[Published in Anuaryo/Annales 26: 105-28 (July 1997).

Journal of history published by De La Salle University,

Manila. It is now defunct. This version (2017) is slightly revised.]

PHILIPPINE REVOLUTION:
A PHILOSOPHICAL ANALYSIS1
Rolando M. Gripaldo, PhD

The author analyzes albeit philosophically three basic terms which

have become controversial in Philippine revolutionary historiography
today. These terms are “Philippine,” “revolution,” and “Philippine
Revolution.”

INTRODUCTION

In ordinary parlance, any analysis in philosophy is philosophical analysis. In

contemporary philosophy, however, philosophical analysis is a technical
methodology—an offshoot of the Anglo-American analytic tradition in philosophy.
It is a combination of logical analysis as developed by Bertrand Russell (1972,
828-36) and the logical positivists, especially Rudolf Carnap (1955, 209-25), among
others, and linguistic analysis as developed by George E. Moore (White 1955, 20)
and Ludwig Wittgenstein (1989, 31-36) in his Philosophical investigations. John
Searle (1972, 1) calls this analytic methodology “linguistic philosophy,” and he
uses it to analyze the meanings and the deep logical structures of general features of
language. The aim of philosophical analysis is to clarify the meanings of concepts
of whatever field of study and their theoretical underpinnings. It is the broad
method of conceptual analysis where the analyzer can himself modify or
reformulate the theories behind the concept. 2
In this paper, I will do a philosophical analysis of the term “Philippine revolution.” There
are three basic concepts to be analyzed here. The first is the term “Philippine.” It is
important to understand the evolution of this concept in the light of attempts by
some sectors of Philippine society to change it to “Rizal” or “Maharlika,” etc.
Towards the end of my analysis of this term, I will discuss the first attempt to
replace it. Andres Bonifacio (1963, 68-69) and Emilio Jacinto (1935, 60) wanted to
call the Philippine nation as “Katagalugan.”
The second concept is the term “revolution.” It is significant to analyze this in
the light of the continuing debate as to whether Rizal was simply a reformist or
truly a revolutionist. What is the difference, for example, between a “reform” and a
“peaceful revolution”? Why is a peaceful revolution called a “revolution”?
The third concept is the term “Philippine revolution.” Is it a revolution from above (the
Great Tradition), from below (the Little Tradition), or in between (the Middle Tradition)? What
is the criterion of classification? Is it simply the bulk of participants—the dominant participant
class—in the revolution, or is it the group that initiated or originated the revolution? What are
some significant differences among the Philippine Revolution, the American Revolution, and the

1
French Revolution? It is probably fruitful to contrast these three revolutions, which belong to the
same genre—i.e., democratic in inclination—and see some of their essential differences.

ON THE CONCEPT “PHILIPPINE”

From our history, we know that the term “Philippine” is derived from the name of the
Prince of Asturias, Philip II. In Spanish, he is Principe Felipe II (Segundo). In the Spanish
tradition, the Prince of Asturias is the heir apparent of the king of Spain in the same manner that
the Prince of Wales is the heir apparent of the king of Great Britain. When Ruy Lopez de
Villalobos named the island of Tandaya (now Samar) in 1543 as “Felipina” in honor of the
Prince of Asturias, he knew that Principe Felipe II would be the next king of Spain.
It was Miguel Lopez de Legazpi who called the entire archipelago as “Felipinas” in 1565
(later it became “Philipinas” or “Filipinas”). By this time, Philip II was already the king of Spain
since his father, Carlos I, decided to retire in 1556. It was Philip II who ordered the expedition to
colonize the Philippines from Mexico. When Andres de Urdaneta refused to head the expedition,
saying that it violated the Treaty of Zaragosa of 1529 since the archipelago lay within the
demarcation line of Portugal, Philip II replaced him with Legazpi with the express instruction to
colonize the archipelago.
During the early part of Spanish colonization, Pedro Chirino in 1604, Juan Francisco de
San Antonio in 1784, and Franco Antolin in 1739 called the natives of the archipelago as
“Philipinos” or “Filipinos” (Scott 1994, 6). Originally, the term “indios” simply meant
inhabitants of West Indies (Agoncillo 1980,83). Later on, however, the Spaniards used this term
pejoratively—to connote inferiority, indolence, stupidity, fit only to be servants, and the like.
In the nineteenth century, the insulares or Creoles, or Spaniards born in the Philippines,
regarded themselves as equal to the peninsulares or Spaniards born in Spain. But the
peninsulares, who considered themselves as the true Spaniards, or the true natives of Spain,
looked down upon the insulares and called them Filipinos, or natives of the Philippines. During
the Propaganda Movement, the term “Filipino” was used to include not only the insulares but
also the urbanized and educated indios like Jose Rizal, Graciano Lopez Jaena, Marcelo H. del
Pilar et al., and the Spanish and Chinese mestizos. But the common man remained to be called an
indio. Leon Ma. Guerrero (1974, 1-549) considers Rizal as the first Filipino because the latter
was the first to think in terms of the Philippines as a nation. During the Philippine Revolution,
Emilio Aguinaldo called all the natives of the Philippines as Filipinos when he issued his first
manifesto on 31 October 1896. Later on, in 1898, Governor General Basilio Agustin called the
indios as Filipinos themselves when he solicited their help against the American forces who were
preparing to attack Intramuros (Gripaldo 1994, 114). In describing the entire archipelago, the
Spaniards and Filipinos called it “Islas Filipinas” or simply “Filipinas” while the Americans
called it the “Philippine Islands” or simply the “Philippines.”
The term “Filipino,” however, was limited to Christianized natives. The pagan and Moro
tribes refused to be called as Filipinos. The Moros, in particular, viewed the Filipinos as
Christians and they would not want to be called Filipinos because they would not want to
become Christians. Moro nationalism probably began during the time of Laut Buisan (Majul
1973, 118; De los Santos 1988, 101-102), the sultan of Maguindanao, who held a meeting in
1603 with several datus of Leyte at Dulag so that the Leyte datus and the Maguindanaos can
unite to fight against the Spaniards. This was short-lived, however. His son, Sultan Kudarat, also
desired unity in 1628 against the invaders.

