PHILIPPINE CARTOON'S

GROUP 8
VEDAD, KAYE ANTHONETTE A.
PLANDANIO, OLGA
JEEWANI FERNANDO
EDU 1Y1-2
Dr Alfred W. McCoy

 is professor of SE Asian History at

the University of Wisconsin at
Madison where he also serves as
director of the Center for SE Asian
Studies, a federally-funded
National Resource Center.

 He's spent the past quarter-

century writing about the politics &
history of the opium trade.

 Born in United States (June 8,

1945)

 Notable works: The Politics of

Heroin in Southeast Asia (1972)
ALEJANDRO R. ROCES
 McCkoy , Alfred and Alejandrino Roces
Political Caricatures of the American Era

MANILA, JUNE 9, 1917

I s the Police Forced Bribed?

The Independent, 9 June 1917 ( Dibujo de Fernando Amorsolo)

Esta La Policia Sabornada?

  Despite the Free Press retreat, VICENTE
 Thiscartoon depicts THE 1ST OF SOTTO’S Independent insisted, in this
MANILA PERIODIC POLICE editorial cartoon, that Chua’s Charges were
SCANDAL. accurate. Such allegations of police
corruption in gambling law enforcement
were a constant theme in cartoons
 In 1917 a mysterious informant named throughout the American Period.
PEDRO CHUA wrote the Philippines
 The cartoonist FERNANDO AMORSOLO,
Free Press alleging that senior police gives illustration his usual racist edge. While
were accepting bribes from Chinese the corrupt Filipino policeman is shown with
gambling houses in Binondo and normal features, the Chinese are caricatured
Quiapo districts. Demonstrating the as emaciated, leering creatures more rodent
power of Manila’s leading weekly than human.
newspaper publication of Chua’s letter
sparkled allegations that led eventually
 Although Amorsolo was more extreme than
to “the suicide of police chief”. the most, cartoonists often showed Chinese
corruptions or opium smugglers in similarly
in a racist manner.
 The cartoon’s caption,
“New Bird of Prey,” is an allusion
to the most famous libel case in
the history of Philippine
journalism. In 1908 the
nationalist weekly El
Renacimiento published an
editorial titled Aves de Rapina
(birds of prey) which attacked the
Philippine Commission’s
Secretary of the Interior, dean C.
Worcester, for abusing his office
to exploit the country. Worcester
sued for libel and, two years
later, won a judgment of
P60,000 against El
Renacimiento, a collosal sum
that forced closure of the paper
and sale of its assets.
 LIKE MANY NATIONALISTS of his day,
Vicente Sotto, the publisher of The
Independent, never missed a chance to attack
the Catholic Church. The editorial below this
cartoon urged the government to confiscate
the large priest’s residence attached to Santa
Cruz parish church. The people should not be
made to share the painful congestion of Plaza
GOITI and Plaza Santa Cruz while a single
priest sits midst a sprawling residence.

 The question of Church property was a

particularly sensitive one for nationalists. In
1906 the Philippine Supreme Court had ruled
that the Roman Catholic Church was the legal
owner of all disputed properties, thus
stripping the nationalistic Aglipayan Church
of the parish churches it had occupied right
after the revolution. Following this decision,
the Aglipayan Church went into decline and
nationalists remained embittered over the
issue.
 BUILT ON A SWAMP and ringed with streams and ponds
Manila is a natural ground for malarial mosquitos. During
the 19th century, Spanish public health procedures were
grossly inadequate to the imperatives of Manila’s site, and
the Americans found the city a cesspool of ill health when
they occupied it in 1898.

 With their experience in tropical

health gained in the Garribean,
Americans made major advances
in epidemic disease control
during the first decade of their
rule.
 Through an arbitrary application
of public health regulations, the
Board of Health brought tropical
disease- malaria, small pox,
cholera and plague- under
control. During the cholera
epidemic of 1902-04, for
example, 4,386 people died in
Manila, a mild toll compared to
previous outbreaks in the late
19th century. Subsequent
outbreaks in the 1905-06 were
contained and by 1911 the disease
had been eradicated.
THE PHILIPPINE ASEMBLY PASSED a law authorizing all legislators, active or retired to build firearms.
The Manila was outraged, but the legislators ignored the opposition and promulgated the law over the
screams of protest.

 In its mocking editorial of February

1921, the Free Press commented:
“Now, with our legislators and officials
able to strut around with a gun or two
guns strapped but their manly waists,
they will have to be respected.
 ANGERED BY TWO RECENT road
accident, the Free Press denounces the
proliferation of illegal taxis called
COLORUM. Instead of paying the public
utility fee the license a legal taxi cab,
automobile owners were registering taxis
as private vehicles and leasing them to
irresponsible drivers. With an estimated
300 colorum cab operating in Manila, fatal
accidents were on the rise.
 AS THE FREE PRESS BEGAN to
despair over the quality of Manila's
government, its cartoon grew
increasingly sharp thought the
1930’s. While Governor- General
Dwight F. Davis cruises the Pacific
and Vice Governor George C.Butte
vacation in Baguio, Manila sinks
into miasma of corruption, vise and
mismanagement
 When Manila emerged as the
National Center for University
Education during the 1920’s,
the annual March ritual of the
city- wise student returning
home to his village was played
out in barrios across in
archipelago. Although
graduation and tertiary degree
often allowed a villager to leave
a barrio for a city civil service
post, while still a student he has
to return to the village of
summer holidays.