Girl Power: The Women of Malolos

Posted on September 4, 2012

GIRL POWER: THE WOMEN OF MALOLOS

By: Quennie Ann J. Palafox

When the Spaniards came into the Philippines, they brought with them their
patriarchal values about women which eventually diffused into Philippine culture.
The women during the Spanish period were tied to the house and their roles were
confined exclusively to housekeeping and child rearing. On the other hand, there
was the chivalrous idea that men should be the provider of the family and protector
of the women. Women were also taught to be compliant to elders and always
submissive to males. They were oriented to remain incorruptible until marriage and
to focus on building skills that would make them good daughters, housewives,
mothers and servants of God. Women were even barred from participating in political
undertakings because it was considered a man’s work. Filipinos were familiarized to
a religious and patriarchal system of education which emphasized the domestic value
that women were the property of men. This infiltration of Spanish culture into
Philippine norms and behavior is an evidence of feudal social relations.

In the second half of the nineteenth century, a group of young women in

Malolos, Bulacan participated in a peaceful movement for educational reforms. This
remarkable event showed the aptitude of these women for political and social
reforms. The authorities came up with educational policies that were discriminatory
against women who wanted to pursue higher education. The women of Malolos struggled
to disprove the principle that women are destined to be homemakers and demonstrate
that women are at par with men in other fields of endeavors.

The effort of the Women of Malolos is recognized as one of the most

important events that contributed to the development of feminist movement in the
country. This group of young women personally handed their letter of petition
addressed to Governor-General Valeriano Weyler to allow them to put up a night
school where they can study the Spanish language under Teodoro Sandiko. Their
action received diverse reactions from the pro-friar sectors and the reformists
because it was viewed as protest against the political power of the friars. The
twenty young women, majority of whom were related to each other by blood or
affinity, were members of the four major-Sangley clans of Malolos: the Tiongsons,
the Tantocos, the Reyeses, and the Santoses. Although these women were raised by
well-to-do families and enjoyed a life of luxury, they opted to be educated rather
than to be contented with what society expected from them.

Prior to the education reform of 1863, education was left entirely in the
hands of priests or curates of the parish. Since the responsibility of educating
the natives belonged to the friars, its thrust was more of religious education.
Students were taught to read the alphabet and syllables; and study sacred songs and
music, and basic arithmetic. Education for females was not the same with males.
Education was more of a privilege than a right, daughters of well-to-do families
were taught reading, writing, arithmetic, religion and needlecraft, a benefit not
enjoyed by daughters of Indios. Formal training beyond the primary grades was
generally a male privilege. For the most part of the Spanish period, the majority
of secondary and vocational schools as well as colleges were exclusively for males.

The Royal Decree of 1863 made primary instruction compulsory to all native
and Chinese children between the ages of seven and twelve. It ordered that opening
of a primary school for boys and another for girls for each town. One important aim
of the decree was to teach Spanish to the populace. Although this move was to
improve the poor state of education in the country, it failed due to the meddling
of the friars in the state affairs. Lack of school buildings and teachers were also
pointed as major hindrances for this program to be successful. There were only few
teachers who knew Spanish but they received only modest salaries.

The Women of Malolos desired to learn the Spanish language because it was
the language of politics and society. They found an ally in the person of Teodoro
Sandiko who arrived in Malolos in 1888. Sandiko supported the aspirations of the
women and offered to teach them the language but it would be done secretly. For the
friars prohibited the teaching of Spanish to the natives and to the mestizos as it
would lessen their influence. The government communicated directly with the friars
who knew both the Spanish and the native language. To the friars, it would be
better off the leave the natives and mestizos ignorant of the Spanish language so
that their minds will not be penetrated by the liberal ideas since most books were
written in Spanish. Gaining knowledge would make them crave for freedom and demand
to human rights which were deemed a threat to Spanish rule and the power of the
Church.

Sandiko by that time was secretly teaching Spanish language to adults but
he wanted to make it legal. He requested to the provincial governor of Bulacan
sometime to grant the opening of night schools without the expense of the
government. However, it was disapproved because Felipe Garcia, the friar curate of
Malolos prepared a report that Sandiko’s proposal would pose a threat to the
government. Although their proposal was rejected, Sandiko and the Women of Malolos
remained positive that their desire to put up a night school would be approved
anytime soon.

