CHAP. 803.—An Act Making appropriation for the support of the Army for the fiscal year ending June thirtieth, nineteen hundred and two.

All military, civil, and judicial powers necessary to govern the Philippine Islands, acquired from Spain by the treaties concluded at Paris on the tenth day of December, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, and at Washington on the seventh day of November, nineteen hundred, shall, until otherwise provided by Congress, be vested in such person and persons and shall be exercised in such manner as the President of the United States shall direct, for the establishment of civil government and for maintaining and protecting the inhabitants of said islands in the free enjoyment of their liberty, property, and religion: Provided, That all franchises granted under the authority hereof shall contain a reservation of the right to alter, amend, or repeal the same. Until a permanent government shall have been established in said archipelago full reports shall be made to Congress on or before the first day of each regular session of all legislative acts and proceedings of the temporary government instituted under the provisions hereof; and full reports of the acts and doings of said government, and as to the condition of the archipelago and of its people, shall be made to the President, including all information which may be useful to the Congress in providing for a more permanent government: Provided, That no sale or lease or other disposition of the public lands or the timber thereon or the mining rights therein shall be made: And provided further, That no franchise shall be granted which is not approved by the President of the United States, and is not in his judgment clearly necessary for the immediate government of the islands and indispensable for the interests of the people thereof, and which can not, without great public mischief, be postponed until the establishment of permanent civil government; and all such franchises shall terminate one year after the establishment of such permanent civil government. All laws or parts of laws inconsistent with the provisions of this Act are hereby repealed.

Approved, March 2, 1901.

[No. 222.]

An Act Providing for the organization of the departments of the interior, of commerce and police, of finance and justice, and of public instruction. By authority of the President of the United States, be it enacted by the United States Philippine Commission, that:

SECTION 1. Whereas the President of the United States, through the Secretary of War, has directed the establishment of four departments, to wit, the department of the interior, the department of commerce and police, the department of finance and justice, and the department of public instruction, and has appointed persons to be secretaries or heads of such departments: Now, therefore,

The department of the interior shall embrace within its executive control the bureau of health, the quarantine service of the marinehospital corps, the bureau of forestry, the bureau of mining, a bureau of agriculture, a bureau of fisheries, the weather bureau, a bureau of pagan and Mohammedan tribes, the bureau of public lands, the bureau of government laboratories, and the bureau of patents and copyrights. SEC. 2. The department of commerce and police shall have under its executive control a bureau of island and interisland transportation, the bureau of post-offices, the bureau of telegraphs, the bureau of coast and geodetic survey, a bureau of engineering and construction of public works other than public buildings, a bureau of insular constabulary, a bureau of prisons, a bureau of light-houses, a bureau of commercial and street railroad corporations and all corporations except banking.

SEC. 3. The department of finance and justice shall embrace within its executive control the bureau of the insular treasury, the bureau of the insular auditor, the bureau of customs and immigration, the bureau of internal revenue, the insular cold storage and ice plant, a bureau of banks, banking, coinage and currency, and the bureau or justice.

SEC. 4. The department of public instruction shall embrace under its executive control the bureau of public instruction, a bureau of public charities, public libraries, and museums, the bureau of statistics, a bureau of public records, a bureau of public printing, and a bureau of architecture and construction of public buildings.

SEC. 5. The secretaries of the departments described in the foregoing sections shall exercise the executive control therein conferred, under the general supervision of the civil governor. The executive control vested by law, however, in the central government over provincial and municipal governments and the civil service, shall be exercised directly by the civil governor through the executive secretary.

SEC. 6. The officers and subordinates of each department shall consist of the secretary and such assistant clerks and other employés as may be provided by law. The official correspondence of the head of each department may be recorded by direction of the head of the department in the office of the executive secretary, and such clerical work as may be needed in each of the departments and as may be conveniently done in the office of the executive secretary shall be there done by direction of the head of each department.

