The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1899-02-08
B|GELON ON F|L|P|NOS
BELIEVES IN EXPANSION UNDER
PROPER CONDITIONS.
Is Urgent That Good Government
Be Administered 10y Intelligent
Ofiicials-Need Local Liberty.


In an interview with the London !
correspondent of the New York Her
aid, Poultney Bigelow, the well known
writer and traveller, had this to say
of the Philippines
I'VE Americans have succeeded as
colonists because we started as Eng
lishmen about two hundred and fifty
years ago. and if after that lapse of
time we confess to the world that we
cannot do little more colonizing it
is time we held an inquiry into the
cause of our degeneracy.
You ask me about our future man
agement of the Philippines, and in
answering | will have to incur the
odium of being a iingo, although by
education and taste | am free trade
Democrat. believe in holding the
Philippines. while conscious that we
are repeating blunder upon blunder
and will probabaly have disastrous
experience with the natives before we
| learn to live in peace with the sub
| iect races.
Colonial government is Il business,
and the best business men are none
too good for the job. England has
learned to send her best business tai
ent to the administration of her col
| onies and she succeeds.
1--WE have sent to conquer and adj
minister the Philippines men with no
business capacity, men who do not
command the respect of average
! Americans at home, men who would
make a failure of any commercial en-
| terprise and who cannot, without
| miraculous Intervention. succeed in
making the American name respected
in the Far East.
The volunteers who are attempt
ing to pacify that colony are splendid
individual men. but the staff officers
are not competent soldiers and in
most cases owe their positions eX-
clusively to political influence.
IF military success is to follow
such leadership, then we had better
abolish West Point and recruit our
officers from Tammany Hall and kim
dred political schools.
THE Filipino is neither negro nor
savage. but a man of acute Oriental
perceptions, quick to recognize justice
and power. He would welcome the
British flag because propinquity to
Hongkong has taught him that Brit
ish administration means local self
government and liberty. He is sus-
picious of American rule because SO
far he has seen no evidence that the
Stars and Stripes represent either
good administration or the local indie
pendence he has Il right to expect.
He sees in our volunteers little
more than stalwart day laborers, who
have come with rather indefinite mill
tary political aims, and what he has
I Of nth ntfi ~. :
not inspired him with any desire to
surrender what little military aGvan-
tages he possesses.
This is humilating confession
for an American to make, but we car
expect no improvement until this is
taken to heart
mo relation with the Philippines
can be successful until il means good
American administration. We must
guarantee the building of roads, rail
ways aud telegraph lines, the dredg-
ing of the rivers and harbors and in
every other way develop the material
resources of that country. as England
does those of India The Fiipinos
cannot do this. They have neither
!, money nor organizing capacity, and
as fast as we do this we shall com
mand their respect and allegiance, for
there is no missionary in the Far East
comparable to the locomotive or the
steam dredger.
The Philippines are enormously
rich and practically a wilderness. The
so-called rebel leaders represent but
a very small fringe of artificial civil
iZation on the edges of n vast wilder
, ness of natives. to whom the Span
iards, Americans and Aguinaldo's fol
lowers are matters of equal indiffer
ence. The strength of the rebels is
considerable, but it is as nothing com
pared to the millions of natives who
are to be the future wage earners Of
that rich country.
'The traveller in the Philippines is
in savage country within half {
days canoe padding from Manila
The word savage however, has NJ
reference to the inveterate hatred o.
work. characteristic of our red IndiaT
or the helpless barbarism of tn,
Kaffir.
1.-THE native Filipino suggests
strongly Japanese ancestry, ant
though 300 years of Spanish rule hav,
not opened up more than one-tentl
of the Philippines, there is no gooC
reason why in the next generation
those whom we now call 'savages
should not be worthy of a very lib
5 eral local franchise.
There are two measures | consider
of vital and immediate importance
? First, that Manila be declared a free
l port in the fullest sense of the term
l as, for instance, Hongkong and Singa
pore Second, the Chinese should b,
encouraged to settle, for they are
most excellent elements in the de
velopment of every eastern colony
/ To neglect them is to accept a heavy