APOLINARIO MABINI: Political Ideologies

• Apolinario Mabini was born on July 23, 1864 in Talaga, Tanuan. Batangas. His parents are
Inocencio Leon Mabini and Dionisia Magpantay Maranan. He studied at the Dominican school
of San Juan de Letran and finished law at the University of Santo Tomas in 1894. He served as
the first prime minister and Secretary of Foreign Affairs of the First Philippine Republic from
January 2, 1899 to May 8, 1899. He also was appointed as the President of the Supreme Court.
Mabini acted as the chief adviser of President Emilio Aguinaldo in 1898. His influence was
evident in the proclamation changing the form of government of the Philippines from being a
Dictatorial Government to a Revolutionary Government. He also provided a simple
structure of government for the Philippines during the Second Phase of the Philippine
Revolution. He was the most constant defender of the Revolution and of Philippine
independence. He was also considered as the brain and conscience of the revolution.

• Apolinario Mabini understood the problems of the Filipinos under the Spanish colonial
government. In his article entitled “Mabini: Philospher of Citizenship,” Randy David believes
that Mabini wanted Filipinos to assert their rights as free citizens of a republic. In the attainment
of their objective, Mabini saw the need for political freedom geared toward the establishment
of self-government institutions.

• According to Mabini, genuine social renewal can only be achieved through radical
institutional and personal changes. Personal change meant an alteration of the way of
Filipinos think and live. Mabini believes that an “internal and external revolution” was
necessary in order to “establish a more solid basis for moral education and to foreswear the
vices that we have inherited from the Spaniards.” (David, 2015)

• Mabini, according to Majul, calls man as a creation of God who possesses certain inalienable
rights called natural rights. Man, Mabini asserts, “had the right to seek those means necessary
to maintain and perpetuate his life.” Men are by nature good and just and have the capacity to
unfold his goodness and sense of justice to others. In this context, freedom can only be
understood as doing what is good, just and reasonable. He said that true liberty is only for what
is good and never for what is evil; it is always in accordance with reason and the upright and
honest conscience of the individual.”

• Authority in society constitutes the government. According to Majul, Mabini believes that
society “should have a soul: authority. This authority need an intellect to guide and direct it:
 the legislative power. It also needs a will that is active and which shall make it work: the
executive. It needs a will that is active and which punishes those who are bad: the judicial
power. These powers should be independent of one another, in the sense that one should not
encroach upon the functions of the other; but the last should be subordinate to the first; in the
same manner that both will and conscience are subordinate to the intellect” (Majul, 2004, p.
199).

• Mabini believes that all divisions of the government were responsible to the people. Disruption
of harmony happens when there is usurpation of one branch of the government by another
branch. This brings about chaos in the body politic (Majul, 2004, p. 199). Mabini asserts that
government must guarantee to the citizens “the highest degree of personal security, the greatest
number of rights, the maximum satisfaction of economic wants, and the best possible
education.” In turn, Mabini states that citizens must be “law-abiding, obedient to authority,
virtuous, and eminently patriotic” (Majul, 2004, p. 200).

• Mabini did not live to see his 40th birthday. Yet in his short career, he had an outsize role in
shaping the revolutionary government and the future of the Philippines. The Museo ni
Apolinario Mabini in Tanauan, Philippines exhibits the life and deeds of Mabini. Mabini's face
has been on the Philippine 10-peso coin and bill. The Gawad Mabini is an honor given to
Filipinos for distinguished foreign service.