page_title: History of the Philippines (1898–1946)
section_title: Spanish–American War ends
hierarchical_section_title: History of the Philippines (1898–1946) / Spanish–American War (1898) / Spanish–American War ends
caption_attribution_description: Felipe Agoncillo, a Filipino diplomat
context_page_description: The history of the Philippines from 1898 to 1946 describes the period of the American colonization of the Philippines. It began with the outbreak of the Spanish–American War in April 1898, when the Philippines was still a colony of the Spanish East Indies, and concluded when the United States formally recognized the independence of the Republic of the Philippines on July 4, 1946.
  With the signing of the Treaty of Paris on December 10, 1898, Spain ceded the Philippines to the United States, thereby beginning the era of American colonization. The interim U.S. military government of the Philippine Islands experienced a period of great political turbulence, characterised by the Philippine–American War.
  Beginning in 1901, the military government was replaced by a civilian government—the Insular Government of the Philippine Islands—with William Howard Taft serving as its first Governor-General. Also, a series of insurgent governments that lacked significant international and diplomatic recognition existed between 1898 and 1904.
  Following the passage of the Philippine Independence Act in 1934, a Philippine presidential election was held in 1935. Manuel L.
context_section_description: Article V of the peace protocol signed on August 12 had mandated negotiations to conclude a treaty of peace to begin in Paris not later than October 1, 1898. President McKinley sent a five-man commission, initially instructed to demand no more than Luzon, Guam, and Puerto Rico; which would have provided a limited U.S. empire of pinpoint colonies to support a global fleet and provide communication links. In Paris, the commission was besieged with advice, particularly from American generals and European diplomats, to demand the entire Philippine archipelago. The unanimous recommendation was that "it would certainly be cheaper and more humane to take the entire Philippines than to keep only part of it." On October 28, 1898, McKinley wired the commission that "cessation of Luzon alone, leaving the rest of the islands subject to Spanish rule, or to be the subject of future contention, cannot be justified on political, commercial, or humanitarian grounds. The cessation must be the whole archipeligo or none. The latter is wholly inadmissible, and the former must therefore be required." The Spanish negotiators were furious over the "immodist demands of a conqueror", but their wounded pride was assuaged by an offer of twenty million dollars for "Spanish improvements" to the islands. The Spaniards capitulated, and on December 10, 1898, the U.S. and Spain signed the Treaty of Paris, formally ending the Spanish–American War. In Article III, Spain ceded the Philippine archipelago to the United States, as follows: "Spain cedes to the United States the archipelago known as the Philippine Islands, and comprehending the islands lying within the following line: [... geographic description elided ...]. The United States will pay to Spain the sum of twenty million dollars ($20,000,000) within three months after the exchange of the ratifications of the present treaty."
  In the U.S., there was a movement for Philippine independence; some said that the U.S. had no right to a land where many of the people wanted self-government. In 1898 Andrew Carnegie, an industrialist and steel magnate, offered to pay the U.S. government $20 million to give the Philippines its independence.
  On November 7, 1900, Spain and the U.S. signed the Treaty of Washington, clarifying that the territories relinquished by Spain to the United States included any and all islands belonging to the Philippine Archipelago, but lying outside the lines described in the Treaty of Paris. That treaty explicitly named the islands of Cagayan Sulu and Sibutu and their dependencies as among the relinquished territories.
caption: Felipe Agoncillo was the Filipino representative to the negotiations in Paris that led to the Treaty of Paris (1898), ending the Spanish–American War. He has been referred to as the "outstanding first Filipino diplomat."
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