2
 Emilio Aguinaldo saw the problem of politically integrating the Moros into the national
body politic. An appeal of “unity” was communicated to the Moro leaders (Agoncillo 1980, 271;
Majul 1973, 315) to work hand in hand with the revolutionists and fight the Americans. The
immediate solution of politically integrating the pagan and Moro tribes would be to make a
transition from the historical meaning of the term “Filipino” to the political or constitutional
definition in the Malolos Constitution (Title IV, Art. 6) where anyone was a Filipino if (1) he is
born in Philippine territory, including a vessel flying the Philippine flag; (2) he is a child of a
Filipino father or mother, although born outside the Philippines; (3) he as a foreigner is a
naturalized Filipino; and (4) he as a foreigner has acquired residence in any town of the
Philippines and paid taxes for two years without interruption. Aguinaldo officially
communicated his approval of the Malolos Constitution on 21 January 1899 (Agoncillo 1960,
761).
During the American Period, the Moros wanted a separate independence from the
Filipinos. The American administration in the Philippines decided to unite the entire archipelago
and introduce education in Moroland, but most of the Moros did not allow their children to enrol
for fear of being educated and then made Filipinos or Christians (Elequin 1981-82, 83). For the
Americans, it was important to educate the pagan and Moro tribes so that they could easily be
integrated into the national mainstream of political consciousness.
The Filipino leaders continued the Malolos tradition and in 1935 produced a Constitution
(n.d., n.p.) which defined the Filipino as a person (1) who is a Filipino citizen at the time of the
adoption of the 1935 Constitution; (2) who was born in the Philippines of foreign parents but
who had been formerly elected to public office; (3) whose father is a Filipino citizen; (4) whose
mother is a Filipino citizen and who elects Filipino citizenship upon reaching the age of
majority; and (5) who becomes a Filipino citizen by naturalization.
After independence, a committee of three Muslim leaders3 (Saber 1979, 55) identified the
Moro Problem as a problem of integration into the national body politic through education.
Former Domocao Alonto thereby authored a bill creating the Mindanao State University with the
primary purpose of politically integrating the pagan and Moro tribes into the mainstream of
national consciousness. The integration process will be political assimilation so that the non-
Christian tribes will accept themselves as Filipinos and also cultural acculturation so that they
will eclectically internalize nonharmful cultural values from other tribes. At present, there are
still a resistance to the term Filipino from the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), Moro
Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), and others4 who would rather want to establish an independent
Bangsa Moro. Nur Misuari of the MNLF agreed with the Philippine government to run as
governor of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao and at the same time to be the
chairman of the Southern Philippines Council for Peace and Development.

ON “KATAGALUGAN” AND “TAGALOGS”

At this juncture, let me turn the discussion on Katagalugan as the first attempt to change
the name of Filipinas and of the term “Tagalog” to replace the term “Filipino.” The basis of this
interpretation is Bonifacio’s manifesto, “Ang Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog,” which appeared
in the first issue of the Katipunan newspaper Kalayaan. The date and place of publication of the
first issue were January 1896 and Yokohama, Japan to mislead the Spanish authorities but it
actually came out in mid-March 1896 and was printed in Manila.

