Readings 2:

THE RIZAL LAW AND THE CATHOLIC HEIRARCHY

THE MAKING OF A FILIPINO

Recto’s everlasting credit that he saw these contradictions earlier than his colleagues and that
unlike the occasional nationalism of most of his contemporaries, his nationalism became a constant and
growing ideal.

THE RIZAL LAW AND THE CATHOLIC HEIRARCHY

Recto’s next big fight was over the Rizal bill. Through this did not directly affect our colonial
relations with America, his championship of the measure was an integral part of his nationalism. It was
his belief that the reading of Rizal’s novels would strengthen the filipinism of the youth and foster
patriotism.

Recto was the original author of the bill which would make Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere and El
Filibusterismo compulsary reading in all universities and colleges. Reported out by the committee on
education, it was sponsored by Senator Laurel, committee education. The easure immediately ran into
determined opposition from the Catholic heirarchy spearheaded in the Senate by Senators Decoroso
Rosales; Mariano J. Cuenco, brother of Archbishop Cuenco; and Francisco Rodrigo, former president of
Catholic Action. Their argument was that the bill would violate freedom of conscience and religion. The
Catholic Heirarchy even issued a pastoral letter detailing its objections to the bill and enjoining Catholics
to oppose it. Despite the fact that public hearings had already been a closed-door conference with the
Catholic heirarchy to search for a solution to the dispute.

Laurel and the other supporters of the bill rejected the proposal in as much as the public hearing
had already afforded the church the opportunity to be heard fully. Recto said that Father Jesus Cavanna of
the Paulist Fathers, who had written the pastoral letter, had himself testified against the bill during the
public hearing. A closed-door conference was obviously one of the means by which the heirarchy hoped
to exert pressure against the bill lobbies from various catholic orgaanizations as ell as the clerics
themselves were very active in the senate throughout the discussion of the Rizal bill. These clerics, many
of them foreigners, were seeking conferences with senators to convince them to oppose the Rizal bill.

NEW INSIGHTS AND NEW AWARENESS

A more organized campaign against the bill was launched under the auspices of the Catholic
Action of Manila. Its first activity was a symposium and open forum in which two announcements were
made: first, that the Sentinel, official organ of Philippine Catholic Action, would henceforth be published
daily instead of weekly, and second, that Filipino Catholics would be urged to write their congressmen
and senators asking them to “kill” the Rizal bill. Speakers at the symposium offered a variety of
objections to the measure. Fr. Jesus Cavanna, introduced as ann authority on Rizal, said that the novels
“belong to the past” and it would be “harmful” to read them because they presented a “false picture” of
the conditions in the country at that time. He described the Noli Me Tangere as “an attack on the clergy”
and said its object was to “put ti ridicle the Catholic Faith.” He alleged that the novel was not really
patriotic because out of 333 pages only 25 contained that since some parts of the novels had been
declared “objectionable matter” by the hierarchy, Catholics had the right to refuse to read them so as
not to “endanger their salvation.” Narciso Pimentel, Jr., another radio commentator, offered the
interesting speculation that the bill was Recto’s revenge against the Catholic voters who, together with
Magsaysay, were responsible for his poor showing in the 1955 senatorial elections.

Against this background of bitter opposition, one can more fully appreciate the intergrity and
courage of Recto in championing the bill. He stubbornly persisted in his defense, unmindful of the fact
that he was antagonizing a vital electoral element.