After learning that the highest official of the land would visit Malolos on
December 12, 1888, Sandico prepared a letter in Spanish, and requested the women to
sign and present the letter to Weyler. Twenty of these women affixed their
signatures to the letter. The women went to the church and presented the letter to
the governor-general.

The request of the women did not get the approval of the governor-general
because the parish priest Fray Garcia went up against it. Although disheartened,
the women did not give up. With the support of the reformist Doroteo Cortes and the
Maestra Guadalupe Reyes, the women continued to lobby for the school, traveling
between Malolos and Manila to convince the governor-general to allow their request.
Luckily, these young women triumphed in the end in February 1889 on the conditions
that the women would finance their schooling, the teacher would be Guadalupe Reyes,
and, the classes held in the daytime, not at night.

Although they did not get everything they asked for, the women proceeded to
open their school at the house of one of their group, Rufina T. Reyes, first cousin
of Elisea and Juana. The schooling however, was cut short when Sandico, was accused
in late April 1889 by the Church authorities of spreading teachings against
morality and of eating meat on days of abstinence during the Holy Week of 1889. On
May 13, 1889, the Gobernadorcillo Castro and the Alferez Carlos Peñuelos closed
down Sandico’s school of primary and secondary instruction. When Sandico left for
Spain, the school where the Women of Malolos were attending had to close because of
the pressure from the authorities. The school operated for only three months.

The establishment of a school out of the enduring efforts of the women to be

educated in Spanish was commended by several newspapers. Graciano Lopez Jaena in
the column Ecos de Ultramar, praised the women because of their courage to present
themselves to the governor-general, an action considered bold that time.

Right after the article of Lopez Jaena was published in La Solidaridad,

Marcelo H. del Pilar wrote from Barcelona to Jose Rizal in Madrid, on February 17,
1889, requesting Rizal to write them a letter in Tagalog commending the bravery of
the women and with hopes that this valiant struggle against friar hegemony in the
affairs of the Filipinos will enthuse all compatriots. Hence, Rizal sent del Pilar
on February 22, 1889 the letter written in Tagalog for transmittal to the 20 young
women of Malolos.

The message conveyed to the young women of Malolos centered on salient

points such as the denunciation of the abuse of the friars in exercising their
spiritual authority bestowed upon them by the church, traits Filipino mothers must
have; duties and obligations of Filipino mothers to their children, functions and
errands of a wife to her husband, and guidance to young women on their choice of a
lifetime partner. Rizal also expressed his philosophy of freedom and independence
that he believed was the key to the emancipation of humankind from slavery, and the
necessity for education as the fundamental source of liberation. In the letter,
Rizal enunciated his great desire for Filipino women to enjoy the privileges in
education along with men. Moreover, he appealed to women to be heedful of their
rights and not to be docile towards many injustices forced upon them. Men and women
are born equal. God did not create men and women to be slaves, nor did he embellish
them with reason only to be blinded by others.

Perhaps having experienced firsthand the warmth of his mother’s love, he

defined in his letter the obligations and roles of the Filipino mothers to their
children. For Rizal, the youth is a flower-bed that is to bear fruit and must
accumulate wealth for its descendants. The mother must raise her children according
to the image of God and orient the mind towards pleasant ideas. A mother must teach
her children to prefer death with honor to life with dishonor. Mothers should
inculcate the following values to their children: love of honor; sincere and firm
character; clear mind; clear conduct; noble action; love for one’s fellowmen; and
respect for God. Ever patriotic in his views, he warned that the country will never
be free and flourishing as long as the children and the women remain ignorant. With
this, the education of the children should not be limited to religious activities.
He stressed obedience and reason as the highest virtues that one must possess.

The school of the Women of Malolos was closed down in May 1889 but their
aspirations did not end. These women served their countrymen by supporting the
cause of the Revolution against Spain. Some of them became members of the National
Red Cross, while others became founding members of the Malolos Committee of the
Asociacion Feminista de Filipinas in 1906, a national women’s organization aimed
improving the welfare of women in all classes. It can be said that the women of
Malolos were the forerunners of the feminist movement in the country for
championing the cause of women’s right to education and equal rights regardless of
gender.
References:
Tiongson, Nicanor. The Women of Malolos. Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila Unibersity
Press, 2004
Women’s Role in Philippine History: Selected Essays Second Edition. Quezon City:
University Center for Women’s Studies University of the Philippines, 2001
On February 22, 1889, national hero Dr. Jose Rizal wrote a letter to a group of
young women of Malolos supporting their plan of putting up a night school.

