Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1916 edition. Excerpt: ...their government and national institutions, if these are to be satisfactory to them. There remains only the other solution of the problem, which is independence for the Philippines. To defer independence for the Philippines until after several generations have gone by, when no living American or Filipino will see it, as Mr. Taft and those who are in accord with him have suggested, is practically to deny the Filipino people their right to govern themselves. Who can honestly assert that, because it is hinted that the Filipinos may become an independent nation within three or four generations, their control in the meantime by the United States is not in violation of the letter and spirit of the Declaration of Independence? Independence, to be a true American policy, should be recognized at once or within a reasonable time; certainly within the lifetime of those who are responsible for the control of the Islands by the United States. Such a course is the only course that will relieve this country from the charge of having assumed permanent control of the Philippines. To this exposition American imperialists may rejoin with the familiar assertion that the Filipinos do not want independence; that it is but the cry of a few Filipino politicians, who, disguised as patriots, desire to get power into their hands in order that they may enslave and exploit their own people; that there is no such thing as a Filipino people. To this Mr. Quezon would answer: We all want independence and are entitled to it. The argument of Filipino incapacity for self-government is hypocritical. It is the veil with which the American office-holder covers his desire to keep his place. It is the ambush behind which lurks the company which monopolizes our hemp and the sugar...
