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Philippines INDEPENDENCE AND CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT, 1945-72
Demoralized by the war and suffering rampant inflation and
shortages of food and other goods, the Philippine people prepared
for the transition to independence, which was scheduled for July
4, 1946. A number of issues remained unresolved, principally
those concerned with trade and security arrangements between the
islands and the United States. Yet in the months following
Japan's surrender, collaboration became a virulent issue that
split the country and poisoned political life. Most of the
commonwealth legislature and leaders, such as Laurel, Claro
Recto, and Roxas, had served in the Japanese-sponsored
government. While the war was still going on, Allied leaders had
stated that such "quislings" and their counterparts on the
provincial and local levels would be severely punished. Harold
Ickes, who as United States secretary of the interior had civil
authority over the islands, suggested that all officials above
the rank of schoolteacher who had cooperated with the Japanese be
purged and denied the right to vote in the first postwar
elections. Osmeña countered that each case should be tried on its
own merits.
Resolution of the problem posed serious moral questions that
struck at the heart of the political system. Collaborators argued
that they had gone along with the occupiers in order to shield
the people from the harshest aspects of Japanese rule. Before
leaving Corregidor in March 1942, Quezon had told Laurel and José
Vargas, mayor of Manila, that they should stay behind to deal
with the Japanese but refuse to take an oath of allegiance.
Although president of a "puppet" republic, Laurel had faced down
the Japanese several times and made it clear that his loyalty was
first to the Philippines and second to the Japanese-sponsored
Greater East Asia Coprosperity Sphere.
Critics accused the collaborators of opportunism and of
enriching themselves while the people starved.
Anticollaborationist feeling, moreover, was fueled by the
people's resentment of the elite. On both the local and the
national levels, it had been primarily the landlords, important
officials, and the political establishment that had supported the
Japanese, largely because the latter, with their own troops and
those of a reestablished Philippine Constabulary, preserved their
property and forcibly maintained the rural status quo. Tenants
felt the harshest aspects of Japanese rule. Guerrillas, particularly those associated with the Huks, came from the ranks of the
cultivators, who organized to defend themselves against
Philippine Constabulary and Japanese depredations.
The issue of collaboration centered on Roxas, prewar
Nacionalista speaker of the House of Representatives, who had
served as minister without portfolio and was responsible for rice
procurement and economic policy in the wartime Laurel government.
A close prewar associate of MacArthur, he maintained contact with
Allied intelligence during the war and in 1944 had unsuccessfully
attempted to escape to Allied territory, which exonerated him in
the general's eyes. MacArthur supported Roxas in his ambitions
for the presidency when he announced himself as a candidate of
the newly formed Liberal Party (the liberal wing of the
Nacionalista Party) in January 1946. MacArthur's favoritism
aroused much criticism, particularly because other
collaborationist leaders were held in jail, awaiting trial. A
presidential campaign of great vindictiveness ensued, in which
Roxas's wartime role was a central issue. Roxas outspent and
outspoke his Nacionalista opponent, the aging and ailing Osmeña.
In the April 23, 1946, election, Roxas won 54 percent of the
vote, and the Liberal Party won a majority in the legislature.
On July 4, 1946, Roxas became the first president of the
independent Republic of the Philippines. In 1948 he declared an
amnesty for arrested collaborators--only one of whom had been
indicted--except for those who had committed violent crimes. The
resiliency of the prewar elite, although remarkable, nevertheless
had left a bitter residue in the minds of the people. In the
first years of the republic, the issue of collaboration became
closely entwined with old agrarian grievances and produced
violent results.
Data as of June 1991
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