Chapter XVIII: Governor Wright--1904 (2)

These details are not related with Pickwickian gravity in order to acquaint the reader with my utterances as being important per se. But it is important to make clear to the reader, and he is entitled, in all frankness, to have it made clear by one who has now so long detained his attention on this great subject, to know just when "the light from heaven on the road to Damascus" broke upon this witness, and how and why he came to be in favor of Philippine independence, because the reasons which convinced him may seem good in the sight of the reader also. If the man who reads this book shall see that the man who wrote it was, in Samar in 1904, neither a Republican nor a Democrat, but simply an American in a far distant land, jealous of the honor of his country's flag in its capacity as a symbol of protection to those over whom it floated, then the work will not have been written in vain.

The presidentes or mayors of the various pueblos were in session at Catbalogan in semi-annual convention during the first few days of October, 1904, when the Assistant Attorney-General, Mr. Harvey, visited Catbalogan. Mr. Harvey and the writer had taken a number of long walks together in the suburbs of Catbalogan, though Major Dade, commanding the Samar constabulary, an officer of the regular army, had warned us it was not safe outside of town. We had talked over the situation fully. Besides all its other aspects, there were a number of American women in Catbalogan, an American lawyer's wife, the wife of the superintendent of schools, her sister, and others. It was not at all likely that the Pulajans would enter Catbalogan, but there was always the possibility, not to be wholly ignored, that some such episode as that of March 23d, of the preceding year, at Surigao, already described, might be repeated. As hereinbefore noted, on August 9th, the Pulajans had done some killing and burning at Silanga, less than ten miles north of Catbalogan and likewise at Motiong, less than ten miles south of Catbalogan, on September 1st, and on the evening of September 2d, about 7:30, there had been a false alarm caused by some native of Catbalogan running down the main street yelling, "Pulajans! Pulajans!" All of which did not tend to make you feel that your American women were quite as entirely safe from harm as they ought to be.

In the course of one of our walks Mr. Harvey and I had stopped on the mountain side overlooking Catbalogan, to catch our breath and take in the view of the town below and the sea beyond. I said to him, because I knew his mind also was on the one great need of the hour: "Yes sir, if President Roosevelt were here, and could see this situation as we do, he would order out the army and protect these defenceless people, no matter which way the chips might fly." Mr. Harvey agreed with me. He promised to go back to Manila and tell the authorities there so. After we came back to town, we were advised that the convention of presidentes desired to have Mr. Harvey favor them with an address. He said, "What shall I tell them?" I said, "Tell them that if they will do their duty by the American Government, the American Government will do its duty by them." He spoke Spanish fluently, made a good speech, and told them in effect just that thing. Then he went back to Manila, and shortly afterward wrote me the two letters which follow:

Department of Justice, Philippine Islands,
Office of the Assistant Attorney-General
for the Constabulary,

Manila, P. I., October 15, 1904.

My dear Judge: We arrived in Manila on Tuesday morning,
the 11th instant, and I prepared my report and submitted it
to the attorney-general on the 12th, in the meantime making a
transcript of your summary and delivering a copy of same with other
information to the attorney-general along with my report. After
dictating the report and before delivering it I had a conversation
with General Allen on the situation in Samar and told him what
my recommendations would be. He agreed that rewards should be
offered for the capture of Pablo Bulan, Antonio Anogar, and Pedro
de la Cruz, but took issue on the other recommendations, and to my
mind he takes a very extreme view; but I thought at the time and
still think that he wanted to tone me down in my feelings in the
matter. I think the real cause for his opposition is the effect
that he fears an aggressive attitude might have on the presidential
election. In other words, whatever they do aggressively might be
misconstrued and made use of as political capital.

At Governor Wright's request I got the report from the
attorney-general before it was sent up and went over to the
Malacanan, and the governor read the report and read most of the
data that I submitted with the report, including your summary, and
while he did not say much what he did say convinced me that there
would be something doing if it were not on the eve of election,
and in my opinion there will be things doing in Samar within
thirty days.