3
 Historians like Teodoro Agoncillo and Isagani Medina5 believed that Bonifacio’s
manifesto already addressed the entire archipelago when he used the terms “Tagalog” and
“Katagalugan.” Agoncillo (1963, 2-3) specifically translated Bonifacio’s manifesto as “What the
Filipinos Should Know.” The only justification for this interpretation was a footnote in one of the
works of Emilio Jacinto, “Katipunan ng mga A. N. B.” and subtitled “Sa may nasang makisanib
sa Katipunang ito” (“For those who want to join the Katipunan organization”). The footnote
(Jacinto 1935, 60; see Guerrero, Encarnacion, and Villegas 1996, 5-6; Reyes 1996, 22) reads:
“Sa salitang tagalog katutura’y ang lahat ng tumubo sa Sangkapuluang ito, sa makatuid, bisaya
man, iloko man, kapangpangan man, etc. ay tagalog din.” (“The word ‘Tagalog’ refers to all
natives of the archipelago; in other words, Bisayans, Ilokanos, Pampangueños, etc., are all
Tagalogs.”) It is important to ascertain when the article was actually written. Agoncillo did not
provide any categorical answer. He simply assumed that the article, or even the idea of
Katagalugan, in the context of his writings, came very much earlier than the appearance of
Bonifacio’s manifesto in Kalayaan. Even assuming it was the case, it is not exactly clear if it
immediately referred to the entire archipelago or if it did, whether or not it was accepted by the
educated original members of the Katipunan (see Richardson 2013).
The Katipunan was established on 7 July 1892 and Jacinto became a member in 1893
when he was eighteen years old. It took time before he became a fluent speaker of Tagalog since
he spoke fluently what was known as “Kastilang tindahan” (Santos 1935, 13).
We have no evidence that Jacinto wrote the article “Katipunan ng mga A(nak) N(g)
B(ayan)” (the Katipunan Kartilya) prior to March 1896, the appearance of the newspaper
Kalayaan. In all likelihood, he wrote it after the publication of Bonifacio’s manifesto in
Kalayaan. John R. M. Taylor (1971, I:215-16), who published the five-volume work on the
Philippine insurgent records entitled The Philippine insurrection against the United States said
that Jacinto’s article was written in 1896. Guerrero et al. (1996, 5) confirmed this by saying that
the Katipunan Cartilla was “[w]ritten and published in 1896…” Since the article was not
published in the first issue of Kalayaan, it must probably be written after the publication of the
first issue. What is interesting in Taylor’s English translation of Jacinto’s article is that there was
no mention of “Tagalog” and definitely there was no footnote explaining the use of the term
Tagalog.
Assuming that this footnote was not an addition and was originally there in the Tagalog
article, and assuming that Taylor (1971, I:216) himself simply omitted the word “Tagalog” and
the footnote, and replaced them with the phrase “all Filipinos,” there is still a need to find a
justification why Jacinto made it a point to explain the term Tagalog to mean natives of the entire
archipelago in a footnote.
The theory I forwarded in two articles, “Bonifacio the translator: A critique,” which
appeared in Kinaadman in 1987 (42-56) and “Pagbabalik-tanaw sa pilosopiya ng rebolusyon ni
Andres Bonifacio” (see Llanes 1994, 105-15 and Gripaldo 1995, 51-52) is that Bonifacio wrote
his manifesto only for the Tagalog tribe because he wanted to have a core of revolutionists.
Jacinto, later on, was compelled to extend the meaning of the term “Tagalog” to include all
natives of the archipelago because of the surge of applicants for membership to the Katipunan
society from all types of tribes after the distribution of Kalayaan, which contained the
philosophies of revolution of Bonifacio and Jacinto.
Notice that from 7 July 1892 to mid-March 1896, the appearance of the first issue of
Kalayaan, or three years and nine months after the establishment of the Katipunan, there were
only approximately 300 Katipunan members. If Bonifacio wanted to refer by “Tagalog” and

4
“Katagalugan” to the whole archipelago, respectively, he should have already made this
explanation in his manifesto because (1) of the significance of its content (it was actually his
philosophy of revolution) and (2) he knew beforehand that there were members of the Katipunan
who were non-Tagalogs like Valentin Diaz, an Ilokano, and Candido Iban and Francisco del
Castillo, both Bisayans, among others. He must have, therefore, limited his manifesto to the
Tagalog tribe. From mid-March 1896 to 19 August 1896 when the Katipunan was discovered, a
matter of five months, the membership jumped to about 30,000. Later estimates make it even up
to 400,000 Katipunan members (Guerrero et al. 1996, 4). In all probability, non-Tagalog
migrants who lived in Tondo and nearby places (see note 5 below), who had read Kalayaan or
who have known about the contents of Kalayaan through gossips or discussions, decided to join
the Katipunan. Jacinto was, therefore, constrained to expand the meaning of the term Tagalog
when he wrote the “Katipunan ng mga A. N. B.,” which was intended for those who may want to
join the secret revolutionary society.
The argument of Guerrero et al. (1996, 5) that at the time Bonifacio used the term
“Tagalog”, “The term ‘Filipino’ applied solely to Spaniards born in the archipelago” and
therefore “Bonifacio and Jacinto made ‘Tagalog’ a term applicable to all indios or natives,” is
not accurate. Bonifacio and Jacinto had read Jose Rizal’s works and even some issues of La
solidaridad. At the time, the term “Filipino” was already in wide currency among the urbanized
and educated indios like Jose Rizal, Marcelo H. del Pilar, Graciano Lopez Jaena et al. Rizal
extensively used the term “Filipino” in his writings to mean all natives of the archipelago, and
Bonifacio and Jacinto were aware of it. In particular, they had read Rizal’s (II, 1973, 464) “Sobre
la indolencia de los Filipino,” which explicitly mentioned the word “Filipino.”