In a three-hour speech on the Senate floor, he attacked the hierarchy of the Catholic church for
its pastoral letter. He declared that the pastoral letter had been “more severe” in its condemnation of
the novels than a committee of Spanish Dominican priests whose findings had resulted in Rizal’s
execution. In support of his contention, he brought up the fact that the pastoral letter had cited 170
passages from the Noli and 50 from the Fili which it regarded as attacks on the doctrines and dogmas of
the Catholic church. He said he could understand the foreign clergy taking such a position but he found
it difficult to understand how Filipino bishops “ who will not be bishops now were it not for Rizal” could
adopt such a stand when Rizal exalted the Filipino clergy in his novels.
Rodrigo interpallated the speaker and in the process found himself the butt of Recto’s galley, to
the delight of the gallery. Rodrigo said he had read the books at twenty after securing special
dispensation from church authorities. Having taken advanced scholastic philosophy and religion, he
declared his faith was then firm enough, :But I cannot allow my son who is now 16 to read the Noli Me
Tangere and the El Filibusterismo last he lose his faith.” Rodrigo said. He proposed instead compulsaro
reading of footnoted editions of the novels.
Commenting on the opening paragraph of the pastoral letter which praised Rizal as our greatest
hero, Recto charged that these mandatory phrases were being used “to hide the real intentions of the
pastoral which is to separate the people from Rizal.” When Rodrigo agreed to his appeal to the people
to scrutinize the pastoral letter, Rodrigo said this would arouse the people to oppose the measure.
Recto retorted that on the contrary the reading of the hierarchy’s letter “should open the eyes of the
people to the real enemies of Rizal and true nationalism.”
While others were beginning to yield to pressure, no threats could frightem Recto. IN reply to a
threat that Catholic schools would close should the Rizal bill pass, Recto went on record in favor of the
nationalization of all schools. He contended that nationalization might be just the step needed to foster
a more vibrant nationalism among Filipinos. He did not really believe the threat, “They are making too
much profit which they can ill-afford to give up,” he said.
Tempers flared during the continuous debates and opponents attacked each other with greater
violence. Recto was in the thick of the fight, his tirades against the church growing over more bitter. On
May 5, in a privilege speech, he recalled that during the days of Rizal, religious orders dominated the
government. “Is this a new attempt to deliver the State to the Church?” he asked. Reacting to a
Philippine News Service report thatBishop Manuel Yap had warned that legislators who voted for the
Rizal bill would be “punished” in the next election. Recto took the floor for the seventh time to warn
against church interference in state affairs. He branded Yap as “the modern-day Torquemada.”
Finally, on May 12, the month-old controversy ended with unanimous approval of a substitute
measure authored by Senator Laurel and based on the proposals of Senators Roseller T. Lim and
Emmanuel Pelaez. The bill as passed was clearly an accommodation to the objections of the Catholic
hierarchy and Laurel said as much. Though it still unexpurgated editions of the two novels, it was now
possible for students to be exempted from using the unexpurgated editions on grounds of belief.
Opponents of the original Recto version jubilantly claimed a “complete victory” Proponents felt they had
at least gained something.

THE BASES QUESTION

On July 4, 1956, Richard M. Nixon on a visit here issued a joint statement with Magsaysay
affirming Philippine title to American: a lands in the country. Recto immediately sought a redefinition of
the sovereignty pronouncement of Nixon. He said:

I hope what Mr. Nixon said about sovereignty is not any different from our concept of
sovereignty. Sovereignty can only be expressed through the operation of our laws and courts.

It will be recalled that Attorney-General Brownell hadporpounded the dictum of American

ownership of these bases. Recto was the foremost opponent of this thinking. The Supreme Court ended
the controversy with its decision in the case of Sun Life vs. Brownell. The joint statement was an
affirmation of the court opinion.
Romulo, taking advantage of the situation, tried to claim credit for getting the American
affirmation. At the same time, he blamed nationalist agitators for having delayed the American decisio
by their belligerence. Recto could not let this pass. In an article entitled “The Smallness of a Little Man,”
he expressed his belief that “it was the belligerence of those to whom he (Romulo) refers as ‘outside the
Administration’ that really brought about the recognition of our sovereignty over and our ownership of
American bases.” That Romulo who was “fence-sitting” in Washington all along shoulf now play hero
was too much Recto to take. He put Romulo in his place.

Reference:

The Rizal Law and Catholic Hierarchy .Retrieved from

https://joserizallifeandworks.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/03-constantino_rizal-law-and-the-catholic-
hierarchy-1.pdf)

*******

Readings 3:
REPUBLIC ACT NO. 1425
AN ACT TO INCLUDE IN THE CURRICULA OF ALL PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SCHOOLS, COLLEGES
AND UNIVERSITIES COURSES ON THE LIFE, WORKS AND WRITINGS OF JOSE RIZAL,
PARTICULARLY HIS NOVELS NOLI ME TANGERE AND EL FILIBUSTERISMO, AUTHORIZING THE
PRINTING AND DISTRIBUTION THEREOF, AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES

WHEREAS, today, more than any other period of our history, there is a need for a re-dedication to the
ideals of freedom and nationalism for which our heroes lived and died;
JOHN N. SCHUMACHER, SJ

The Rizal Bill

of 1956
Horacio de la Costa
and the Bishops

Several drafts of a pastoral letter, written by Horacio de la Costa for the

bishops in 1952, survive. De la Costa’s Rizal emerges as an outstanding
moral figure whose devotion to the truth made his novels a source of moral
as well as social and political wisdom for Filipinos. Although subsequent
drafts show he was forced by an unknown interlocutor to temper this
view, he retained an essentially positive reading of the novels. In the face
of Recto’s 1956 bill imposing the novels, however, Abp. Rufino J. Santos
commissioned Fr. Jesus Cavanna to draft a new “Statement.” Beginning
with a few positive paragraphs from De la Costa, the “Statement” then
absolutely condemned the novels and forbade their reading, a prohibition
that proved quite ineffective. The drafts of De la Costa show that there was
within the Catholic Church a totally different attitude toward Rizal, whose
legacy the church could embrace.

