and homogenous body

2) mutual protection in every want and necessity3) defense against violence and injustice4) encouragement of instruction, agriculture and commerce5) study and application of reforms

These were innocent, naive objectives but Spanish authorities were alarmed that they arrested Rizal on July 6, 1892, a scant four days

after the Liga was organized.

Through the efforts ofDomingo Franco and Andres Bonifacio, it was reorganized. Apolinario Mabini became the secretary of the

Supreme Council.

The Split

At first, the Liga was quite active. A few months later, the Supreme Council of the Liga dissolved the society. The leaders of Liga

opted for dissolution.

The Liga membership split into 2 groups: the conservatives formed the Cuerpo de Compromisarios which pledged to continue

supporting La Solidaridad while radicals led by Bonifacio devoted to a new and secret society, Katipunan, which was organized on thevery day Rizal was deported to Dapitan. The goal was separation. From peaceful agitation for reforms to armed revolution.

The desire for separation became more acute as masses knew that only solution was revolution. This revolutionary consciousness was

the fruit of centuries of practice. The stage was set for an anti-colonial, national revolution whose ebb and flow would depend on which

of two currents was temporarily dominant.Ambivalent Classes

Economic progress formed a fairly broad petty bourgeois stratum which occupied a social and economic position between peninsulares

and the masses. They were joined by some who by Phil. standards were considered affluent and by others who had economic and social

aspirations akin to those of their countrymen.

Many ilustrados belonged to this stratum. They were ambivalent in their attitudes toward the colonizer. This explains the confused

stand many of them took during this time. They were like rising classes, both reformist and revolutionary, and related themselves to

ruling power. They also identified themselves with people in order to secure maximum concessions from colonial establishment. Theyhad to include the plaints of their less fortunate brothers in presenting their case against colonial injustice.

Ilustrado strength could be measured only in terms of support by vast majority. They wavered between assimilation and separation,

between reform and revolution.

We may say that the higher the economic status the stronger the tendency toward assimilation and reformism.

Long experience with Spanish hierarchical organization had accustomed the masses to regard direction from their social superior as

natural and proper.

Among urban masses, no distinct class consciousness existed as yet inasmuch as the predominantly commercial economy produced a

diffusion and admixture of strivings.

The nature of peasants activities and isolation militated against their developing an ideology of their own. But because of their

incessant struggles, they quickly rallied to the struggle.

Urban Ideas, Rural Masses


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The focus of revolutionary movement was in the 8 Tagalog provinces most affected by growing commercialization of economy.

Rural masses are able to maintain the struggle long after the metropolitan districts have been subdued.

Urban Sense of Solidarity

Economy was in mercantile capitalist stages but there were already quite large concentrations of workers in some factories.

One of Spains projects was tobacco monopoly. The government set up 5 factories in Manila. These factories were employing 20,000

from 1850 to 1852. Convergence of thousands of workers in single place necessarily developed in them recognition of their solidarityof interest as Filipinos though not yet as proletarians.

Depression in Countryside

Economic progress had depressed the living standards of masses, both absolutely and relatively. Successful development of cash cropsfor export intensified exploitation and suffering in a number of ways. Land rentals were increased from year to year; tenants forced by

landowners to concentrate on cash crops were no longer sure of their food supply.

Export-crop economy increased the value of land and the desirability of owning as many hectares as possible.

In 1888, tenants of Calamba were dispossessed by Dominicans.

The Land Question

Resentment was particularly great against landgrabbing activities of friars and against their other exploitative practices.

Spaniards were absentee landlords who left management and supervision of their estates to administrators whose efficiency was

measured in terms of their ability to extract more profit.

Isabelo de los Reyes describes some of the exploitative practices of friar estate administrators.

- In San Juan del Monte, the scene of the first battles near Manila, I was told that the ground rent for one loang (ten squarefathoms) of farm land was four pesos a year. Hacenderos imposed a surcharge of ten rials vellon for every mango tree

planted by inquilino; two and a half rials for every sapling of bamboo; ad 35 cents for every ilang-ilang tree, which is plantedfor its flowers.

Importance of land question and depth of grievance against friar landowners is evident from the fact that the 1

st

provinces that rose inrevolt were those in which there were extensive friar estates.Immediate Causes

An economic depression had set in during the period from 1891 to 1895 which was characterized by an unstable currency and exchange

fluctuations. Even the higher wages since 1898 compensated only partly for previous hardships imposed on Filipino worker by adeclining medium of exchange.

During recession, hemp and sugar prices fell disastrously while prices of imported goods rose because of unfavorable exchange. Indigo

production was paralyzed and a canker which attacked the coffee plant drove coffee planters to bankruptcy.

Misery and desperation rallied the peasantry of Luzon to the cause of Katipunan.

Convergence of Grievances

The ilustrado drive for political and economic parity had manifested itself during the propaganda period in demands for reforms which

had in turn been partially inspired by Spanish demands for reform of their own government.

If a governor general was opposed to a given decree, he could delay its implementation in hope that a political change in Spanish

capital would result in its repeal. These wings in Spanish politics from reaction to liberalism and back again raised the Filipinos hopes

for reform only to doom them to disappointment. Abuses and corruption were constant ingredients of both liberal and reactionary administrations.

