Emilio Aguinaldo

Emilio Aguinaldo Famy
Portrait of General Emilio Aguinaldo in 1919
1st President of the Republic of the Philippines
In office March 22, 1897 – April 1, 1901
Preceded by	Captaincy General of the Philippines
Succeeded by	Miguel Malvar
Personal details
Born	March 22, 1869 Cavite, Captaincy General of the Philippines
Died	February 6, 1964 (aged 94) Manila, Philippines
Party	Katipunan
Spouse(s)	Hilaria del Rosario (1896–1921) María Agoncillo (1882–1963)
Children	Carmen, Emilio, María, Cristina, Miguel
Parent(s)	Trinidad Famy Carlos Aguinaldo
Occupation	Politician, military officer
Signature

Emilio Aguinaldo y Famy (Cavite, March 22, 1869 – Manila, February 6, 1964) was a Filipino general and politician, one of the leaders of his country's pro-independence movement.

Aguinaldo fought in the pro-independence war of 1898 against Spain, presided over the first government of the First Philippine Republic, which obtained little international recognition for fear of antagonizing the United States, and later fought in the conflict against the United States.

Biography

Childhood

Aguinaldo was born in the Province of Cavite, on the island of Luzon, in what was then the Spanish possession of the Philippines. He was the seventh of eight children of Carlos Aguinaldo and Trinidad Famy, members of an educated and well-to-do family.

As a young boy, Aguinaldo received basic education from his great-aunt and later attended the elementary school of his town. In 1880 he began his secondary education at the Colegio de San Juan de Letrán; however, after his father died during his third year of studies, he interrupted them to return to his town and help his mother manage the family's agricultural holdings.

At the age of 17, Aguinaldo was elected cabeza de barangay, that is, head of the barrio of Binakayan, the most progressive barrio of Cavite at the time; he would hold the post for eight years. Meanwhile, he devoted himself to maritime shipping, traveling widely and far from his homeland. In 1893 the so-called Maura Law reorganizing municipal governments came into force, under which the office of gobernadorcillo was converted into a municipal captaincy endowed with greater autonomy. On January 1, 1895, Aguinaldo was elected capitán municipal, the first in Cavite.

House of General Aguinaldo on the Cavite road.

Philippine Revolution

Main article: Philippine Revolution

In 1895, under the leadership of Andrés Bonifacio, the secret patriotic organization Katipunan was founded with the aim of expelling the Spanish colonial power and obtaining the independence of the Philippines. Aguinaldo joined the association with the rank of lieutenant, and within a few months rose to the rank of general thanks to his gifts of command. In 1896 the Katipunan succeeded in sparking the outbreak of the revolutionary war, during which Aguinaldo took part in several military engagements and managed to free his province from Spanish control; his success in them earned him such popularity among the revolutionaries that in the elections following the seizure of power he was elected President of the nascent Republic.

When Bonifacio learned of these events, he tried to challenge the election to ensure his own continuity in power. In the confrontation between Bonifacio's followers (the Magdiwang) and Aguinaldo's supporters (the Magdalo), Procopio, Bonifacio's brother, was wounded, and Bonifacio himself was captured along with his supporters. After a military trial, both brothers were sentenced to death for sedition on May 10, 1897, and were executed that same day in a forest near Cavite.

At that point, Aguinaldo took command of the Philippine insurrection, going on to constitute the first sovereign government of the Philippines and drafting its first constitution. On December 14, after months of negotiation with the Spanish Government, which had used its superiority in arms and numbers to recover from its initial defeats, the Pact of Biak-na-Bato was signed, in which peace was guaranteed on condition that Aguinaldo and 33 other insurgent leaders go into exile. The pact was ratified, and Aguinaldo went into exile in Hong Kong, where he used the 400,000 pesos paid as an indemnity by Spain to obtain weapons.

On May 19, 1898, he secretly returned to the Philippines and resumed hostilities. Counting this time on the support of the United States, which at that moment was fighting Spain in the Spanish–American War, the revolutionary army won victory without much difficulty and proclaimed the independence of the archipelago on June 12, 1898.