SEC. 7. Nothing in this act contained in respect to the executive control by the department of finance and justice over the office of insular auditor and the office of insular treasurer shall affect the powers of those officers conferred by Act No. 90, and the independence of judgment to be exercised by the auditor in auditing and adjudicating the validity of accounts presented to him in accordance with law.

SEC. 8. The public good requiring the speedy enactment of this bill, the passage of the same is hereby expedited in accordance with section 2 of "An act prescribing the order of procedure by the Commission in the enactment of laws," passed September 26, 1900.

SEC. 9. This act shall take effect on its passage.

Enacted, September 6, 1901.

INAUGURAL ADDRESS OF THE CIVIL GOVERNOR.

MY FELLOW-COUNTRYMEN: This ceremony marks a new step toward civil government in the Philippine Islands. The ultimate and most important step, of course, will be taken by the Congress of the United States, but with the consent of the Congress the President is secking to make the Islands ready for its action. However provisional the change made to-day, the President by fixing the natal day of the Republic as its date has manifested his view of its importance and his hope that the day so dear to Americans may perhaps be also associated in the minds of the Filipino people with good fortune. The transfer to the Commission of the legislative power and certain executive functions in civil affairs under the military government on September first of last year, and now the transfer of civil executive power in the pacified provinces to a civil governor, are successive stages in a clearly formulated plan for making the territory of these Islands ripe for permanent civil government on a more or less popular basis. As a further step in the same direction, on September first next, at the beginning of the Commission's second legislative year, there will be added as members to that body by appointment of the President, Dr. Trinidad H. Pardo de Tavera, Senor Don Benito Legarda and Senor Don Jose Luzuriaga. The introduction into the legislature of representative Filipinos, educated and able, will materially assist the Commission in its work by their intimate knowledge of the people and of local prejudices and conditions. On September first, also, the executive branch of the insular government will be rendered more efficient by the establishment of four executive departments. There will be a department of the interior, of which Commissioner Dean C. Worcester will be head; a department of commerce and police, of which Commissioner Luke E. Wright will be the head; a department of justice and finance, of which Commissioner Henry C. Ide will be the head, and a department of public instruction, of which Commissioner Bernard Moses will be the head. The foregoing announcements are made by direction of the Secretary of War.

Since the above was written, in confirmation of the statement of the President's purposes with respect to the people of these Islands, I have this morning received the following telegram from the President of the United States:

TAFT, Manila:

WASHINGTON, July 3—3.45 p. m.

Upon the assumption of your new duties as civil governor of the Philippine Islands I have great pleasure in sending congratulations to you and your associate commissioners and my thanks for the good work already accomplished. I extend to you my full confidence and best wishes for still greater success in the larger responsibilities now devolved upon you, and the assurance not only for myself but for my countrymen of good will for the people of the Islands, and the hope that their participation in the government which it is our purpose to develop among them, may lead to their highest advancement, happiness, and prosperity.

WILLIAM MCKINLEY.

The extent of the work which the Commission has done in organizing civil governments in towns and provinces is considerable, but its scope and effect may easily be exaggerated by those not fully acquainted with the situation. Twenty-seven provinces have been organized under the general provincial act; but it has not been possible to fill the important office of supervisor in eight or nine of them because a supervisor must be a civil engineer. We have sent to America for competent persons, whose arrival we look for this month. As the supervisor is one of the three members of the governing provincial board, his absence necessarily cripples the administration. Of the 27 provinces organized, four, possibly five and small parts of two others in which armed insurrection continues, will remain under the executive jurisdiction of the military governor and commanding general. There are 16 provinces or districts in which there is entire freedom from insurrection which the Commission has not had time to organize. Of the unorganized provinces and districts, including Mindoro and Paragua, the latter just occupied by the army, there are four that are not ready for civil government. In the organized provinces nearly all the towns have been organized under the municipal code; and some towns have been similarly organized in unorganized provinces. It was not supposed that either the municipal code or the provincial government act would form perfect governments, though it was possible to make the former much more complete than the latter, for there had been two experiments in municipal government under the administration of General Otis and General MacArthur before the Commission began its legislative work. The provincial government act was tentative. The result of the southern trip of the Commission was a substantial amendment and there will doubtless be others. Government is a practical, not a theoretical, problem; and the successful application of a new system to a people like this must be brought about by observing closely the operation of simple laws and making changes or additions as experience shows their necessity. The enactment of the law in its first form and appointments under it are but one of several steps in a successful organization.