Filipino university graduates seldom received government positions. The grievances of each class flowed together to form one common

stream of national protest.

The Katipunan

Katipunan officers:

Deodato Arellano presidentAndres Bonifacio comptrollerLadislao Diwa fiscalTeodoro Plata secretaryValentin Diaz - treasurer

Deodato Arellano studied bookkeeping at Ateneo Municipal and upon graduation worked as assistant clerk in the artillery corps. He

had been secretary of Liga Filipina.

Teodoro Plata was the nephew of Gregoria de Jesus, Bonifacios second wife. His father was a mail carrier. He studied at Escuela

Municipal where he completed the segunda enseanza. A clerk in Mindoro then became clerk of court in Mindoro.

Ladislao Diwa was an employee of court of Quiapo and subsequently became clerk of court in Pampanga.

Valentin Diaz wasalso a court clerk. He helped to draw up statutes of Katipunan.

Bonifacio

Bonifacios mother was a Spanish mestiza who used to work as a cabecilla in a cigarette factory. His father, a tailor, had served as a

teniente mayorof Tondo. He was born in Tondo in 1863. He first earned his livelihood by making walking canes and paper fans whichhe himself peddled. He worked as a messenger for Fleming and Co. and as salesman of tar. His last job was bodeguero orwarehouseman for Fressell and Company.

Guardia Civil Veterana of Manila searched his home, they found among his papers masonic documents, collection ofLa Solidaridad.

Influence of Plaridel

Plaridels ideas exerted a strong influence on Bonifacio. He was the one who saw the futility of fighting for reforms and was veering

toward revolution. His experience in mass propaganda made him regard the reformists work in Spain only as a first stage. He was


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sympathetic toward the Revolution. He declared himself in favor of insurrection as a last remedy, especially the people no longerbelieved that peaceful means would suffice. He died in Spain in 1896.

Bonifacio submitted to del Pilar for his approval the by-laws of the KKK and made use of del Pilars letter approving of the

organization of the revolutionary society to recruit more adherents. The Kalayaan carried del Pilars name as editor-in-chief aplot tothrow off authorities.

Many members of Katipunan could be considered almost plebeian in social status for in the evolving society of that time, class

differentiation was not very marked in lower levels. This was possible to become the triggering force that would galvanize the masses

into action.Historic Initiative of Masses

Katipunan emerged as natural heir of revolutionary tradition of people, a tradition that manifested in uprising after uprising throughout

three centuries of Spanish rule. These struggles were the instinctual reactions of people that could not yet articulate its thoughts and

goals.

Each resistance was a both negative reaction to reality and a positive to change the existing order. Each revolt was a search for an

alternative as yet inchoate in mind but deeply felt.

Katipunan itself set the task of arousing national feeling and working for the deliverance of Filipino people as a whole from Spanish

oppression and friar despotism. It saw all Filipinos as equals and brothers regardless of economic status. Its approach was racial andanti-colonial.

Common Denominator

The motive force of Revolution was simply a common grievance of all social strata against a common enemy. They sought to

strengthen national unity by emphasizing need for brotherhood.

According to Bonifacios compendium, The Duties of Sons of People, and Kartilla by Jacinto, we may find many admonitions

regarding the proper attitude towards good behavior.

One might classify the aggrupation as a primitive form of a united front welded together by a common desire for independence.

Bonifacio a Synthesis

Ilustrados were the exponents of theory without movement. It is characteristic of middle class that its members have latent inclinations

toward both upper and lower class.

Bonifacio imbibed the liberal ideas of the time and transmit them to people in their own writings. They were able to articulate the

desires of the people. Their writings voiced the raw ideas of people.

Ilustrados could articulate their demands with greater facility and skill. They were already acquiring a vested interest in status quo.

Their struggles were therefore based on preservation of colonial relation. Their participation was generally characterized bby prudenceof men who from the start were ready for retreat.

Bonifacios ideas were a primitive ideology based in dignity of man. He raised the banner of separatism and saw revolution as the only

solution.

Inchoate Ideology

Katipunan ideology was articulation of people just discovering themselves. It was the inchoate ideology of people that had just

become a nation. It was a call for struggle, for separation. It was also a demand for democracy. This was the answer to lack ofdemocracy among Filipinos because they were not equals of Spaniards.

The masses, now becoming conscious of their power, looked up to leaders who came from higher stratum.

In early days of Revolution, it seemed as if the idealist goal of universal equality was within reach and all the revolutionists shared a

common identification as Filipinos.

Katipunan failed to detect fundamental bifurcation within its ranks which would erupt in a struggle for leadership.

Ilustrado Imprint

It was a beginning for masses and emerging leadership.

Supreme Council was a shadow government and popular councils acted as governing bodies.

Inchoate desires of people were responsible for inchoate declarations of Bonifacio.

Ilustrados took these desires more explicit form; they took care that the resulting creation would carry their imprint.

Revolution became a peoples war under elite leadership.

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Chapter 10 Revolution and Nationhood