The American Period (1898–1946)

As of 2026-08-30 · Updated 2026-08-30 · Section: History · 日本語版

Along with the 333-year Spanish period, the roughly 48-year American period is impossible to skip if you want to understand the Philippines. English, public education, the presidential system, judicial review, and even today's IT-BPM industry — much of what makes the present-day Philippines both "easy to work with" and "distorted" traces back to this half-century. Below is an organization of the record, drawn as far as possible from primary sources (treaty texts, US federal statute texts, and government-agency materials) that could be checked directly.

0. Quick-reference timeline

1. The Treaty of Paris — was the Philippines "bought" for $20 million?

Article III of the Treaty of Paris, signed 10 December 1898, provided that Spain would cede the Philippine Islands to the United States, and set out the consideration in its own text as follows (treaty text held by Yale Law School's Avalon Project):

The United States will pay to Spain the sum of twenty million dollars ($20,000,000) within three months after the exchange of the ratifications of the present treaty.

In other words, the provision is that $20 million would be paid within three months of the exchange of ratifications.

注 In Japanese-language circles this is often summarized as "the US bought the Philippines for $20 million," but the text of the treaty is structured as "cession" plus "payment" — it does not take the form of a sale-and-purchase contract. Also worth noting: Article II ceded Puerto Rico and Guam without any payment, so the fact that a price attached only to the Philippines reflects a compromise reached in negotiation.

注 Emilio Aguinaldo had declared independence on 12 June 1898, and the First Republic (the Malolos Republic) had been established in January 1899 — but the Philippine side was not included among the treaty's parties at all. This is the starting point of the Filipino historical narrative that "the victory of the independence war was hijacked." The Philippines moved its independence day from 4 July to 12 June in 1962 (under President Macapagal), and 12 June 2026 marked the 128th Independence Day celebration (per multiple June 2026 news reports).

2. The Philippine–American War (1899–1902) and the dispute over the death toll

Fighting began on 4 February 1899 in a clash on the outskirts of Manila. The following table sets out the official figures given by the US Department of State's Office of the Historian, alongside the range found in historical research.

Why does the death toll range five-fold, from "200,000" to "1,000,000"? There are essentially three points of contention: (1) how far to count "excess deaths" from famine and disease — rather than combat deaths — as war-caused; (2) how to treat deaths caused by the US Army's policy of reconcentration (forcibly interning the population in "protection zones"); and (3) the fact that the pre-war Filipino population itself is only an estimate. 注 When citing a figure, one must always note "whose estimate it is" and "whether it counts combat deaths only, or excess deaths as well."

Main sequence of events: Malolos fell in March 1899, and the fighting shifted to guerrilla warfare from November of that year. On 23 March 1901, forces under Brigadier General Frederick Funston captured Aguinaldo.

注 (Corrected in the 2026-08-25 verification) The earlier draft's claim that "US military rule ended on 16 June 1902" could not be sourced and the date was wrong. The correct sequence unfolds in two stages (source replaced 2026-08-27: the earlier draft cited the English Wikipedia article "Insular Government of the Philippine Islands" as its source. Sources: the US House of Representatives' official historical archive, "The Philippines, 1898–1946" (history.house.gov), and National Archives records of the Bureau of Insular Affairs. Retrieved 2026-08-27):

• 4 July 1901: William Howard Taft becomes Civil Governor. However, in areas where resistance continued, military governor Adna Chaffee retained authority.
• 4 July 1902: The post of Military Governor is abolished, and Taft becomes the first Governor-General. On the same day, President Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed the end of the war and an amnesty.

The fact that "the end of military rule" and "the declaration of the war's end" both fall on 4 July (in 1901 and 1902 respectively) is the source of the confusion. Always attach the year.

注 However, this "1902 end" declaration applies only to the Christian-majority regions of Luzon and the Visayas; the Moro Rebellion in the Muslim regions continued from May 1902 through June 1913. "The war ended in three years" is inaccurate.

3. The Balangiga incident and the 2018 return of the bells

3-1. What happened in 1901

On 28 September 1901, in Balangiga, Eastern Samar, Company C of the US 9th Infantry Regiment, while eating breakfast, was attacked by residents and Filipino forces.

注 (Corrected in the 2026-08-25 verification) The earlier draft's claim that "48 of 78 died" is incorrect. The actual breakdown is as follows (source replaced 2026-08-27: the earlier draft cited the English Wikipedia article "Balangiga massacre" as its source. Sources: the official website of the US Marine Corps Museum (usmcmuseum.com), "The Battle of Balangiga – Samar 1901"; US History Scene; and kahimyang.com. The death toll ranges from 48 to 54 across sources. Retrieved 2026-08-27):

The figure "48 dead" comes from adding together the 36 killed outright, the 8 who died of wounds, and the 4 missing, and counting them all as dead; the correct baseline figure is also "74," not "78." Do not simply write "48 dead" without stating which counting method is being used. The church bell is said to have been used as the signal for the attack.

