and these were communicated to Congress by the message of the Presi dent dated February 25, 1901, and are printed in Senate Doc. 190, Fifty-sixth Congress, second session.

I now transmit copies of all the enactmerts of the commission, numbers 1 to 263, inclusive, covering the period ending on the 11th of October, 1901, and, for convenience, including those previously

sent.

The presentation of this report to Congress will thus put the National Legislature in possession of the entire body of legislative acts under which civil government in the Philippine Islands is proceeding, consisting of 263 statutes.

A brief account of the growth and general character of the present government of the Philippines may be of service in considering these

enactments.

In March, 1900, the insurgent government and the organized forces supporting it had been dispersed. The principal cities and the greater part of the country were in possession of the American forces, subject to forcible interference only by the numerous guerrilla bands which were scattered through the mountains, and considerable portions of the territory were held in apparently peaceable possession. The government was a government of military occupation, and the civil laws were being administered under the direction of military officers. All laws were subject to be amended, repealed, or overruled by the order of the military commander, which was, as must always be the case in such governments, the supreme law. Such a government is always unsatisfactory in its character, and while the conditions in many large parts of the archipelago rendered its continuance necessary, the people of the pacified provinces were eager for the resumption of peaceable conditions under a government regulated by formal and public laws which should supersede the necessarily arbitrary orders of the military commander. The first Philippine Commission, of which Mr. Schurman was chairman, had urged the early establishment of civil government, and it was manifestly desirable that as soon as possible those parts of the Filipino people who had turned to paths of peace should be relieved so far as practicable from the prejudicial effects of purely military methods.

The sole power, however, which the President was exercising in the Philippine Islands was a military power derived from his authority under the constitution as Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy.

The question presented was how, in the exercise of the President's military power under the Constitution, to give the peaceful people of the Philippines the real benefits of civil government. The question was answered by an analysis of the military power, which when exercised in a territory under military occupation includes executive, judicial, and legislative authority. It not infrequently happens that in a single order of a military commander can be found the exercise of all three of these different powers--the exercise of legislative power by provisions prescribing a rule of action, of judicial power by determinations of right, and of executive power by the enforcement of the rules prescribed and the rights determined. It is indeed the combination of all these powers in a single individual which constitutes the chief objection to any unnecessary continuance of military government. It was accordingly determined that as the fundamental step in giving the substance of civil government to the people of the Philippines there should be a separation of these powers so that the executive, the legislative, and the judicial powers should be exercised by different persons throughout the pacified territory; and as it is well settled that the military authority of the President in occupied territory may be exercised through civil agents as well as military officers, it was determined that that part of the military power which was legislative in its character should be exercised by civil agents proceeding in accordance with legislative forms, while the judicial power should be exercised by courts established and regulated by the enactments of the legislative authority. The President accordingly, on the 16th of March, 1900, appointed the second Philippine Commission of five members, with Judge Taft as its president, and vested in them authority to exercise such legislative authority, subject to the approval and control of the Secretary of War, leaving in the military commanders the executive authority (except certain specific powers of appointment not important to notice here), and vesting judicial authority in the courts to be established through the legislative action of the commission.

On the 7th of April, 1900, formal written instructions were given to the commission, which defined their powers and formulated the policy which was to be followed in the gradual development and conduct of civil government in the Philippines. A copy of this instrument is annexed to my annual report of November 30, 1900, and it was set forth in full in President McKinley's message to Congress on the 3d of December, 1900. It remains the guide and rule of action of the

insular government, and all the steps taken in the government of the Philippines since that time have been in conformity to its provisions. Legislative power. The scope of the authority conferred upon the commission was declared in the following words:

Exercise of this legislative authority will include the making of rules and orders, having the effect of law, for the raising of revenue by taxes, customs, duties, and imposts; the appropriation and expenditure of public funds of the islands; the establishment of an educational system throughout the islands; the establishment of a system to secure an efficient civil service; the organization and establishment of courts; the organization and establishment of municipal and departmental governments, and all other matters of a civil nature for which the military governor is now competent to provide by rules or orders of a legislative character.