I inclose herewith a copy of your summary, and also a copy of my
report to the attorney-general. On the 18th instant I received
your telegram to hold the completion of your summary until receipt
of a letter mailed by you that day. I telegraphed you in reply
that my report and your summary were placed in the hands of the
attorney-general on the 12th instant. If there is any additional
data in your letter mailed on the 13th I will submit it to the
proper authorities.

For the lack of time, I will close, and write more next time.

Very truly yours,
(Signed) Geo. R. Harvey,
Assistant Attorney-General.

Department of Justice, Philippine Islands,
Office of the Assistant Attorney-General,
for the Constabulary,

Manila, P. I., October 19, 1904.

My dear Judge Blount: Since mailing my letter to you of last
Saturday I have found the copies of your summary on the situation
in Samar and inclose two herewith, in accordance with my promise.

This week we have received some good news from Samar with
reference to important captures and killings of Pulajans. I
am not in touch with what is going on with reference to Samar,
and can give you no information along that line. As I remember,
the governor told me the other day when I was talking with him
that one more company of scouts will be sent down right away.

I sincerely hope the situation is improving, and that you are
getting along rapidly in disposing of the large docket before
you. If there is not a very great improvement in the situation
by the 9th of November, I think there will be a considerable
movement of troops in Samar within thirty days. For the good of the
government, I hope the situation will improve materially before
that time. I would like to see them put the troops there right
now. I am of the opinion that it would not affect the election a
half-dozen votes, and it might save two or three or a half-dozen
massacres and the destruction of much property.

With best wishes for your success in your work, and with regards
to Mr. Block, I am,

Very truly yours,

Geo. R. Harvey,

Assistant Attorney-General, Philippines Constabulary.
To Hon. James H. Blount,
Judge of First Instance, Catbalogan, Samar, P. I.

These two letters may be found at p. 2532, Congressional Record, February 25, 1908, where they were the subject of remark in the House of Representatives by Hon. Thomas W. Hardwick of Georgia, apropos of Governor Ide's North American Review article of December, 1907.

A few weeks after the presidential election I saw Mr. Harvey in Manila. We naturally talked about Samar and his two letters to me. The troops had then been ordered out. He referred to his conference with the Governor-General and stated, "Yes, he told me that was the reason," meaning that the reason for not ordering out the troops was the one assigned in his (Harvey's) letter to me, viz., "Whatever we do aggressively might be misconstrued and made use of as political capital."

On October 18, 1904, there was received at Manila the following cablegram concerning the presidential campaign in the United States:

New York, 16th. Judge Parker, in addressing campaign clubs at
Esopus the past week returned to the subject of the Philippines
in the evident hope of making it a paramount issue of the
campaign. He repeated his former declaration that the retention
of the Philippines and the carrying out of the policy of the
Republican Administration have cost six hundred and fifty millions
of dollars and two hundred thousand lives. Secretary of War Taft,
in addressing a mass meeting held in Baltimore, Saturday night,
ridiculed Judge Parker's statement and characterized his figures
as alarmist.

Of course Judge Parker's figures were rather high--of which more anon. He was not going to miss anything in the way of a chance of "getting a rise" out of the Administration, by understatement. But some statement from the Philippines at once became a supremely important desideratum, to counterbalance Judge Parker's over-statement, some optimism to meet the Parker pessimism. Encouraged by the public interest aroused by the figures furnished him, and the consequent apparent uneasiness it created in "the enemy's camp," Judge Parker soon had the whole Philippine group of islands going to "the demnition bow-wows." On October 20th, Secretary of War Taft cabled Governor Wright, then Governor-General of the Islands, a long telegram, quoting Judge Parker as having used, among other language descriptive of the beatitudes we had conferred on our little brown brother, the following: "The towns in many places in ruins, whole districts in the hands of ladrones." [443]

At that time the whole archipelago was absolutely quiet for the nonce, except Samar. Samar was the only island where Judge Parker's statement was true, and as to Samar, it was absolutely true. On October 23d Governor Wright wired Secretary of War Taft as follows:

There is nothing warranting the statement that towns are in
ruins. It is not true that there are whole districts in the hands
of ladrones. Life and property are as safe here as in the United
States. [444]

This was followed by a perfectly true and correct picture of the peace and quiet which then prevailed for the time being everywhere throughout the archipelago, except in Samar, which dark and bloody isle was specifically excepted. Then followed a statement as to Samar, full of allusions as elaborately optimistic as any of the Taft cablegrams of 1900, to impliedly inconsiderable "prowling bands" of outlaws in Samar. Of course nobody at home knew the answer to this, so it silenced the Parker batteries, and the Samar massacres proceeded unchecked. Meanwhile the 14th Infantry at Calbayog, Samar, and the 18th Infantry, at Tacloban, Leyte, smiled with astute, if contemptuous, tolerance, at the self-inflicted impotence of a republic trying to make conquered subjects behave without colliding too violently with home sentiment against having conquered subjects; sang their favorite barrack room song,

He may be a brother of Wm. H. Taft,
But he ain't no friend of mine;

and continued to enjoy enforced leisure. They did chafe under the restraint, but it at least relieved them from the not altogether inspiring task of chasing Pulajans through jungles and along the slippery mire of precipitous mountain trails, and at the same time permitted the secondest second lieutenant among them to swear fierce blase oaths, not wholly unjustified, about how much better he could run the Islands than they were being run.

On October 26th, I wired Governor Wright at Manila as follows:

Since my letter of October 6th, situation appears worse. Additional
depredations both on east and west coast. Smith-Bell closing
out. [445] Reliable American residing in Wright says that during
week ending last Sunday thirteen families living along river
Nacbac, barrio of Tutubigan, said pueblo, kidnapped by brigands
and carried off to hills. This means some sixty people having
farms along river, rice ready to be harvested. Seven of the eleven
barrios of Wright have been burned.

Blount.