Meanwhile, the Spanish and the Americans were confronting each other in the Caribbean for control of Cuba. On the American side, Admiral George Dewey was sent to the archipelago to face the Spanish, who were under the command of Admiral Patricio Montojo, Marquis of Almenara, who, owing to a lack of forces and the age of the Spanish ships, lost the Philippines. In the Treaty of Paris, Spain ceded to the United States its territories of the Philippines, Guam, Puerto Rico and Cuba, causing surprise and anguish among the Filipinos, who instead of the planned independence found themselves subjected to a colonial power.

Later, when the journalist Guillermo Gómez Rivera asked Emilio Aguinaldo whether he regretted anything in his life, he declared:

Yes. I regret to a large extent having risen up against Spain, and that is why, when the funeral of King Alfonso of Spain was held in Manila, I presented myself at the cathedral, to the surprise of the Spanish. And they asked me why I had come to the funeral of the King of Spain against whom I had risen in rebellion… And I told them that he is still my King, because under Spain we were always Spanish subjects, or citizens, but that now, under the United States, we are merely a market of consumers for their exports, when not pariahs, because they have never made us citizens of any state of the United States… And the Spanish made way for me and treated me as their brother on that very significant day…

— December 16, 1958.

Philippine–American War

Main article: Philippine–American War

On January 23, 1899, the Constitution of the Philippine Republic was promulgated and Aguinaldo was named President.

Shortly afterward, on February 4, 1899, war broke out between Aguinaldo's government and the North American occupiers, after a Filipino soldier was killed by an American guard while crossing the San Juan Bridge. Aguinaldo led the Filipino troops against the superior forces of the occupiers. Despite successive defeats, he continued the fight in retreat, while falling back with his troops toward northern Luzon, the island where Baler was located, the place where a group of Spanish soldiers still remained besieged, presumably unaware of the new situation.

He was accused of killing General Antonio Luna on June 5, 1899, who was a brilliant strategist and a rival in the military hierarchy. However, these accusations were denied many years later, in an interview given in 1958 to a Filipino journalist, in which Emilio Aguinaldo disclaimed all responsibility for Luna's murder and attributed it to Masonic maneuvers by the North Americans, who were eager to eliminate any remnant of Spain in the Philippines, such as the Catholic religion, the Spanish language or the social organization of Castilian roots.

On March 23, 1901, he was captured by American forces in Palanan, Province of Isabela, thanks to the deceptions of General Frederick Funston, who feigned surrender. General Arthur MacArthur assumed responsibility, and acknowledged before the United States Senate Committee on the Philippines that he had used deception to capture Aguinaldo, justifying it as follows:

"It was one of the deceptions frequently practiced in war, and I assume any deception it entails".

However, MacArthur insisted before the Committee that feigning surrender to the enemy, in order to then attack him treacherously, did not violate the rules of civilized warfare.

Faced with the alternative of being summarily executed or renouncing military action and accepting American sovereignty, Aguinaldo gave in and signed the surrender on April 1, 1901, which put an end to the First Republic.

Macario Sakay, a veteran member of the Katipunan, then assumed command and established the Tagalog Republic in the mountains of Dimasalang (today the Province of Rizal), with Francisco Carreón as vice president. Sakay would later be captured, also through deceptions by the American governor, who had promised him an amnesty, and he ended up being hanged by the American forces on September 13, 1907.

American occupation

During the following years, Aguinaldo withdrew from political life, but lent support to pro-independence groups and organized the Association of Veterans of the Revolution to fund pensions for former combatants. In 1919, when the ban on the Philippine flag was revoked, he transformed his former home in Cavite into a monument to the flag; the monument, known as the Aguinaldo chapel, is still preserved today.

In the 1935 elections he ran for the presidency of the Philippine Commonwealth under American auspices, as a preparation for independence, but was defeated by Manuel Luis Quezón.