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PHILIPPINE STUDIES 59, NO. 4 (2011) 529–53 © Ateneo de Manila University

R
eynaldo Ileto (2010), in a recent essay, has studied the efforts
of the 1950s to create a new vision for the nation in the wake
of independence. Prominent was the newspaperman Jose
Lansang, who expressed some of his ideas as speechwriter for
Pres. Elpidio Quirino, but, more importantly, was associated
with a number of professors from the University of the Philippines in
envisioning a secular nationalist program for building the nation. In
Lansang’s vision what was needed was what Ileto calls a “new Propaganda
Movement” of these latter-day ilustrados. Parallel to Lansang’s appeal to
the nineteenth century was wartime president Jose P. Laurel’s Rizalian
educational philosophy, it too envisioning a secular nationalism.
As a foil to Lansang Ileto (ibid., 233) singles out Fr. Horacio de la Costa,
SJ, returned in 1951 to the Ateneo de Manila with a PhD in history from
Harvard University, as representing “the Catholic position” toward building
the nation. Although Ileto makes brief mention of Senate Bill 438 in 1956,
introduced by Sen. Claro M. Recto and sponsored by Laurel, making Rizal’s
two novels compulsory reading in all colleges and universities, he does not
specifically attach Father de la Costa to the conflict over that bill (which
indeed falls outside the scope of his article). But as a matter of fact, De la
Costa would play a contested, but hidden, role in that controversy. It seems
worthwhile to examine how this Jesuit intellectual looked to Rizal as the
inspiration for another view of nation building, to see that there was more
than one view in the Catholic Church than appeared in the bishops’ letter
of 1956. As Ileto (ibid.) says, “the descendants of [Rizal’s] teachers were not
about to surrender their Rizal to the national visions of a Lansang, or even
a Laurel.” Although in the end other views prevailed, De la Costa’s Rizal,
based on accurate historical scholarship and a contemporary nationalist
vision, could have let the Catholic Church come to terms with Rizal as
builder of the nation.
It appears that, at the request of a committee of the bishops, De la
Costa had drawn up a draft pastoral letter on the novels of Rizal “some
years” before 1956, when Recto introduced a bill, sponsored by Sen. Jose P.
Laurel, prescribing their reading in all public and private schools (Kennally
1956a).1 In fact, the initiative for De la Costa’s work must be dated late 1951,
since on 5 January 1952 Dean Jose M. Hernandez of the University of the
East, who had published a book on Rizal in 1950, forwarded to De la Costa
through Sen. Francisco “Soc” Rodrigo nine pages of passages from Rizal’s
530 PHILIPPINE STUDIES 59, NO. 4 (2011)
Noli me tángere, supposedly containing attacks on, or praises of, the church
(Hernandez 1952).2 Several drafts of a proposed letter are to be found among
De la Costa’s papers, as his original was modified in response to criticisms
from another source.
It has not been possible to identify this source for certain. At first sight,
it does not seem to have been Fr. Jesus Cavanna, CM, who was the principal
author of the 1956 “Statement of the Philippine Hierarchy on the novels
of Dr. Jose Rizal Noli me tangere and El filibusterismo” (Kennally 1956a;
Constantino 1971, 244). For the “Statement” is drastically different in text
and in tone from De la Costa’s drafts, even though it did make some use of
his final draft in its opening paragraphs.
That being said, however, it is still possible that Cavanna was responsible
for the gradual changes that appear here, before breaking drastically from De
la Costa’s drafts. For he published a book on Rizal’s retraction of Masonry in
1952, which he had been preparing since 1951 or earlier.3 Hence his own
work on Rizal coincided in time with that of De la Costa’s. Moreover, it is
likely that the bishops might solicit the aid of more than one expert priest, and
it is difficult to name others aside from these two. Nonetheless, it is apparent
from the extant drafts that De la Costa was the principal author and, if the
bishops’ committee had also named Cavanna, it would be as interlocutor to
De la Costa. Presumably the two men were expected to come to a common
text. Since there are no letters from Father Cavanna among De la Costa’s
papers (Allayban 2010), any such contribution to De la Costa’s drafts must
have been made in meeting(s) of the two men, with De la Costa producing a
new draft subsequently. This could not have happened in 1956, since De la
Costa had been finishing his term as dean of the Ateneo de Manila College
of Arts and Sciences in the early months and was already abroad some weeks
before the bill was introduced on 4 April 1956 (Acosta 1973, 71).4 Moreover,
the Jesuit vice-provincial was not aware of any activity of De la Costa in this
matter in 1956 and wrote to him as if the appearance of the pastoral letter
and Cavanna’s principal authorship were entirely unknown to De la Costa
(Kennally 1956a). It is quite certain then that the modifications made by De
la Costa in his successive drafts were made in 1952, whoever may have been
his interlocutor.
If Cavanna were that interlocutor in 1952, he would only have made
suggestions to De la Costa and could not drastically alter the draft. In 1956
he was principal author and was free to make little or no use of De la Costa’s
SCHUMACHER / THE RIZAL BILL OF 1956 531