Independence Missions (PAINT ME A PICTURE!

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Campaigns for independence had been present since 1906 but such efforts were halted with the
onset of World War I. New active independence missions were once again set to the United States
after the war in 1919. The two most notable, out of the twelve missions, were those led by then
Senate President Manuel L. Quezon in 1919 and the OsRox mission led by then Senate President Pro-
tempore Sergio Osmeña and Speaker of the Assembly Manuel Roxas in 1931. Quezon will soon
become the future President of the Commonwealth period and both Osmeña and Roxas as future
Presidents of the Philippines.

The missions sent to the US provided an amount of exposure to autonomy where Filipinos under
closed supervision by the American dreamt and made a definite commitment to freedom and
independence. The main purpose of these missions is to negotiate for and organize Philippine
independence. Three American groups were favorable to Philippine Independence – the American
farm group, American labor leaders and the isolationists. These three supported independences as
they saw their counterparts from the Philippines a competition to the economic opportunities
especially in terms of employment and security.

The Independence Missions which were sent almost annually from 1919 to 1933 to the United
States had significant influence on the final independence act of the Philippines. The OsRox Mission,
for example, resulted to the first U.S. law to decolonize the Philippines, the Hare-Hawes-Cutting Act.
This act states that at the end of a ten-year period, to be named as the Commonwealth period,
Philippine independence will be granted. Quezon worked with Tydings and McDuffie to have the
Hare-Hawes-Cutting Act reenacted. This will be otherwise known as the Tydings-McDuffie Act.

One of the main provisions of the Tydings-McDuffie Act was the organization of a convention that
would draft and finalize the constitution to be used by the Philippine government. In July 1934,
Filipinos elected around 200 delegates for the said convention with Senator Claro M. Recto as the
head. With the Tydings-McDuffie Act, the constitution would include a provision that Americans will
have the same civil rights as the Filipinos and the United States would have control over the foreign
affairs and currency of the Philippines before they leave. The constitution was finalized in February
1935 and was formally ratified through a plebiscite on May 14, 1935.
In Kasaysayan Series Vol VI (1998), Osmeña was quoted demanding independence from the United
States. He said, “The Filipino people aspire today as before taking up arms for the second time
against Spain, as thereafter in the din of arms and then in peace, for their National Independence.
The phrase ‘immediate independence’ engraved in the banner of the majority is not new, it had not
been invented only today, nor does it signify a new idea… it has been the slogan always, and
embodies and signifies the Filipino people’s true aspiration which has not suffered mutation nor
change, which has not even cooled, which has not been forgotten by the sons of the country for
even a moment through all the adversities suffered and all the vicissitudes that have arisen; it has
not been forgotten, no, this ideal has not dimmed, not even at the moment of taking the oath of
allegiance to the constituted government, because that allegiance does not repudiate our ideals and
because we believe that fidelity to America permits us to be true to our sacred desire for our
National Independence.”

Pledging loyalty to the mandate of the Filipino people, the campaign for independence purportedly
intensified the push that made national leaders assume the needed responsibility to this mission. A
great number of Filipino statesmen and legislators cemented their status in the political scene as
they attended Independence Commission meetings and trips to the U.S. and endeavored to sort out
and prepare the Philippines for independence and self-rule.