ON THE CONCEPT “REVOLUTION”

The purpose of this section is to make some clarifications about the meaning of the term
“revolution” and its counterpart, “reform.” Then on the basis of this purpose, I will try to show
where Jose Rizal’s sentiments lie.

Distinction of Terms

There are many definitions of the term “revolution.” The Webster’s Unabridged
Dictionary of the English Language (1989) listed some nine such definitions. But we are here
concerned with political revolution, which may be defined as a forcible and violent overthrow of
an established civil authority, political system, or government. It connotes widespread violence.
Among the popular examples are the French Revolution, the American Revolution, the
Philippine Revolution, and the Russian Revolution. They were all initiated by the middle class:
in France by the Third Estate, in America by the lower house of the legislature of each colony
and later by the Continental Congress, in the Philippines by the Katipunan society, and in Russia
by the Bolshevik, Menshevik, and the Social Revolutionary intellectuals who formed the Soviet
in the Tauride Palace of Petrograd (Goldston 1966, 122).
A revolution is a form of social change which is generally national in scope or intent.
Chalmers Johnson (1966, 1-2, 121-22) distinguishes a simple revolution from a total revolution.
The former has the aim of changing only some basic values within the social system while the
latter has the aim of changing most, if not all, the basic structures of society. Johnson considers
the American Revolution of 1776 as simple since its goals were achieved simply by

5
“proclaiming or rewriting a political constitution for the system.” The French Revolution for him
was total because it aims “to replace the entire structure of values and to rearrange the entire
division of labor” such as the “systems of landholding, taxation, choice of occupation, education,
prestige symbols, military organization,” etc.
A nonviolent revolution is actually a civil disobedience—or a passive resistance or
noncooperation—that may eventually lead to a total structural social change. An example is
Gandhi’s revolution.
An unorganized violence is sometimes called a riot or a spontaneous anarchy (Taine
1931, 1). An example is the student riots against the police in the 1960s and early 1970s. A
sudden forcible takeover of government by a small armed group, often only a day or a few days
and often accompanied by violence, is usually considered a coup d’etat. For instance, we have
the successful coups d’etat of Muammar Khadafi of Libya and Gamal Abdul Nasser of Egypt in
1952. Johnson considers the 1917 Bolshevik revolution of Russia a coup d’tat when the Soviet
was established which later replaced the Duma or Russian Parliament.
An armed resistance against a constituted authority need not be a revolution but a
guerrilla warfare like the armed struggle or resistance of Filipino guerrillas against the Japanese
during the Second World War. But in some instances, according to Johnson (1966, 131), a
revolution such as the Chinese communist revolution which ended in 1949 can take the form of a
guerrrilla war, “which is a prolonged struggle” whereby “smaller groups or armed rebels, or
guerrillas, fight the larger forces of the established regime.” In other cases, when a revolution
does not have the status of belligerency, or it does not have a revolutionary government, or its
revolutionary government is not recognized by the government in power, that political
disturbance is simply called a revolt, an “uprising,” a rebellion, or an insurgency. The Dagohoy
revolt, the Lapiang Malaya uprising of 1967, the Hermano Pule’s rebellion of the 1840s, and
Sacay’s insurgency during the first decade of the 1900s are examples.
Hannah Arendt (Johnson 1966, 118) distinguishes between a simple and an ideological
rebellion. A simple rebellion is guided by political principles; it is normally the restoration of a
system betrayed by an ineffective or a tyrannical ruler. An ideological rebellion is a dispute
about political principles and it can lead to total revolution. Theda Skocpol (1979, 4-5), on the
other hand, believes that political revolutions transform state structures but not social structures
while social revolutions transform both structures. It seems then that the American revolution
was political while the Philippine revolution was social. In practice, however, this distinction is
blurred. Any revolutionary change in state structures will definitely affect the social structures,
no matter how small. Where only state structures are transformed as, in some cases, in a
constitutional convention, we do not call it a political revolution.
Where the expected violence of a forcible overthrow of an established government does
not exist, or if it does—but not on a grand scale—then it is called a peaceful revolution. The
English Glorious Revolution of 1788 and the EDSA revolution of 1986 are such examples. If the
EDSA phenomenon of 1986 was crushed and its leaders punished, it would have been simply
called in Philippine history as the EDSA revolt or rebellion. All these distinctions, however, are
not necessarily hard and fast as there are overlappings. On the other hand, Barbara Salert (1976,
5) says that “a revolution in one theory may not be considered revolutionary in others.”
In contrast, a political reform is normally a sudden or gradual peaceful change that takes
place in a constituted political system or civil government without the expectation of violence.

