FREEDOM OR INDEPENDENCE?

Emilio Aguinaldo last appeared before the American public as a Philippine insurgent fighting for independence. Today, with the same ultimate object in view, but with peaceful intent, he is one of a delegation of prominent Filipinos sailing for Washington to lay before Congress a strong for absolute autonomy. The Wood report of last summer, declaring that the Philippines were not yet ready for independence, found very little favor in the islands, as was perhaps natural; and this question has for years been an issue between the two great American parties.

But there is very little real understanding in this country of conditions of Philippine administration, and until there is it is hard to see how the question of independence can be fairly discussed. The idea that the Philippines are "groaning under the heel of American exploitation" as was stated recently in the Senate, is a great exaggeration. Very few Americans have any real power now in the islands. Filipinos have been in actual as well as nominal control of the government departments,--executive, legislative, judicial, and educational,--since 1917. There are only 582 Americans on the government staff today, and 325 of them are there in a teaching capacity. The American officials with any real power in the government do not number more than a dozen: Governor, Vice-Governor, Insular Auditor, directors of the six departments in the administration, three judges in the Supreme Court, and four American assistant chiefs of the Constabulary under a Spanish brigadier. The army forces in the Philippines are cut down far below the margin of safety; and the coastal defences have been stripped to the limit. Philippine autonomy as it exists today is protected not by the battery at Corregidor or the guns of Cavite, but by such teeth as there are in the four-power treaty. Meanwhile, the islands have thrived under American rule; sanitation, communications, and the general welfare of the people have all improved greatly.

What Senors Aguinaldo, Quezon, and the others will have to say at Washington will be of great interest in showing the Filipino side of the question. At present, the grounds of native dissatisfaction, beyond an ethereal vision of the glories of nationhood, are not clear. The Philippines under American protection have autonomy. If permitted to go entirely free, they would gain little more control of their government than they have today, and they would lose what advantages they now possess under American guidance and protection.