The conditions under which the municipal and provincial governments of the Islands are to have their first real test are trying. The four years' war has pauperized many, and its indirect effect in destroying the habits of industry of those who have been prevented from working in the fields, or who have been leading the irresponsible life of guerrillas is even more disastrous. Not only war, but also the death from disease of a large percentage of the carabaos which are indispensable to the cultivation of rice and are greatly needed in all agriculture, has largely reduced the acreage of rice and other staple products. Then the pest of locusts has been very severe. In one province, and perhaps more, gaunt famine may have to be reckoned with. Poverty and suffering in a country where ladronism has always existed are sure to make ladrones.

With the change made to-day, the civil governments must prepare to stand alone and not depend on the army to police the provinces and towns. The concentration of the army in larger garrisons where, in cases of emergency only, they can be called on to assist the local police may be expected; but the people must be enabled by organization of native police under proper and reliable commanders to defend themselves against the turbulent and vicious of their own communities.

The withdrawal of the army from the discharge of quasi civil duties of police will be accompanied also by the ceasing of the jurisdiction of military commissions to try ordinary criminal cases. They have been most useful in punishing and repressing crime. We have enacted a judiciary law and appointed judges under it who will succeed to this work. But the adoption of a new civil code of procedure, a new criminal code and code of procedure, all of which are ready, may be delayed somewhat by the needed public discussion of them. Until they are all adopted, we shall not feel that the chief step has been taken toward securing the blessings of civil liberty to the people of the pacified provinces, the protection of life, liberty and property.

The difficulties of official communication between provinces on the sea and between towns of the same province similarly situated must be met by a properly organized fleet of small steamers or launches which shall, at the same time, assist in the revenue or postal service. Provincial governments, in many cases without such means of communicating with their numerous towns, are greatly impeded in their functions.

Congress, in its wisdom, has delayed until its next session provision for the sale of public lands, of mining rights and the granting of franchises. All are necessary to give the country the benefit of American and foreign enterprise and the opportunity of lucrative labor to the people. Commercial railroads, street railroads, mortgage-loan companies or land banks and steamship companies only await Government sanction to spring into being. These may remedy the poverty and suffering that a patient people have now to bear.

The school system is hardly begun as an organized machine. One thousand American teachers will arrive in the next three months. They must not only teach English in the schools, but they must teach the Filipino teachers. Schoolhouses are yet to be built; schoolrooms are yet to be equipped. Our most satisfactory ground for hope of success in our whole work is in the eagerness with which the Philippine people, even the humblest, seek for education.

Then there is another kind of education of adults to which we look with confidence. It is that which comes from observation of the methods by which Americans in office discharge their duties. Upon Americans who accept office under the civil government is imposed the responsibility of reaching the highest American standard of official duty. Whenever an American fails; whenever he allows himself to use his official position for private ends, even though it does not involve actual defalcation or the stealing of public property or money, he is recreant to his trust in a far higher degree than he would be were he to commit the same offense in a similar office at home. Here he is the representative of the great Republic among a people untutored in the methods of free and honest government, and in so far as he fails in his duty, he vindicates the objection of those who have forcibly resisted our taking control of these Islands and weakens the claim we make that we are here to secure good government for the Philippines.

The operation of the civil-service Act and the rules adopted for its enforcement have been the subject of some criticism; but I think that when they are fully understood, and when the Filipino, in seeking a position in executive offices where English is the only language spoken, fits himself, as he will with his aptness for learning languages, in English, he will have nothing to complain of either in the justice of the