Advertisement

A BACK YARD INSURRECTION

Even though the wireless and the mail service are popularly supposed to bring all the world within a penny's reach of everybody, conditions at present in the Philippines are hardly more clear and definite to most Americans than those in Western Europe. That much rebellious unrest exists there is certain. If the Filipino has read his appear he should have found valuable precedents i Ireland India, Spain and Germany, and even Oklahoma. Perhaps armed and noisy brawls are contagious; and having become fevered there with, the people have taken General Wood as a good broad mark at which to let fly. Whatever may be the rights and wrongs of the matter, the Philippine Legislature appears to have asked for the Governor general's recall.

The history of the movement also is tolerably clear. The trouble arose over the interpretation of the Jones Insular Government Act. Manuel Querzon, at the head of an amalgamation of all the secret societies, wanted the executive made responsible to the Philippine legislature, not to this country. Perhaps the nature of the movement has since changed. At any rate the Philippine delegate to the United States has stated that the hostile legislature was opposed merely to the person of General Wood.

Although arrangements are not yet entirely certain, it seems probable that the same delegate, the official spokesman for the party now in power, will be got to speak at the Union tonight or tomorrow night. It Fortune favors the University, undergraduates will have an invaluable opportunity of learning at first hand what cannot be gleaned from the papers about the present situation and the rights and wrongs of it. Furthermore, Mr. Guavara will undoubtedly lay before his audience the case for Philippine Independence. The agitation for such independence began at the time of annexation and has increased ever since. If Mr. Guavara can be inveigled into paying Harvard a visit, he will certainly be assured of a large and interested audience.

Advertisement
Advertisement