In reprisal, Brigadier General Jacob H. Smith is recorded as having ordered that Samar be turned into a "howling wilderness," directing that anyone capable of bearing arms who was 10 years of age or older be shot. Smith and Marine Major Littleton Waller were court-martialed; Waller was acquitted, and Smith was found guilty but received only a reprimand and was retired from service, with the prosecution soon dropped.

US forces brought back 3 church bells as trophies (cast in 1853, 1889, and 1895).

3-2. The return, 117 years later

注 Some Japanese-language articles state "all 3 were in Wyoming," which is incorrect — one was in Korea. 注 It also should not be characterized as "the US apologized" — the return was carried out separately from any apology or reparations.

4. Pacification policy and the "policy of attraction"

American rule cannot be explained by military suppression alone. The Library of Congress Country Study attributes much of its success to co-opting the Filipino elite (the ilustrados) — the so-called "policy of attraction."

• In 1901, T. H. Pardo de Tavera and Benito Legarda became the first Filipinos to serve on the Philippine Commission.
• The Philippine Organic Act of 1 July 1902 set out a bill of rights, two non-voting Resident Commissioners to the US Congress, the reservation of natural resources for Filipinos, and separation of church and state along with the sale of Church lands.
• The same act provided that an elected legislature would be established once three conditions were met: ①the end of the insurgency, ②completion and publication of a census, and ③a subsequent two years of peace. The census was conducted in 1903, published on 25 March 1905, and led to the 1907 legislative elections.
• The 1902 Land Act limited land acquisition by American citizens and corporations to 16 hectares for an individual and 1,024 hectares for a corporation. This ended up curbing the formation of Cuba-style vast American-capital plantations and instead preserved the Filipino landowning class (the hacenderos).

This "preservation of the elite" is the direct origin of what continues today as the dominance of political dynasties in local government. The Country Study records that neither Sergio Osmeña nor Manuel Quezon "had an essential interest in social reform."

5. The Thomasites and English-language education

Act No. 74, of 21 January 1901, established the Department of Public Instruction (corrected from 20 to 21 January in the 2026-08-25 verification pass. As of 2026-08-27 the source has not been replaced: no primary source to replace the earlier draft's English Wikipedia citation could be identified in this session = needs re-verification). That same year, a large contingent of American teachers was dispatched.

Major institutions founded: the Philippine Normal School (1901, now PNU), Silliman (1901), and the University of the Philippines (1908). Beginning in 1903, the pensionado program also sent government-funded students to the United States (the first year drew about 20,000 applicants for 100 places, and the program ran until 1943).

The 1925 Monroe Survey examined 32,000 pupils and 1,077 teachers, finding that while arithmetic and science achievement matched American students at the same grade level, English proficiency lagged significantly, half of children were not reaching school at all, and 82% did not advance past the fourth grade. 注 The simple narrative that "the US made the entire nation English-speaking" is refuted by the US's own survey.

注The widely repeated claim that "the Thomasites made the Philippines the world's third-largest English-speaking country" is common, but no source specifying the metric (native speakers or second-language speakers, and which survey) could be confirmed in this research, so the ranking should be treated as unconfirmed. For reference, Ethnologue (2020) puts the Philippines' English speakers at 200,000 as a first language and 52 million as a second language.

6. Public health — gains and costs

• A military Board of Health was established in September 1898, transitioning to a civilian Board of Health in 1901 (first director, Louis M. Maus).
• In 1901, the Bureau of Governmental Laboratories was established, handling vaccine production and medical research.
• In 1905, under the leadership of Secretary of the Interior Dean C. Worcester, the University of the Philippines College of Medicine (modeled on Johns Hopkins) was founded.

On the other hand, the cholera pandemic of 1902–04 in the early period of American rule killed 200,222 people, of whom 66,000 were children — roughly 3% of the population — recorded as the worst epidemic in Philippine public-health history (Department of Health historical materials). 注 Because this overlaps in period and geography with the civilian-death estimates for the Philippine–American War, one must be careful not to double-count "war deaths" and "epidemic deaths."

注 The modernization of public health is a real fact, but it also carries the flip side of being the aftermath of an epidemic spread by wartime reconcentration policy and troop movements. A story of "public health was brought to us" tells only half the picture.

