Heading: (Philippine-American War)
Author:
Title: Reports of the Taft Philippine Commission / Message of the President of the United States Transmitting a Report of the Secretary of War, Containing the Reports of the Taft Commission, Its Several Acts of Legislation, and other Important Information relating to the Conditions and Immediate Wants of the Philippine Islands
Place Published: Washington, DC
Publisher:
Date Published: 1901
Description:

333 pp. Illustrated with 34 photographs and several graphs. Original three-quarter calf and marbled boards. U.S. Senate Document 112.

The Second Philippine Commission, headed by future President William Howard Taft, was established by President McKinley in 1900 to create an American-controlled civil government for the Philippines - ignoring the Republic of the "rebel" Aguinaldo. It was charged with examining the general condition of the country and gauging the progress of American counterinsurgency operations against the ongoing native uprising. An uncommon official document.

Although this document deals with such issues as government administration, health, agriculture, mining, education and policing, especially in the isolated Luzon province of Benguet, there is a wealth of detail about what Filipinos would later call the Philippine-American War, from inspection of local prostitutes infecting American soldiers, to sabotage of railways, the hostility to US dominance of the Catholic Church, and racist American treatment of the natives, plus a general assessment of military pacification, which was not proceeding with the rapidity expected in Washington. Theodore Roosevelt, McKinley's successor, did not officially end the War until July 1902.

Good overall.