6
Rizal on Reform and Revolution

The reform that takes place through a legislation, a royal decree, an executive order, or an
executive proclamation is a reform that comes from above. This is precisely what Jose Rizal
(1972, 349) meant in 1896 when he said that reforms that “come from above” are fruitful while
reforms that “come from below,” that is, from the people themselves, are irregular and
unreliable.
After a violent revolution, it is expected that reforms will follow, but this is not
necessarily the case. Rizal, in fact, was quite apprehensive about this. For him, it does not follow
that the political independence brought about by a revolution would necessarily entail freedom
and not the continuation of slavery. That is why he made a distinction between independence
(national liberty) and freedom (individual liberty). A nation can be independent without being
free while it can be free without being independent. According to him (1975, 297), “What is the
use of independence if the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow?” He was well aware
of what happened to the Spanish colonies in Latin America, which became dictatorships—ruled
tyrannically not by their previous colonial masters, but by their native substitutes.
The question now arises: was Rizal a reformist or a revolutionist? Using our definitions
of political reform and political revolution as earlier discussed, what is the status of the so-called
peaceful revolution that Father Florentino espoused in Rizal’s El filibusterismo in contrast to
Simoun’s bloody revolution?
John Schumacher (1987, 97-107) argues that Rizal’s Noli me tangere served as a catalyst
of the Philippine revolution in that although Rizal was originally a reformist, he eventually
became a revolutionist. Rizal wrote the Noli as a novel of the present, the purpose of which was
to open the eyes of the Filipinos as to what was happening during their contemporary times.
When he was about to finish the novel, Rizal was convinced about writing two other novels as
sequels that would give the Filipinos and the Spanish authorities some options as to what to do in
the future. The second novel would be about the past while the third novel would be about the
future. Ferdinand Blumenritt suggested to Rizal Antonio de Morga’s Sucesos de las Islas
Filipinas as a background reading for the second novel. Rizal studied Morga’s Sucesos at the
British Museum in London and later decided that instead of a second novel, he would just write
an annotation of Morga’s book, which he later published in Paris. This annotated book would
inform the Filipinos about their culture and their forbears before the coming of the Spaniards and
what happened to them during colonization. The third and final book was El filibusterismo. It is
here that Rizal presented the Filipinos two options: the peaceful course of action of Father
Florentino or the bloody revolution of Simoun. Rizal, of course, favored the former, not simply
because Simoun’s revolution was selfishly motivated, i.e., personal revenge against the society
that caused him personal misfortunes, but also because he did not believe that any violent
revolution was timely or was even probable of succeeding. He thought that the Filipinos must
first be educated so that they would be enlightened and, consequently, they would no longer
allow the abuses and tyrannical rule of the colonial masters. There were actually two courses
which Spanish authorities could do: first, make the Filipinos equal to the Spaniards in terms of
human and political rights, which is tantamount to saying that the Philippines be made a province
of Spain; or second, grant the enlightened Filipinos—the “new men” of society—their political
independence. As Rizal said (1972, 143), “…for new men, a new social order.”
What would happen if Spain does not follow any of these two courses? Then definitely
another two alternatives would become possible. Either (1) the constant agitation of the Filipinos

7
for human and political rights would lead to something similar to the EDSA people-power
peaceful revolution, that is to say, in unison the Filipino people would rise peacefully to demand
for their rights and restore their human and political dignity, not to kill but be killed in the
process. Apparently, Rizal’s expectation here would be similar to the success of the EDSA
people power revolution of 1986 and not the failure of the Chinese people power peaceful
rebellion of 1989 (4 June) which led to the Tian-an-men massacre. As Rizal (1912, 360)
asserted:

Our ills we owe to ourselves alone, so let us blame no one. If Spain should
see that we were less complaisant with tyranny and more disposed to struggle and
suffer for our rights, Spain would be the first to grant us liberty.

Or (2) the constant agitation, especially one that includes a massacre, would lead to
Simoun’s bloody revolution. As Schumacher (1987, 107) says, Rizal expected that “God would
provide the weapon, and tyrants would fall like a house of cards.” In either case, Rizal would be
classified as a revolutionist.

ON THE CONCEPT “PHILIPPINE REVOLUTION”

In Philippine history, we usually distinguish between the Filipino revolution against

Spain and the Filipino war against the Americans. Our contention is that we rose up in arms
against our colonial master, Spain, but with regard to the Americans, they were not our colonial
master. Rather we had already established our revolutionary government in 1898 before the
Americans finally decided to gobble us up. Milagros Guerrero et al. (1996, 6-11) even argue that
we had already established the Republika ng Katagalugan in 1896 and Andres Bonifacio was the
first president.
But what type of revolution is the Philippine Revolution? We can distinguish revolutions
in terms of nationalities and the origin of initiation. And I will discuss three democratically-
inclined revolutions and highlight some of their differences.