When I sent that telegram of October 26th, the situation in the pueblo of Wright was typical of the reign of terror throughout the island. Wright could have been reached by the 18th Infantry (then over at Tacloban, in Leyte), and garrisoned on eight hours' notice. But I had little hope that the telegram would stir the 18th. The best man I had ever personally known well in high station was at the head of the government of the Islands, and as he was my friend, I sat down to think the situation out, determined, with the prejudice which is the privilege of friendship, to analyze his apparent apathy, and to conjecture how many times thirteen families "having farms along river, rice ready to be harvested" would have to be carried off to the hills by the brigands in order to move the 18th Infantry before the presidential election. Then I wondered just how many seconds it would have taken a British governor-general, backed by unanimous home sentiment concerning the wisdom of having colonies, to have acted, had a great British colonial mercantile house like Smith, Bell & Co. appealed to him for protection of its interests. And that brought me, there on "the tie-ribs of earth," as Kipling would phrase it, to the fundamentals of the problem. The British imperial idea of which Kipling is the voice and Benjamin Kidd the accompanist is based, superficially, upon a supposed necessity for the control of the tropics by non-tropical peoples, though fundamentally, it is an assertion of the right of any people to assume control of the land and destinies of another when they feel sure they can govern that other better than that other can govern itself. Is this proposition tenable, and if so, within what limits? Is it tenable to the point of total elimination of the people sought to be improved? If not, then how far? How far is incidental sacrifice of human life negligible in the working out of the broader problem of "the greatest good of the greatest number?" In his article in the North American Review for December, 1907, Governor Ide makes exhaustive answer to "the doctors who for some months past, in the columns of the North American Review and elsewhere, have published prescriptions for curing the ills of the Filipino people," including Senator Francis G. Newlands, Hon. William J. Bryan, and the writer. In the course of disposing of the quack last mentioned, Governor Ide gets on rather a high horse, asking, with much dignified indignation, "How many people in the United States would have known or cared whether the army was or was not ordered out in Samar in 1904?" I concede that the solicitude was a super-solicitude, as do the Harvey letters, but like them, I must recognize its reality. However, when Governor Ide reaches this rhapsody of conscious virtue: "It is inconceivable that the Commission could have been animated by the base and ignoble partisan prejudices thus charged against them," capping his climax by triumphantly pointing out that "Governor-General Wright was a life-long Democrat," he doth protest too much. For the angelic pinions he thus attaches to himself are at once rudely snapped by the reflection that a very short while after his article came out in the North American Review Governor Wright became Secretary of War in President Roosevelt's Cabinet, and a little later took the stump for Taft and Sherman, in 1908. Governor Wright did not stoop to deny or extenuate his share in the matter, and I honor him for it. [446] But to stick to your own crowd and then deny afterwards that you did so--that is another story. However, let us brush aside such petty attempts to cloud the real issue, which is: How many people would Governor Wright and Vice-Governor Ide have permitted to be massacred by the Pulajans in Samar in 1904 before they would have ordered out the military prior to the presidential election? Let us consider the case, not with a view of clouding the issue, but of clearing it. The truth is, Governor Wright was very gravely concerned about the Samar situation from August to November, 1904. Of course it is due to him to make perfectly clear that he did not realize the gravity of that situation as vividly as those of us who were on the ground in Samar, four or five hundred miles away. But the information hereinbefore reviewed, conveyed to him by the Provincial Governor, by Mr. Harvey, the Assistant Attorney General sent to Samar for the express purpose of getting the Manila government in possession of the exact situation, and by myself, was certainly sufficient to make him "chargeable with notice" of all that happened thereafter, certainly chargeable with knowledge of all that had happened theretofore. Of course there was General Allen, the commander-in-chief of the constabulary, at Manila, presumably speaking well of his command--the right arm of the civil government--presumably giving industrious and tactful aid and comfort to the idea that the authorities could afford to worry along with the constabulary alone until after the presidential election. But that could not discount the actual facts reported from the afflicted province by the officials on the ground. General Allen, it should be noted, remained in Manila all this time. So that any Otis-like "situation-well-in-hand" bouquets he may have thrown at his subordinates in Samar, and the situation there generally, were mere political hothouse products, surer to be recognized as such by the shrewd kindliness of the truly considerable man at the head of the government than by most any one else he could hand them out to. That man knew, to all intents and purposes, in the great and noble heart of him, what was really going on in Samar. He knew that massacres had been occurring, and that they were likely to keep on occurring. In other words, he knew that preventable sacrifice of life of defenceless people was going on, and that he could put a stop to it any time he saw fit. The question he had to wrestle with was, should he stop it, knowing the "Hell fer Sartin" the Democratic orators in the United States would at once luridly describe as "broke loose" in the Philippines? I insist that there is no use for any holier-than-thou gentleman to become suffused with any glow of indignant conscious rectitude based on the premises we are considering. Better to look a little deeper, on the idea that you are observing your republic in flagrante colonizatione, with as good a man as you ever have had, or ever will have, among you, as the principal actor. Governor Wright's course was entirely right, if the Philippine policy was right. If his course was not right, it was not right because the Philippine policy is fundamentally wrong. Governor Wright of course believed that the Philippine policy was right. I myself did not come finally to believe it was wrong until it was revealed in all its rawness by the period now under discussion. Of course the Governor did not vividly realize that the American women in Catbalogan were not entirely safe. If he had, he would have rushed the troops there, politics or no politics. But native life was politically negligible. What difference would a few score, or even a few hundred, natives of Samar make, compared with that pandemonium of anarchy and bloodshed all over the archipelago which Messrs. Taft, Wright, and Ide had long been insisting would follow Philippine independence? Was the whole future of 8,000,000 of people to be jeopardized to save a few people in Samar? That was the moral question before the insular government, in its last analysis. And the government faced the proposition squarely, and answered it "No."

