Evening star., 1925-01-23

preamble to the Jones law, the or
ganlc act of the Philippines:
whereas II is, as 1t has always
been. the purpose of the people of
the United States to withdraw their
sovereignty over the Philippine Is
lands and to recognize their inde-
pendence as soon as a stable gov
eminent can be established there
in >"
Mr. Loomis, however, asserts that
TINS preamble as well as these pro-
nouncements of American Presidents
are not legally binding. Legally. no
II may be-but morally. they are. And
Mr Loomis knows that moral obIiga-
tlon is even more solemn and more
plnoihg than a legal one, for the lat
ter mas to be translated into reality
because of statutory compulsion
while the former may become a
reality only by the degree with which
an Individual or a. nation regards a
promise solemnly made
MT Loomis agrees to the claim of
the American Chamber of Commerce.
or the Philippines, we'll known for
It's opposition to independence thai
congress has no power to alfenata In
other words, grant Philippine indie
pendence. We simply reply by re-
Ierrlhg Mr.. Loomis to the State De-
a.
longed. If he will take the tro,hIa
10 go into its records. he will dis
cover ruling handed down bv tho
department last year during the CON
gresslonal hearings on the PhiIin-
plnes' and submitted to the House
committee on insular affairs. 10 TIA
enect that Congress, having power
10 acquire territory, has also mower
10 ALLEVIATE territory
iS
talk about independence as thoneh
we were Withholding from them an
inestimable boon which they had nre-
viousiy enjoyed" In reply to this
ulatrlbe we humbly say that II has
simply been our misfortune never 70
nave enjoyed this boon. although we
nave struggled for centuries. both in
the neld of~war and in the realm of
peace, to secure IL
Mr.. Loomis brands Filipino auto
homy as proof of Filipino inca
paclty. Whiie we do not claim that
no mistakes were made, we assert
that Filipino autonomy proves inst
the contrary, as may be shown by the
tact that, compared with the preyi-
Gus administration when the govern
ment was practically entirely In the
hands of Americans, progress was
even greater: Expense for public in
structton increased 10 per cent; num-
Der or schools 1872 per cent; mileage
OF first-class roads 100 per cent. for
! eisn trade 800 per cent; cases dis
posed of by the courts of first in
stances AZ per cent; gross business in
the islands 100 per cent; resources of
commercial bank 100 per cent. And
sanitation by diminishing death rate.
with regard to these figures, the
Wood-Forbes mission, which report
ed against Independence, said:
1T should be noted that whatever
mistakes have been made here, they
! have not been sufficient to arrest the
steady rate of progress which these
| figures show"
To his charge that the bank was
mismanaged by Filipinos to the ex-
tent of losing s37 900, we reply
that the alleged loss, which Is not
irrecoverable, was due to war time
and postwar imitation, and the conss-
quent economic depression which not
only caused the loss of millions of
dollars by hundreds of banks in
America and in Europe, but their
| completely going to the wall. Cover
nor General Wood, in his 1923 report
commenting on the loss Of the bank,
said:
TN this its experience has been
Guiding the United States"
| Most of the loss of this $4,000, ,000
| which was considered frrecoverahle
is now being paid back by the con-
Germs to which it was loaned. The