With due allowance for the time necessary to reach their destination and become familiar with the conditions, the commission was directed to commence the performance of its duties on the 1st of September, 1900; and ever since that time, with the addition to its numbers which will be hereafter stated, that body has acted as the local legislature of the Philippine Islands. While the President vested and could vest in it no greater legislative authority than the military commander previously had, it has exercised that authority in accordance with legislative forms. Its sessions have been stated and public. Its legislative enactments have been publicly introduced and printed in the form of bills. When of general public interest they have been made the subject of public hearings before committees, which the people of the islands have freely attended and at which their views have been freely expressed. The ordinary legislative opportunities for amendment have been afforded, and finally the amendments and the bills have been publicly debated and voted upon, and the bills passed have become in effect statutes, subject to the approval of the Secretary of War, which has not in any case been withheld.

The statutes thus enacted have become the law of the land in the Philippines, and bear the same relation to governmental action and private rights in the archipelago that the statutes enacted by the Congress and the State legislatures in the United States bear within the territory for which they are enacted. Under this system the Philippine Islands have had the practical advantages of having the legislative separated from the executive authority; of having laws matured under the influence of public discussion and deliberation; of having the laws, when adopted, certain, permanent, and known; and of having the moneys of the insular government expended only

pursuant to previous appropriations made by law, so that official accountability could be enforced by a rigid system of audit, testing the accounts of all disbursing officers from the lowest to the highest by reference to a fixed standard of lawful authority. I have no question that the substitution of this method for the orders of a single military commander, however competent, has been of the greatest value. I invite the attention of Congress to the 263 statutes now set before them, with the hope that the work of the commission will receive the approval which I believe it merits for its high quality of constructive ability, its wise adaptation to the ends desirable to be accomplished, and its faithful adherence to the principles controlling our own Government.

It should be observed that these statutes are not mere expressions of theoretical views as to how the Philippines ought to be governed, but are the practical treatment of carefully studied conditions. Many of the most important are not the beginnings but the results of patient experiment the outcome and improvement of successive military orders dealing with the same subjects.

Spooner amendment.-In the act making appropriation for the support of the Army for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1902, approved March 2, 1901, Congress enacted the following provision (commonly known as the Spooner amendment):

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 interest 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.

These provisions were immediately communicated to the commission by cable, with the following direction:

Until further orders government will continue under existing instructions and orders.

Conditions and policy. The conditions at that time did not permit, nor, great as has been the improvement, do they now permit, the abandonment of military government throughout the archipelago. In the more unsettled portions of the islands the restrictive and punitive force of purely civil administration would as yet be quite inadequate to the maintenance of order, even if the creation of a civil-service personnel were already accomplished. The work of securing the great number of competent and faithful civil agents necessary for the administration of government is necessarily slow, even in thoroughly pacified territory. It requires that the appointing power should become familiar with great numbers of the natives, and should learn both who are competent and who are to be trusted-a necessarily gradual process.

The policy contemplated in the instructions of April 7, and followed by the War Department, has been to steadily press forward, as rapidly as it could be done safely and thoroughly, the gradual substitution of government through civil agents for government through military agents, so that the administration of the military officer shall be continually narrowed, and that of the civil officer continually enlarged, until the time comes when the Army can, without imperiling the peace and order of the country, be relegated to the same relation toward government which it occupies in the United States. In this way we have avoided the premature abandonment of any power necessary to enforce the authority of the United States, and at the same time have held open to the people of every community the opportunity to escape from the stringency of military rule by uniting with us in effective measures to bring about peaceful conditions in the territory which they inhabit.

Municipal governments.-The first duty charged upon the commission by the instructions of April 7 was "the establishment of municipal governments, in which the natives of the islands, both in the cities and in the rural communities, shall be afforded the opportu