French Revolution

First of all, there is the French Revolution of 1879 which is essentially of one nationality.
The French people rebelled against the French monarchy under King Louis XVI. I want to limit
myself to 1879 only because the whole period of the French Revolution covered some 26 years
(1789-1815). It included a number of revolts, execution of the royal family, counter reactions,
massacres, reigns of terror, and the rise and fall of Napoleon Bonaparte (Thomson and the
editors 1968, 726-35). The revolution ended with the second restoration in 1815 of King Louis
XVIII. What is interesting is that the French people were distinct and separate from the clergy
(135,000 members) and the nobility (400,000 nobles) who were the traditional allies of the king.
The French people (26,000,000) were represented by the middle class (Thomson 1966, 31):
lawyers, businessmen, military officers, agriculturists, doctors, etc., or what collectively was
called in France the Third Estate. Although the Fall of Bastille on 14 July 1879 was engineered
by ordinary Parisians who gathered in crowds—the Paris mob—and seized arms, it was in
support of the Third Estate which was threatened to extinction and the defense, of course, of
Paris.

8
 The Parisians supported the Third Estate because its debates included the possibility of
limiting the power of the French king as in the English political experience (Huisman 1966, 10).
The king could not handle effectively the problems of state and acq uiesce to the demand to
convene the Estates-General but he separated them to discuss state problems independently. The
Third Estate wanted the other two estates—the clergy and the nobility—to sit down with them
and form the National Constituent Assembly, the Estates-General en banc. When the two
refused, the Third Estate declared themselves the National Assembly. The king ordered the
closure of the place but the Third Estate held their meeting at the tennis court. Eventually the
king ordered the clergy and the nobles to meet jointly with the Third Estate for the purpose of
writing a constitution. The king in effect surrendered his prerogatives to the legislature.
The Parisians also supported Jacques Necker, the king’s Finance Minister who was in
sympathy with the people’s welfare and the Third Estate. When the king dismissed Necker, the
Parisians believed the king would dissolve the National Constituent Assembly. Afraid that the
king’s troops, especially the Swiss and German mercenaries at Versailles, would attack Paris, the
Parisians decided to arm themselves. They had taken 32,000 rifles, 1 mortar, and 27 cannons
from the Invalides, the home for old soldiers (Huisman 1966, 14). They needed gunpowder.
Since the Arsenal supplies had earlier been distributed, they focused their attention to Bastille
(Thomson 1966, 62). Together with some ordinary members of the French guards, the Parisians
stormed the Bastille, almost an empty prison but an armed depot. It was the symbol of tyranny
and feudalism. The French Revolution was initiated by the middle class or upper members of the
Third Estate but was violently enforced by the lower members or the masses.

American Revolution

Second, there is the American Revolution (1775-81). The American nation consisted of
13 English colonies. The population were mostly British (English, Welsh, Scots, Irish)—
comprising in 1790 approximately 83.5 percent of the total white population of about 3,200,000
(Winther 1968, 600). The rest were Spaniards, Dutch, French, Germans, Swiss, and
Scandinavians (Alden 1968, 602). According to Winther (1968, 600, 602), these different
national groups extensively intermarried such that by the time of the revolution,

...they could properly be called a new people—“American” as distinguished from

“British.” Moreover, by the time of independence from Great Britain these
Americans, representing many faiths and backgrounds, had through several
generations of living in the New World developed culture patterns that were also
distinctively American [such as self-reliance, self-independence, and extreme
individualism].

We can, therefore, say that the American Revolution was generally of two
nationalities but of one racial stock, Indo-Europeans. The type of colonization was
similar to some of those of ancient Greece where, because of an exploding population or
of adventurism, the Greeks found colonies in nearby places, in neighboring islands, as
well as in Asia Minor and elsewhere. There was generally no or little absorption of the
indigenous population. It was only later in the American case that the local Dutch natives
of New Amsterdan was absorbed by the British when they colonized what is now New