I will go farther than this. If I had believed, with Messrs. Taft, Wright, and Ide, that Philippine independence meant anarchy in the Islands, and the orthodox "bloody welter of chaos," I too might have hesitated to order out the troops on the eve of the election, and my hesitation, like theirs, might have continued until the election was safely over. So might yours, reader. Don't be so certain you would not. Practically absolute power, sure of its own benevolence, has temptations to withhold its confidence from the people that you wot not of. Don't condemn Governor Wright. Condemn the policy, and change your republic back to the course set by its founders. Give the Philippine people the independence they of right ought to have, instead of secretly hoping to unload them on somebody else, through the medium of your next great war.

The question of whether the troops should have been ordered out or not at the time above dealt with is by no means without two sides. On the "bloody welter" side, you have the well-known opinions of Messrs. Taft, Wright, and Ide. On the other side you have before you--for the moment--only my little opinion. So instead of having in Governor Wright a Bluebeard, you simply have a man of great personal probity and unflinching moral courage, following his convictions to their ultimate logical conclusion without shadow of turning, in the act of colonization. In other words, Mr. American, you see yourself, as others see you. So face the music and look at yourself. In your colony business, you are a house divided against itself, which cannot stand. On the other hand, I knew the Filipino people far more intimately than either Mr. Taft, Governor Wright, or Judge Ide. I spoke their language--which they did not. I had met them both in peace and in war--which they had not. I had held court for months at a time in various provinces of the archipelago from extreme northern Luzon to Mindanao--which they had not. I had met the Filipinos in their homes for years on terms of free and informal intercourse impracticable for any governor-general. It was therefore perfectly natural that I should know them better than any of these eminent gentlemen. I was not prepared to be in a hurry about recommending myself out of office by assenting that our guardianship over the Filipinos should at once be terminated, but I knew there was nothing to the "bloody welter" proposition. The home life of the Filipino is too altogether a model of freedom from discord, pervaded as it is by parental, filial, and fraternal love, and their patriotism is too universal and genuine, to give the "bloody welter" bugaboo any standing in court.

But whosoever questions for one moment Governor Wright's high personal character, simply does not know the man. To do so, moreover, would fatally cloud the issue I have sought to make clear between his view of the duty of our government and my own. In his moods that reminded one of Lincoln, Governor Wright used to say: "Don't shoot the organist, he's doing the best he can." It is true that his answer to Judge Parker was not a full and frank statement of the case. But did it lie in American human nature, when your antagonist was recklessly over-stating the case in the heat of debate on the eve of a presidential election, to take him into your confidence and tell him all you knew, in simple trusting faith that he would thereafter quit exaggerating? To permit the dispute to boil down to the real issue, viz., how many lives it was permissible to abandon on the "greatest good to the greatest number" theory, would obviously jeopardize the existence of a government which the Governor of the Philippines naturally believed to be better for all concerned than any other. And there is your cul-de-sac. Hinc illae lachrymae.

We can point with pride to many things we have done in the Philippines, the public improvements, [447] the school system, the better sanitation, and a long list of other benefits conferred. But in the greatest thing we have done for them, we have builded wiser than we knew. "God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform." In fourteen years we have welded the Filipinos into one homogeneous political unit. In a most charming book, entitled An Englishwoman in the Philippines, [448] we can see our attempts to fit government by two political parties into over-seas colonization caricatured without sting until we really remind ourselves of a hippopotamus caressing a squirrel. In one passage the British sister describes our programme as one "to educate the Filipino for all he is worth, so that he may, in the course of time, be fit to govern himself according to American methods; but at the same time they have plenty of soldiers to knock him on the head if he shows signs of wanting his liberty before the Americans think he is fit for it"--"A quaint scheme," she naively adds, "and one full of the go-ahead originality of America."

The more we teach the Filipinos, the more intimately they will become acquainted, in their own way, with the history of the relations between our country and theirs from the beginning, including the taxation without representation, through Congressional legislation (hereinafter noticed) placed or kept on our statute-books by the hemp trust and other special interests in the United States. And they will learn all these things in the midst of a "growing gulf between the two peoples." [449]

In fourteen years we have made these unwilling subjects, whom we neither want nor need any more than they want or need us, a unit; a unit for Home Rule in preference to alien domination, it is true; but, nevertheless, a patriotic unit--one people--a potential body politic which can take a modest, but self-respecting place in the concert of free nations, with only a little more additional help from us.