Japanese occupation in the Second World War

During the Japanese occupation, Aguinaldo collaborated with them to obtain popular support for the occupiers; he broadcast messages, speeches and radio statements urging the people to cooperate with the collaborationist government of President José P. Laurel, and addressed a request for surrender to General Douglas MacArthur "so as not to cause more harm to the Filipino youth."

For these actions Aguinaldo was accused of treason and collaboration with the enemy after the war, and was imprisoned in Bilibid prison, along with other collaborators. His defense argued that he had acted under coercion, and that the Japanese had threatened him and his family with death if he did not cooperate. In 1945 he was released by means of a general pardon issued by the new Philippine Government.

Postwar republican era

Once the war was over, Manuel Roxas was elected President of the new Republic. When he died of a stroke in the third year of his term, his vice president, Elpidio Quirino, took office.

In the following elections, Quirino triumphed over José P. Laurel and appointed Aguinaldo a member of the Council of State; in that post Aguinaldo secured great benefits for the veterans of the struggle for independence. He retired once again to private life at the end of the term, after the election of Ramón Magsaysay as President.

The following president, Diosdado Macapagal, declared June 12 as Philippine Independence Day, thus recognizing the efforts of the Filipino secessionists in their struggle first against the Spanish and afterward against the Americans. At the first celebration of June 12, Aguinaldo paraded, despite his frail health and advanced age, carrying a Philippine flag.

Emilio Aguinaldo died in Manila on February 6, 1964, at the age of 94, of a coronary thrombosis.

Decorations from Spain

The then regent of Spain, María Cristina of Habsburg-Lorraine, granted Aguinaldo the highest distinction of the Red Cross, as a sign of recognition for the proper treatment he gave the Spanish prisoners in the war for independence, and especially the so-called heroes of the Siege of Baler.

Bibliography

• J. M. Castillo Jiménez, El katipunan o el filibusterismo, Madrid, Imprenta del Asilo de Huérfanos de Jesús, 1897
• E. Reverter, La Insurrección de Filipinas, Barcelona, Alberto Martín, 1899
• F. Primo de Rivera, Memoria dirigida al Senado acerca de su gestión en Filipinas, Madrid, Imprenta y Litografía del Depósito de la Guerra, 1898
• M. Sastrón, La insurrección en Filipinas y Guerra Hispano-Americana, Madrid, 1901
• S. Gómez, La Guerra Hispano-Americana: Puerto Rico y Filipinas, Madrid, Imprenta del Cuerpo de Artillería, 1902
• M. Ponce, Cartas sobre la Revolución, Manila, Bureau, 1932
• A. Mabini, Memorias de la Revolución de Filipinas, Manila, Buró de la Imprenta Pública, 1960
• G. C. Borlaza, In the days of General Emilio Aguinaldo, Manila, Bureo, 1969
• R. Medina and T. Agoncillo, History of the Filipino People, Manila, 1990
• J. Celdrán, Instituciones hispanofilipinas del siglo xix, Madrid, Mapfre, 1994
• A. Castellanos, Filipinas, de la insurrección a la intervención de EE.UU., Madrid, Sílex, 1998
• L. E. Togores, El asedio de Manila (mayo-agosto 1898): Diario de los sucesos ocurridos durante la guerra de España con los Estados Unidos en 1898, Madrid, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1998.

External links

• CAUTUSAN: Gobierno Revolucionario nang Filipinas (ORDEN: Gobierno Revolucionario de las Filipinas) A decree dated January 2, 1899, signed by Emilio Aguinaldo, establishing a council of government. An online document published by Filipiniana.net. In English and Tagalog.
• Entrevista a Emilio Aguinaldo y a su señora, María Agoncillo, el 16 de diciembre de 1958 Semanario de Filipinas
• Entrevista con Emilio Aguinaldo, el 15 de Febrero de 1964 Semanario de Filipinas
• Reseña Veridica de la Revolución Filipina by Emilio Famy Aguinaldo
• Profile at the NNDB