9
York. But the Dutch were still Indo-Europeans and not a different racial stock like the
American Indians.
The American War of Independence—as the American Revolution is otherwise
called—had many causes, but the immediate cause was the destruction of imported tea at
the port of Boston, Massachusetts. In general, the Americans upheld the principle of no
taxation without representation (Adams 1961, 86). The British Parliament had no right to
impose taxes on Amercians who were not represented thereat. The Americans considered
this as violative of the rights of Englishmen—as at that time they still considered
themselves as Englishmen—and later they construed it as violative of human rights.
Prime Minister Lord North repealed in 1770 all the import duties on glass, lead, papers,
etc., except on tea, as he agreed with the king (Hibbert 1990, 18) that the retention of the
tax on tea (Tea Act of 1773) was to assert Parliament’s right to “impose external taxes for
revenue” (Alden 1968, 612-13).
In 1773 ships carrying tea arrived in various ports of the colonies through the East
India Company, a British company, which would sell the tea and pay import duty to the
British government. The East India Company intended the tea to be sold to favored
colonial merchants which vexed American merchants who were not chosen. The
colonists were against its sale. Dressed like Mohawk Indians, some Boston townsmen
“held their Tea Party and tossed 342 chests [containing some 35,000 pounds] of tea into
the harbour” (Alden 1968, 614; Hibbert 1990, 20-21). Similar tea parties were likewise
held in other ports. As earlier said, this was the immediate cause of the American
revolution.
Since London knew the real culprits of the tea destruction in Boston, the North
ministry decided to penalize the city itself. The British Parliament passed the following:
(1) the Administration of Justice Act which permits the Massachusetts governor to
transfer the venue of trials to England if he believed local prejudices would interfere with
the trial; (2) the Massachusetts Government Act where members of the upper house of
the legislature would be nominated by the Crown instead of elected by the lower house;
and (3) the Quartering Act where British troops were to be stationed in Boston (Hibbert
1990, 25). General Thomas Gage was appointed governor and the colony was ordered to
pay the Tea Party (Alden 1968, 614).
The Massachusetts lower house refused to pay and called for a continental
congress. It turned itself, in effect, into a revolutionary government and prepared for war.
The lower houses of other colonies followed suit and turned themselves into
revolutionary governments. They elected 56 members to the first Continental Congress
which met at Philadelphia in 1774 and decided to boycott British goods. The Patriots
strengthened themselves and began to prepare for war. When in April 1775 General Gage
sent 700 men to Concord to destroy Patriot military supplies there, a running battle in
Lexington and Concord ensued. On 4 July 1776 the Second Continental Congress
proclained American independence (Alden 1968, 614-15).
The American Revolution is essentially a resistance by the upper and middle
classes of American continental society against what they perceived as economic
oppression by the British government. They enlisted the help of the lower class, which
likewise suffered from these economic taxes, for the success of their organized resistance.

10
Philippine Revolution

The third type is the Philippine Revolution of 1896. It is distinctly a conflict of

two different racial stocks: one is Indo-European while the other is Austronesian. Unlike
the general British colonization of North America by occupying and settling virgin lands
or by buying lands from the American Indians, the type of Spanish colonization of the
Philippines is one of absorbing and governing the native population.
Andres Bonifacio (1963, 68-69) believed that the revolution against Spain was
caused by a failed contract. The Blood Compact between Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, on
the one hand, and Datu Si Katuna and Datu Si Gala of Bohol, on the other hand, was a
kinship contract as blood brothers who would help each other towards mutual defense
and progress. Bonifacio thought that the Filipinos fulfilled their part of the contract: they
participated in fighting the Spanish wars against their enemies, they built their ships, they
worked for them virtually gratis, and so on. Yet the Spaniards failed to fulfill their part of
the contract: the natives were not given equal rights with the Spaniards, they were treated
like slaves, their products were confiscated or bought by the government at a trifling
price, their daughters were abused, their human rights transgressed, etc. The economic
abundance and literacy of pre-Spanish forbears would, therefore, be restored by his
generation through a bloody revolution.
Emilio Jacinto (1973, 165-66) believed that the Filipino pre-Spanish forbears, at
least in some barangays, enjoyed democratic rights and the political liberty or autonomy
to exercise—to a certain extent, i.e., within the bounds of law—these democratic rights.
According to Jacinto, it is this political liberty which must be restored by his generation.
But what was the original composition of the Katipunan society? There is
certainly a difference between Bonifacio’s 1896 Katipunan and Hermano Pule’s
(Apolinario de la Cruz’s) 1882 Confradia de San Jose.6 Agoncillo and Alfonso (1968,
180) indicate that there were only a very few original members of the Katipunan, which
was founded on 7 July 1892, but he did not give us a complete listing. He mentioned
Andres Bonifacio, Teodoro Plata, Valentin Diaz, Deodato Arellano, Ladislao Diwa, and
“a few others.” Here is Milagros Guerrero (1981, 245-46) on the background of some of
the important early Katipuneros:

[They] did not belong to the lowest rung of Filipino society. The Supremo
himself was educated and widely read…. He found employment in Pressel and
Company, one of those foreign business houses in Manila which became the
nurturing ground for young Filipino workers and employees whose
entrepreneurial spirit would later make them men of status and influence.
Bonifacio’s associates were certainly not plebeaian (sic): Ladislao Diwa and
Teodoro Plata were clerks of court in Binondo and Quiapo respectively; the
former was a graduate of the University of Santo Tomas. Jose Turiano Santiago,
secretary of the first Katipunan supreme council, was a graduate of the same
university, and was an accountant and a business agent. Deodato Arellano and
Roman Basa, prominent council members of the Katipunan, were clerks in the
Spanish artillery corps and the Spanish naval headquarters respectively. A close
associate of Bonifacio, Pio Valensuela, who came from a principalia family of
Polo, Bulacan, was a medical student when he joined the secret society. Emilio

11
 Jacinto, who is regarded as the “brains” of the Katipunan, graduated from the
Dominican-run Colegio de San Juan de Letran and then enrolled at the Pontifical
University. Moreover, he was the son of a prominent merchant.

