San José was one of the oldest institutions in the Islands; it was founded, as a matter of fact, in 1601, by virtue of a legacy left by a Spanish Provincial Governor named Figueroa who provided that it should always be managed by the head of the Jesuits in the Islands. It was originally a college for the education of Spanish boys, but through various vicissitudes, including the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1766, it had changed from one thing to another until, finally, it had become a college of physicians and pharmacists and was made a department of the University of Santo Tomas, the Rector of which was a Dominican Friar. One of the Philips had granted to the college a Royal charter, and within the last hundred years the Crown had asserted its right of control. So when the American government took over all the public property in the Philippines, General Otis closed San José, but he did not issue an order as to its management. The Church was petitioning for a restitution of what it regarded as its rights in the property, and the Commission was called upon to settle the controversy.
They conducted their examinations in open meetings so that all might see the full and free workings of a wholly equitable system, and the Filipinos were enabled to behold, for the first time, the, to them, astonishing spectacle of high ecclesiastics presenting in open court the arguments upon which they based their claims.
The first hearing Mr. Taft describes as “an historic scene.”
“There were the two Archbishops in their archiepiscopal cassocks,” he writes, “with purple girdles and diamond crosses, accompanied by a Secretary of the Dominican order robed in white; while opposed was a Filipino lawyer, Don Felipe Calderón, who derived his education in the University of Santo Tomas. Accompanying him were a lot of young Filipino students and others of the Medical Association interested in wresting San José from the University. The Archbishop of Manila made a speech in which he was unable to restrain the feeling of evident pain that he had in finding the rights of the Church challenged in this Catholic country. He made a very dignified appearance.”
And at the second hearing:
“Both Archbishops were again present, and the same scene was reenacted except that we had rather more of a formal hearing. We had them seated on opposite sides of a table, just as we do in court at home, and had seats for the spectators.
“Señor Don Felipe Calderón, who represents the Philippine people, was given an opportunity to make the first speech. He had printed his argument and read it, having given us translated copies with which we followed him. His argument was a very strong one, lawyer-like and well-conceived, but he weakened it by some vicious remarks about the Dominican order. The Archbishop of Manila, once or twice, felt so much outraged at what he said that he attempted to rise, but Archbishop Chapelle prevented him from doing so. At the close of the argument Monsignor Chapelle asked for ten days in which to prepare an answer and we granted him two weeks. The scene was one I shall always carry with me as marking an interesting period in my Philippine experience.”
The Commission did not settle the question. After careful consideration and many hearings, they left the property in the hands of the Dominicans, but appointed a Board of Trustees to prepare and present an appeal to the Supreme Court of the Islands, appropriating at the same time, five thousand dollars to pay the expenses of the litigation.
Archbishop Chapelle did not like this decision and telegraphed to Secretary Root asking him to withhold his approval. Then he asked the Commission to modify the law and give him an opportunity, in case the decision in the Supreme Court should go against the Church, to appeal to the Congress of the United States. This the Commission refused to do on good and sufficient grounds, whereupon the Archbishop cabled to the President, declaring that the decision as it stood would retard pacification. Although he had always been strongly opposed to the continuation of military government, we were much amused to learn that in his cable to the President he took occasion to remark, significantly, that “General MacArthur is doing splendidly.”
But if Archbishop Chapelle was displeased with the action of the Commission, the Filipino press was delighted, and the editorial encomiums heaped upon them can only be described as brilliant. The Diario de Manila, the next morning, was absolutely unable to express itself, and it concluded a more or less incoherently eulogistic editorial with the words: “The decision satisfies everybody; it raises a question which threatened to drag itself over the hot sands we tread, cleanses it of all impurities, and makes it the beginning and the end of a most transcendental principle of sovereignty and law.” The Filipino or Spanish editor is nothing if he is not hyperbolic.
When we arrived in Manila it was a source of great worry to us that we could not send our children, eight and ten years old, to school. The Jesuits had a school for boys in the Walled City, and Mr. Taft considered for awhile the possibility of sending Robert there, where he might, at least, learn Spanish; but so strong was the feeling against the Friars that this would have been taken by the people as a certain indication that the President of the Commission was leaning toward the Church in his deliberations on the vital subject. As I have said, they could not look upon this question, in any of its bearings, in a reasonable light.
We eventually settled Helen in a convent where she made an effort to learn Spanish, and Robert we turned over to Mrs. LeRoy, the wife of Mr. Worcester’s Secretary, who was a graduate from the University of Michigan and a most excellent teacher.
Mr. and Mrs. LeRoy went to the Philippines as bride and groom. They were classmates,
