(1899-1901) President: Emilio F.

Aguinaldo
(1897?) Vice-President: Mariano C. Trias (elected VP during the Tejeros
assembly)

(born March 22/23, 1869, near Cavite, Luzon, Philippines—died February 6,

1964, Quezon City), Filipino leader and politician who fought first
against Spain and later against the United States for the independence of
the Philippines. He attended San Juan de Letrán College in Manila but left
school early to help his mother run the family farm. In August 1896 he was
mayor of Cavite Viejo (present-day Kawit; adjacent to Cavite city) and was
the local leader of the Katipunan, a revolutionary society that fought
bitterly and successfully against the Spanish
The Filipinos, who declared their independence of Spain on June 12, 1898,
proclaimed a provisional republic, of which Aguinaldo was to become
president; and in September a revolutionary assembly met and ratified
Filipino independence.

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Emilio-Aguinaldo

COMMONWEALTH PERIOD (American Period)

(1935-1944) President Manuel L. Quezon

Manuel Luis Quezon y Molina, (born Aug. 19, 1878, Baler, Phil.—died
Aug. 1, 1944, Saranac Lake, N.Y., U.S.), Filipino statesman, leader of the
independence movement, and first president of the Philippine
Commonwealth established under U.S. tutelage in 1935.
He cut short his law studies at the University of Santo Tomás in Manila in
1899 to participate in the struggle for independence against the United
States, led by Emilio Aguinaldo. After Aguinaldo surrendered in 1901,
however, Quezon returned to the university, obtained his degree (1903),
and practiced law for a few years. Convinced that the only way to
independence was through cooperation with the United States, he ran for
governor of Tayabas province in 1905. Once elected, he served for two
years before being elected a representative in 1907 to the newly
established Philippine Assembly.
In 1909 Quezon was appointed resident commissioner for the Philippines,
entitled to speak, but not vote, in the U.S. House of Representatives;
during his years in Washington, D.C., he fought vigorously for a speedy
grant of independence by the United States.
Quezon played a major role in obtaining Congress’ passage in 1916 of
the Jones Act, which pledged independence for the Philippines without
giving a specific date when it would take effect. The act gave the
Philippines greater autonomy and provided for the creation of a bicameral
national legislature modeled after the U.S. Congress.
Quezon fought for passage of the Tydings–McDuffie Act (1934), which
provided for full independence for the Philippines 10 years after the
creation of a constitution and the establishment of a Commonwealth
government that would be the forerunner of an independent republic.
Quezon was elected president of the newly formulated Commonwealth on
Sept. 17, 1935. As president he reorganized the islands’ military defense
(aided by Gen. Douglas MacArthur as his special adviser), tackled the
huge problem of landless peasants in the countryside who still worked as
tenants on large estates, promoted the settlement and development of the
large southern island of Mindanao, and fought graft and corruption in the
government.
A new national capital, later known as Quezon City, was built in a suburb
of Manila. Quezon was reelected president in 1941.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Manuel-Quezon
During his tenure, he largely resolved the pressing issue of much needed
land reform, as the lingering legacy of the Colonial Spanish land
ownership system continued to plague the countryside with
institutionalized income disparity and inescapable poverty among the
rural masses. He also reorganized island military defense and promoted
foreign relations and commerce. To some extent, he managed to root out
corruption and mismanagement in the government.
https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/presidents-of-the-philippines-through-
history.html

(1944-1946) President: Sergio S. Osmeña, Sr. (Assumed the presidency

upon the death of Quezon while the Philippine Commonwealth
government is in exile in the U.S.)
(born Sept. 9, 1878, Cebu City, Phil.—died Oct. 19, 1961, Manila), Filipino
statesman, founder of the Nationalist Party (Partido Nacionalista)
and president of the Philippines from 1944 to 1946.
Osmeña received a law degree from the University of Santo
Tomás, Manila, in 1903.
In 1904 the U.S. colonial administration appointed him governor of the
province of Cebu and fiscal (district attorney) for the provinces of Cebu
and Negros Oriental. Two years later he was elected governor of Cebu. In
1907 he was elected delegate to the Philippine National Assembly and
founded the Nationalist Party, which came to dominate Philippine
political life.
In 1933 he went to Washington, D.C., to secure passage of the Hare–
Hawes–Cutting independence bill, but Quezon differed with Osmeña over
 the bill’s provision to retain U.S. military bases after independence. The
bill, vetoed by the Philippine Assembly, was superseded by the Tydings–
McDuffie Act of March 1934, making the Philippines a commonwealth
with a large measure of independence.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sergio-Osmena
He devoted his short term as president to the restoration of peace and
order, providing health services for the Filipinos, handling issues of
collaboration, re-establishment of foreign relations and reconstruction of
cities destroyed by war.
http://nhcp.gov.ph/sergio-osmena-remembering-the-grand-old-man-of-
cebu/

SECOND REPUBLIC (Japanese Occupation)

(1943-1945) President: Jose P. Laurel

(1943-1945) Vice-Presidents: Benigno Aquino, Sr. and Ramon Avancena
José Paciano Laurel, (born March 9, 1891, Tanauan, Luzon,
Philippines—died November 6, 1959, Manila), Filipino lawyer, politician,
and jurist, who served as president of the Philippines (1943–45) during
the Japanese occupation during World War II.

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jose-P-Laurel

The younger Laurel received a law degree from the University of the Philippines in 1915
and an advanced jurisprudence degree in 1919 before earning a doctorate in civil
law from Yale University in the United States in 1920. He entered politics and was elected
to the Philippine Senate in 1925, serving there until he was appointed an
associate justice of the Supreme Court in 1936.

Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii (December 1941), and the
subsequent Japanese assault on the Philippines, Laurel stayed in Manila;
President Manuel Quezon had escaped, first to the Bataan Peninsula and then to the
United States. Laurel offered his services to the Japanese, and, because of his criticism of
U.S. rule of the Philippines, he held a series of high posts in 1942–43, climaxing in his
selection as president in 1943. Twice in that year he was shot by Philippine guerrillas, but
each time he recovered. In July 1946 he was charged with dozens of counts of treason, but
he never stood trial; he shared in a general amnesty declared by President Manuel Roxas in
April 1948.

Throughout his stint as president, Laurel tried to solve the problems of the Philippines to
alleviate the people's sufferings. https://kahimyang.com/kauswagan/articles/991/today-in-
philippine-history-march-9-1891-jose-p-laurel-was-born-in-tanauan-batangas

http://www.philippine-history.org/presidents.htm