In the handling of an insurrection in any given province with courts and constabulary during the first four or five years after the Taft government of the Philippines was founded, the function of a representative of the office of the Attorney-General, coming from Manila to help the local prosecuting attorney handle a large docket and a crowded jail, was by no means remotely analogous to that of a grand jury. He originated prosecutions, found "No Bill," etc. When Mr. Harvey came to Samar, he came direct to the court room, and I suspended the trial of the pending case, and, after greeting him, began an informal talk which was akin to the nature of a charge to a grand jury, putting him in possession of the general aspects of the uprising. He was a very just and kindly man, and entered into the spirit of the task. I elaborated on the class of cases where the defendant claimed, as most of them did, "Yes, I joined the band of brigands, but I was made to do so." It was also indictable to furnish supplies to the public enemy. This presented the class of cases where the brigands would swoop down on a town and demand rice, and not getting it, would sometimes kill the persons refusing it, and so intimidate the rest into finding rice for them. Also there was the class of cases where a man would claim to have been one of the inhabitants of an unprotected town who had gone off to the hills in a body, for safety, to propitiate the mountain people by becoming part of them. This sort of thing at one time threatened to become epidemic with all the coast towns. It did not, however. A modus vivendi of some sort, sometimes express, sometimes merely tacit, would be arranged between the coast people and the hill people. These modus vivendi arrangements enabled the coast people to obtain a certain degree of safety, in lieu of that we should have secured them but did not, by making the hill folk believe that the coast men were against us and for them. At one time the prosecuting attorney got hold of evidence sufficient to authorize the issuance of a warrant for the Presidente of Balangiga, the man supposed to have engineered the massacre of the 9th Infantry in September 1901. I authorized the issuance of the warrant for his arrest. But the native governor of the province, and also Major Dade, the American regular officer commanding the constabulary, satisfied me that we did not have force sufficient to protect Balangiga from the Pulajans, if we arrested the presidente, who, being persona grata to the Pulajans, was able to keep them from descending on his town. To arrest him would therefore mean, in their opinion, that the people of Balangiga would take to the hills for protection, and join the hill folk, or Pulajans, and if a town as large as Balangiga set any such example all the coast towns might follow it. So the supposed perpetrator of the 9th Infantry massacre was allowed to remain unmolested. The American court was impotent to enforce its processes.

In my mass of Philippine papers there is one containing a copy of my remarks to the Assistant Attorney-General on his arrival at Catbalogan, above referred to as analogous to a charge to a grand jury at home. It is dated Catbalogan, Samar, September 28, 1904, and is headed: "Remarks by the court upon the occasion of the arrival of Assistant Attorney-General Harvey, with regard to the recent disturbances in Samar, and the cases for brigandage and sedition growing out of the same." Certain parts of this contemporary document will doubtless give the reader a more vivid apprehension of the then situation than he can get from mere subsequent description. Of course the visiting representative of the Attorney-General's office was familiar in a general way with the manner of the handling of the Albay insurrection in the previous year, described in the chapter preceding this. In discussing the Samar situation the "remarks" of the court contain, among other things, this passage:

In the cases growing out of the Albay disturbances there were
a great many people who strayed out to the mountains just like
cattle. They did not know why or whither they went. As to those
persons, Judge Carson, Mr. Ross, and myself were unanimous in the
opinion that some of them could be indicted under the vagrancy
law. There were others of a greater degree of guilt, but who did
not appear to have been what you might call ordinary thieves,
and we were all agreed to indict those under the sedition law,
the limit of which is ten years and ten thousand dollars. Thus you
do not force upon a Judge of First Instance the responsibility of
sentencing a man to twenty years of his life for a connection with
bandits which may be but little more than technical. Besides those
two classes, there were in Albay of course the bandits proper,
to whom the bandolerismo [brigandage] law was specially intended
to apply. There cannot be any doubt about the fact that this
bandolerismo law is one of the most stringent statutes that ever
was on the statute-books of any country. It is very far from the
purpose of this court to attempt to say what would be the wisest
legislation, or to say that this is not the very best legislation,
under the circumstances. How we administer the several laws
alluded to governing public order, will settle whether or not
substantial justice is done.

