The Philippines is a unique nation in Southeast Asia that experienced a change of colonial masters from Spain to the United States through the Philippine Revolution (1896–98) and the Philippine–American War (1899–1902). With this peculiar historical experience at the turn of the twentieth century, we are tempted to divide its modern history sharply between its two colonial rules, though the Philippines continuously underwent dynamic political and socioeconomic structural changes throughout both periods. Anastacio's Foundation of the modern Philippine state is one of the must-read books to understand the emergence and formation of the American colonial state in the Philippine Islands, showing the continuity of its history from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth centuries.
It is widely known that American colonial policy in the Philippines was first and best expressed by President McKinley's ‘Benevolent Assimilation’ proclamation issued in December 1898. To pursue the principles of colonial rule as enunciated by McKinley, one important agenda that the United States needed to tackle was the establishment of an autonomous political and legislative system in the Philippines. Most previous studies on Philippine history have discussed the nature and characteristics of political relations between American colonists and the Filipino elite under the terms of ‘compadre colonialism’ or ‘colonial democracy’.
While acknowledging previous research, Anastacio's major concern is to depict the contradictory ‘story of American constitutional colonialism in the Philippines Islands’ (p. 13). In so doing Anastacio goes beyond the previous thesis that the ‘American liberal constitutional export is fundamentally sound and to attribute difficulties in its implementation abroad to individual or cultural shortcomings’ (p. 12). This book covers the period from 1898 to 1935, which can be subdivided as follows; US military rule for pacification (1898–1900); the three civilian administrations of the Taft era (1901–13), the Harrison era (1913–21) and the Wood era (1921–27); and preparation for the Commonwealth government (1927–35).
Chapter 1 traces the nature of benevolent imperialism as the rational programme for US colonial policy in the Philippines. The next four chapters deal with the Taft era. Chapters 2 and 3 discuss how the United States built up its colonial foundation, keeping the Filipino elite under tight control. Chapter 4 explains the inevitable introduction of a surveillance system into the colonial state as one of the ‘imperatives of legitimacy’, and chapter 5 portrays the limitations of America's civilising colonialism, such as education for democracy or practical liberty.
Chapters 6, 7 and 8 illustrate the Harrison era as a time of turmoil. While chapter 6 reviews the colonial democracy and the rise of the Philippines, chapters 7 and 8 give us fresh insights on the Council of State and the Board of Control, two distinctive organs which strengthened the power of two eminent Filipino politicians, House Speaker Osmeña and Senate President Quezon (who directly confronted Governor-General Harrison). Chapters 9 and 10 show us the restoration of colonial control under the powerful commitment of Governor Wood that later led to the smooth transition to the Commonwealth government in 1935 as shown in chapter 11.
The strength and uniqueness of this book is in its deep analysis of the Council of State and the Board of Control by meticulous research using primary resources. Anastacio first traces the origin of the Council of State in the Malolos Constitution, drafted during the Philippine Revolution. In this sense the book shows the continuity of the Philippine legislative system from the time of the Philippine Revolution to the American period. Second, the author extensively discusses the roles and functions of the Board of Control and the Council of State, both of which emerged in 1918; but the former was abolished in 1927 after the Cabinet Crisis of 1923, while the latter changed in function under Governor-General Stimson.
As the book explains, ‘the 1920s saw great changes’, ‘not only in American colonial personnel and policies, but also in Filipino leadership and strategies’ (p. 195). It was through this political and legislative turmoil that Quezon consolidated his power over Osmeña and controlled the ruling Nationalista Party under American rule. Indeed, ‘Philippine constitutional autocracy is as much American as it is Filipino’ (p. 4). In this book Anastacio vigorously discloses the distinctive transformation of Filipino society under American rule by analysing its legal development and successfully lays the foundation for a legal historiography of the Philippines.
