Seeing the present in the past

Last Dec. 10, in the wake of the death and destruction left by Supertyphoon “Yolanda,” Sen. Grace Poe filed Senate Resolution No. 413 calling on the government to consider electronic backup of important documents. Historians should be happy about this, and I can only hope that the resolution is taken seriously so that government documents will not just be preserved but also made accessible to the public.

As a historian, I have sifted through those thick volumes published by the Senate and the House of Representatives, these being the official record of their sessions and containing all the debates and documents that result in public laws. I have also dipped into the judiciary’s SCRA (or Supreme Court Reports Annotated) that record the discussions and votes on significant legal decisions. SCRA is available online, which is good, but nothing can beat the online Official Gazette published under the direction of Assistant Secretary Manuel Quezon III, which gives us the words and photos that document each working day of the President. It also has many historical features useful for students that are not part of the boring hardcopy edition of olden times. The online Official Gazette is a current, informative and handsome platform that should be the benchmark of all government websites. There should be a way to download these for future reference, too.

Three decades ago, historians had to physically visit libraries and archives to gather the materials for their work. In those days traffic was not so bad, and one could make a trip to Quezon City and Manila in one day, unlike today when reaching one point is already a challenge. Fortunately, many historical materials are now online, and if past and present government documents are systematically arranged, annotated and made available online, life will be better not just for historians but for the public as well.

The Malacañang Museum website is also an engaging place to visit; it makes texts and pictures available to students doing reports and teachers making PowerPoint presentations. I have been told that Malacañang has scanned all the old issues of the Official Gazette, so with proper indexing, cross-referencing, annotation and addition of supplementary documentation, we can form more complete pictures about our presidents instead of just accepting oversimplified biographies fed to us in school.

The documents are not yet available online but shortly before Christmas, I started reading the Annual Reports of the Governors General of the Philippine Islands from 1924. I hope to finish taking notes from all these before I return to Manila from Tokyo.

The first volume I read opened with a message from then US President Calvin Coolidge transmitting a report made by Governor-General Leonard Wood to the US Secretary of War on the events in the Philippines. Volumes were printed in Washington, D.C. as part of a transmittal of the report to the US Congress by the president of the United States. Wood’s 25-page summary is on the following areas:

• Political situation (“Nothing of particular importance has occurred… There has been little or no political activity or excitement in the islands during the year. Political issues are generally personal rather than based upon any important question affecting the wellbeing or progress of the people or the economic development of the islands.”)

• Public instruction (“The widespread and keen interest in education continues to be one of the most encouraging features of the Philippine situation. The people are deeply interested in the schools and contribute very liberally to their support. The schools are crowded to their utmost capacity throughout the islands, except in the Moro [Mohammedan] Provinces, where old prejudices and opposition on the Mohammedan parents to Christian Filipino teachers—especially men, as teachers for their girls—combined with lack of suitable Moro women teachers have served to keep school attendance down below what it should be.”)

• Public health (“Condition continues to improve … [but] one of the greatest handicaps … is lack of adequate doctors and nurses.”)

The rest of the report discusses the activities of the following: Department of the Interior, Department of Finance, Department of Justice, Agriculture and Natural Resources, Commerce and Communications, Government Personnel, Bureau of Audits, Legislation, American Guardians Association, Women’s Clubs, Bureau Directors and Attached Staff. All these may seem trivial and boring at the outset, but when you go through the

appendices of the report, you will find out a bit more about the political situation, like the suppression of unrest in Lanao, as well as “fanatical leaders” or the “colorum” who were active in parts of Surigao in 1923, that are not mentioned in our textbooks.

There is the List of Acts enacted by the Third Session of the Philippine Legislature mostly providing funds for the government, including “compensation in the sum of 4,000 pesos to Julian

Felipe, author of the Philippine National Anthem.” There are approved franchises for transport services, communications, and other utilities. Then there is a row involving the Insular Auditor, who questioned the standing appropriation of P1 million annually for the independence

commissions to the United States.

One can see from these reports the roots of why our politics is the way it is today.

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