The men in the United States who in those days were slinging mud at the Philippine trial judges as being "subservient," wholly missed the core of the whole matter. In the provinces where so many heavy sentences were imposed, the real situation was that a state of war existed, and the judges believed, and I think correctly, that they were practically a military commission of one, and much more able to give a prisoner a square deal, tempering justice with mercy, than officers briefly gathered from the scenes of the fighting to act as a military commission. We tried those men with as little prejudice as if they had just come from the moon. Moreover, from the italicized concluding words of the above excerpt from my talk to the Assistant Attorney-General, it will be seen that the court had practically unlimited discretion in the matter of punishment, and was, in fact, about the only court of criminal equity in the annals of Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence.

In the last analysis, the righteousness or unrighteousness of a civil government in a country not yet entirely subjugated, depends on whether more innocent people suffer through completing the work of subjugation with constabulary whose "prisoners of war" are tried, to see what they may have done, if anything, by one-man courts, or whether more innocent people suffer through completing the work of subjugation as any other great power on earth but ourselves would have completed it, with an army, trying the prisoners by military commission. Unless you yourself were a traitor to your country, you considered as criminal attempts to subvert your government by cut-throats that no one of the respectable Filipinos, from Aguinaldo and Juan Cailles down, would have hesitated to have shot summarily. But you sought to make the punishment in each case fit the crime, by ascertaining as dispassionately as if the defendant were fresh from the moon, just what each accused man had himself done. Either Aguinaldo, or an American military commission would have had such people shot in bunches, as not entitled to be treated as prisoners of war. The trouble with the civil government did not lie in its judiciary, but in its constabulary. It was the physical handling of the crowds of prisoners by the constabulary, and their failure, because not numerous enough, to protect peaceably inclined people, which made it a fact that turning the situation over to the military would have meant less sacrifice of the innocent along with the guilty. It is much more merciful to kill a few hundred people, as a lesson to the rest, and let the rest go, with the clear understanding that if they insurrect again you will promptly kill a few hundred more, than to permit a reign of terror from one month to another and from one year to another, with all the untilled fields, famine, pestilence, and other disease this involves, merely in order to be able to invoke the blessing of the Doctor Lyman Abbots of the world on a supposedly benign "civil" government.

In all my sentences, and in all his indictments, Mr. Harvey and the writer sailed close to the wind, by holding only those responsible who had taken active parts in the sacking and burning of villages and the massacre of their inhabitants. I knew that sooner or later some officious prosecuting attorney of less noble mould than Harvey would ask me to convict some poor creature of brigandage for giving a little rice to the brigands, and my mind was made up to refuse to do so, and in so refusing to commit heresy once and for all by expressing my sentiments, in the decision, concerning the failure to give adequate protection to defenceless people, along the lines indicated in this chapter. No such case was in fact presented. I broke down under the strain of graver cases early in November and left Samar forever, bound for Manila.

Before I left, the whole island was seething with sedition. I was told by a credible American that the chief deputy sheriff of the court, an ex-insurgent officer, one of the "peace-at-any-price" policy appointees, had remarked among some of his own people where he did not expect the remark to be repeated: "I see no use persecuting our brethren in the hills." The municipal officials of the provincial capital, Catbalogan, were suspected by the native provincial governor, and the latter in turn was suspected by the Manila government. In fact the whole political atmosphere of the island had become full of rumor and suspicion as to who was for the government, and who was against the government. I left Samar, November 8th, which was the day of the presidential election of 1904, determined to try no more insurrections. By that time nearly everybody in the island was more or less guilty of sedition, and I did not know the method of drawing an indictment against a whole people.