Los Angeles herald., 1909-08-13
AMERICA i'm THE PHILIPPINES
XTlT-''The Little Brown Brother"
By Frederic L Haskin

! taught that it is consistent with their
| dignity to carry their own books and
! to dig in the garden.
| The Filipino is a Christian, and has
been so for centuries. While he is an
| Oriental in race and habits of life, his
mind is controlled by European ideas.
He is the most occidental of Orientals,
| but he is enough of an Oriental to be
! tenacious in his grasp on the particular
western notions which he already has.
! They are Spanish and just as far away
from ours as are the ideas of the Ven
| eZuelans.
| But, the fact is, the Filipino will
| work if he has the opportunity. lie
| will not do coclie work, and the
American who expects to make for
tune in the Philippines from the profits
on the labor of Filipino poems is
doomed to disappointment. He might
as well try the same game in Ohio.
The Filipino will work when the work
is of kind that suits him. An Ameri-
can tobacco man, a high officer in the
trust, after a trip through the Manila
tobacco factories, declared that he had
never seen better workmen in his life.
The railroads, the electric plants, the
steamships all testify to the Filipino $
ability to work.
The bureau of printing in Manila is
another refutation of the charge that
the Filipino is essentially lazy and in
competent. The bureau is one of the
best and neatest print shops under the
American flag. All of the work is done
by Filipino craftsmen and apprentices,
under the direction of American in
structors. There are 500 Flipinos and
sixteen Americans in the bureau now.
They do all kinds of work, from photo
engraving and multi-color process plate
printing down to ordinary linotype
composition. The work will stand be-
side that produced by any print shop
in the Unidted States, and every bit of
it is done by Filipino labor.
The passion of Filipino boys and
girls to obtain an education is the con-
stant theme of the teachers. Parents
will make the most complete sacrifices
to send their children to the schools,
and the pupils themselves endure hun
ger and suffering and sleeplessness to
get learning The manual training
schools and the agricultural schools are
teaching the people new doctrine con-
corning labor, and with the increase of
needs brought about by wider educa-
tion the Filipino will go to work for
his own sake. But he will never go
to work as a coolie. The reason is a
good one. The Chinese or Japanese or
Hindu coolie must work to live. The
Filipino may retreat to the back
woods, plant some banana trees and
| live to be a hundred without doing
stroke of work.
| Yet the Americans of Manila do not
| like the little brown brother" and
the Filipinos of Manila, the educated
ones. return the dislike with interest.
| They prefer the rule of old Spain. cruel
as 1t was. Spain did not attempt to
educate the common people up to their
class. Spain received them as social
equals. Spain married their daughters
and occasionally let them in on bit
OF graft. The Americans will have
nothing to do with them socially, and
while the United States gives them
many offices. Bilibid prison is the sure
portion Of him who attempts little
grating on the side. The Manila
American wishes to exploit Filipino
labor. Tho government will not per-
NIT it and the Filipino will not fall in
with the plan. Therefore he 'cusses"
both the government and the Filipino.
! The educated Filipino also wishes to
exploit the common classes of his peo-
| pie The government will not permit
| it, and therefore he "cusses" the gov
ernment and hates the Americans.
Out in the provinces. so testify the
men and women who work for the civil
government and who teach in the
schools, the Americans and Filipinos
are very friendly. The Americans are
trying to aid the Tilipinos, not trying
to exploit them. The Filipinos know
this. and are grateful. In Manila there
| is great friction between the nation
alities. In the provinces, witness all
the Americans except the soldiers, the
relations are friendly and are becom-
/ ing more so as the purpose and intent
of the American government is made
more and more clear to the masses OF
1.-The people. In the Philippines every
/ American who has gone among the
people and lived with them declares
! that the little brown brother is a
child of great promise and worthy of
the helping hand of the older and
stronger "big white brother"
Tomorrow: America in the Philippines
| XIV; The First Filipino Assembly.