Dr. Jose P. RizalPinterest

(Dr. Jose P. Rizal)
The so-called Women of Malolos comprised of 20 women from prominent Chinese-
Filipino families in Malolos, Bulacan who signed and presented a letter to
Governor- General Valeriano Weyler on December 12, 1888, requesting permission to
open a night school where they could be taught the Spanish language.

The Spanish parish priest, Fr. Felipe Garcia, objected so that the Governor-General
turned down the petition. However, the young women, in defiance of the friar's
wrath, bravely continued their agitation for establishment of the school, a thing
unheard of in the Philippines in those times.

They finally succeeded in obtaining government approval for their project on

condition that Señorita Guadalupe Reyes should be their teacher, and that the
classes be held in the day-time and not at night. The incident caused a great stir
in the Philippines and in far-away Spain. Marcelo H. Del Pilar, writing in
Barcelona on February 17, 1889, requested Dr. Rizal to send a letter in Tagalog to
the brave women of Malolos.

Although busy in London annotating Morga's book, penned his famous very long letter
and sent it to Del Pilar on February 22, 1889 for transmittal to Malolos.

Part of this letter reads:

I do not expect to be believed simply because it is I who am saying this; there are
many people who do not listen to reason, but will listen only to those who wear the
cassock or have gray hair or no teeth; but while it is true that the aged should be
venerated, because of their travails and experience, yet the life I have lived,
consecrated to the happiness of the people, adds some years, though not many, to my
age. I do not pretend to be looked upon as an idol or fetish and to be believed and
listened to with the eyes closed, the head bowed, and the arms crossed over the
breast; what I ask of all is to reflect on what I tell them, think it over and sift
it carefully through the sieve of reason.

First of all. That the tyranny of some is possible only through cowardice and
negligence on the part of others.
Second. What makes one contemptible is lack of dignity and object fear of him who
holds one in contempt.
Third. Ignorance is servitude, because as a man thinks, so he is; a man who does
not think for himself lacks personality; the blind man who allows himself to be
guided by the thought of another is like the beast led by a halter.
Fourth. He who loves his independence must first aid his fellow man, because he who
refuses protection to others will find himself without it; the isolated rib of the
buri palm is easily broken, but not so the broom made of the ribs of the palm bound
together.
Fifth. If the Filipino will not change her mode of being, let her rear no more
children, let her merely give birth to them. She must cease to be the mistress of
the home, otherwise she will unconsciously betray husband, child, native land, and
all.
Sixth. All men are born equal, naked, without bonds. God did not create man to be a
slave; nor did he endow him with intelligence to have him hoodwinked, or adorn him
with reason to have him deceived by others. It is not fatuous to refuse to worship
one's equal, to cultivate one's intellect, and to make use of reason in all things.
Fatuous is he who makes a god of him who makes brutes of others, and who strives to
submit to his whims all that is reasonable and just.
Seventh. Consider well what kind of religion they are teaching you. See whether it
is the will of God or according to the teachings of Christ that the poor be
succored and those who suffer alleviated. Consider what they are preaching to you,
the object of the sermon, what is behind the masses, novenas, rosaries,
scapularies, images, miracles, candles, belts, etc., etc., which they daily keep
before your minds, ears, and eyes, jostling, shouting, and waxing; investigate
whence they came and whither they go, and then compare that religion with the pure
religion of Christ and see whether that pretended observance of the life of Christ
does not remind you of the fat milk cow or the fattened pig, which is encouraged to
grow fat not through love of the animal, but for grossly mercenary motives.
Let us therefore reflect; let us consider our situation and see how we stand. May
these poorly written lines aid you in your good purpose and help you to pursue the
plan you have initiated. "My profit will be greater than the capital invested"; and
I shall gladly accept the usual reward of all who dare tell our people the truth.
May your desire to educate yourself be crowned with success; may you in the garden
of learning gather not bitter, but choice fruit, looking well before you eat,
because on the surface of the globe all is deceit and often the enemy sows weeds in
your seeding-plot.