Compare these data with Pule’s original members of the Cofradia. According to
Reynaldo Ileto (1979, 40), “In 1832, Apolinario [de la Cruz or Hermano Pule] helped
organize a group of nineteen provincemates, who had settled in the poor suburbs of
Manila, into a confraternity,” the Brotherhood of the Great Sodality of the Glorious Lord
Saint Joseph and of the Virgin of the Rosary, or—in short—the Cofradia de San Jose.
Ileto says that this was a confraternity with poor members as there were wealthier
cofradias during Pule’s times. The Katipunan leadership enlisted the support of the
masses and the middle class while the Cofradia limited itself to the recruitment of
members of the lower class. Later the Katipunan and the Cofradia became relatively
prominent for their uprisings.
The point I want to stress is that the Katipunan was established fundamentally by
the middle class while the Cofradia was essentially a brotherhood organized by the lower
class. The Katipunan revolution, although it enlisted the support of the masses, was
essentially a revolution from the middle. It belongs to the Middle Tradition. Hermano
Pule’s uprising was a revolt from below. It belongs to the Little Tradition. Counter
revolutions of deposed kings also enlist the support of the masses, either their own or of
foreign allies, as they make of them soldiers.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, I want to reiterate the following points: firstly, the term “Filipino” has
transcended its original historical meaning which refers to non-Muslim and non-pagan
tribes of the archipelago. Positively speaking, it originally refers to Christian natives.
Today, as a constitutional concept, the term “Filipino” refers to all inhabitants of the
Philippines: Moros, Christians, pagans, Buddhists, etc., including naturalized foreigners.
Personally, I do not have any colonial hang-ups and is proud to be called a Filipino. I do not
think it is necessary to change the name of the Philippines to Katagalugan, Maharlika, or
any other.
Secondly, the concept “revolution,” politically speaking, should be understood as
denoting an expectation of something violent or forcible. The absence of such violence, or
the failure of the expectation of violence to come through, renders the phrase “peaceful
revolution”—if it succeeded—meaningful. In this sense, the so-called “revolution through
education” of Father Florentino is not, properly speaking, a revolution. It is more of a
reform, a gradual change to be effected in the individual’s consciousness through the study
of civic virtues so that he would be enlightened and would refuse to condone or tolerate
oppression and abuses. But then it can possibly lead to a bloody revolution.
Lastly, the concept “Philippine Revolution” should be understood as fundamentally
different from the American and French Revolutions in terms of nationality structure. The
Philippine Revolution involves two different nationalities of different racial stocks. The
American Revolution involves two nationalities of the same racial stock. The French
Revolution involves one nationality of the same racial stock.

12
 In terms of the originators of the revolution, the Philippine Revolution was
organized by the middle class (The Middle Tradition), the French Revolution was initiated
by the middle class in what might have been a peaceful revolution but it was eventually
transformed into a violent revolution by the lower class by capturing the Bastille. The
leadership was subsequently regained by the middle class, and in that sense it can be
classified as belonging to the Middle Tradition. The American Revolution was a mixture of
the upper and the middle classes, although mostly from the middle class, and in this sense it
is also a revolution from the middle (Middle Tradition).7

NOTES

1. Slightly revised paper read at the Ateneo de Manila University, Gonzaga Hall, 11
August 1996. Sponsored by the Philosophy Circle of the Philippines.
2. At the University of the Philippines the emphasis in the 1990s was on the Anglo-
American analytic tradition. Andresito Acuña wrote a textbook, Philosophical analysis (1995),
for some U.P. courses. He was my professor when I took up in 1973-75 my MA degree in
philosophy.
3. The 1954 Congressional Committee was composed of Domocao Alonto who
represented the Maranaos, Obra Amilbangsa who represented the Tausugs and Samas, and
Luminog Magelen who represented the Maguindanaos.
4. The other groups as mentioned by Nur Misuari are the Abu Sayyaf fundamentalists
and the National Islamic Command Council, “composed of young Muslim militants and MNLF
veterans” (Reuters 1995).
5. I had an extensive discussion on this with Dr. Isagani Medina at the Mariano Marcos
State University in Batac, Ilocos Norte (see Gripaldo 1994, 114).
6. The full name of the Cofradia is Hemandad de la Archi-Cofradia del Glorioso Señor
San Jose y e la Virgen del Rosario (Ileto 1979, 40).
7. It is tempting to continue the comparison with the other revolutions of the world like
the Russian Revolution, the Chinese Revolution, the Latin American Revolutions, etc, but this is
beyond the scope of the present paper. Perhaps, a complete typology of revolutions may be a
worthwhile research project in the future.

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