7. The "Filipinization" of politics

7-1. The 1907 Philippine Assembly

On 30 July 1907, the first nationwide election in Philippine history was held, and the Philippine Assembly (the lower house) opened on 16 October, with 80 seats (81 from 1909). The counterpart to a senate was the appointive Philippine Commission, forming a bicameral structure. The Nacionalista Party (founded 1907), campaigning for immediate and complete independence, took the majority, with Osmeña as Speaker and Quezon as majority floor leader.

注Some accounts describe this as "Asia's first popularly elected legislature," but the materials checked for this article found no support for that claim, and it is treated as unconfirmed. What can be said with confidence is that it was "the first nationwide-elected legislature in Philippine history."

注 The franchise was limited to adult men meeting literacy and property requirements, so eligible voters were a small fraction of the population. The Country Study describes the expansion of suffrage as "literate men (1916)" then "women (1938)."

7-2. The 1916 Jones Law

Under the Philippine Autonomy Act (Jones Law), 29 August 1916, the appointive Philippine Commission was abolished, and a bicameral, popularly elected legislature — a 24-seat Senate and a 90-seat House — was established. Quezon became Senate President and Osmeña became Speaker of the House.

This structure of treating Moro areas separately laid the groundwork for the "Christian-majority central government vs. Muslim" conflict pattern of the latter half of the 20th century.

8. The Tydings–McDuffie Act (1934) and the Commonwealth

Enacted 24 March 1934 (Public No. 127, 48 Stat. 456). The main provisions confirmed by checking the text directly in the US Statutes at Large are as follows.

The Act's passage in the US was not motivated by "goodwill" alone. The Country Study cites both fear among American sugar-beet, tobacco, and dairy producers of competition from low-tariff island products, and pressure from labor unions seeking to exclude Filipino workers. That the independence provision and the 50-person immigration quota were written into the same law speaks plainly to this motivation.

The formation and evolution of the Commonwealth

注 "Commonwealth" did not mean "an independent nation." Foreign affairs and national defense remained in US hands, laws on currency, immigration, and trade required the US President's approval, and Supreme Court rulings were subject to review by the US Supreme Court. The accurate way to understand it is as ten years of domestic self-government.

9. Free trade with the US and dependence on the sugar economy

What changed during the period of American rule (Library of Congress Country Study)

The picture is this: the duty-free US market drove expansion of monoculture in sugar, coconut oil, and abaca, and export income concentrated among sugarcane landlords (in places such as Negros). At the same time, owner-farmers fell into tenancy, and tenant unrest intensified in central Luzon. The 1933 Rice Share Tenancy Act was nominally meant to increase tenants' share, but was hollowed out in local implementation and had little practical effect.

注The assessment that "American rule developed the economy" cannot be separated from the fact that the same data also shows a one-sided dependence on the US and a rising number of landless farmers. Any citation of export figures should be paired with the number of owner-cultivated farms.

10. The Sakdal Uprising (1935)

Discontent over tenancy problems and "a 10-year wait for independence" crystallized into the Sakdal movement.

Timing was decisive: the uprising broke out immediately before the plebiscite on the 1935 Constitution (14 May), and the Sakdalistas opposed both "independence being pushed back 10 years" and the Commonwealth constitution itself. 注 The narrative that "the Commonwealth began amid nationwide welcome" leaves out the fact that roughly 100 people had just died.

Afterward, the legislature passed three concessions: land redistribution, a National Rice and Corn Corporation, and a public-defender system for the poor.

11. Muslim Mindanao — Moro Province rule and settlement policy

11-1. Moro Province (1903–1914)

11-2. Two episodes of bloodshed

After Bud Dajo, President Roosevelt sent a congratulatory telegram, but American newspapers reported that "women and children were killed in the fighting with the Moros," and public opinion hardened. Secretary of War Taft demanded an explanation, and Mark Twain wrote scathingly that "we abolished them, in the ordinary way, in four days." 注Whether those who took refuge were combatants or refugees remains debated today, and whether to call it a "massacre" or a "battle" is a matter of one's position.

The Moro Rebellion effectively ended with Bud Bagsak, and in March 1915 the Sultan of Sulu relinquished political sovereignty (under the Carpenter Agreement).

11-3. Settlement policy — the seeds of today's conflict

American-era land law treated unregistered customary landholding (traditional to the Muslim and Lumad peoples) as "public land," while allocating homesteads to Christian settlers migrating from Luzon and the Visayas. Beginning in the 1920s, the American colonial government and, subsequently, the Philippine government carried out a planned migration of Christians from the Visayas and Luzon into Mindanao, and by the 1970s Christians outnumbered the Moro and Lumad populations there — a qualitative account on which this article agrees with the field articles "Indigenous Peoples and Ethnic Minorities" and "The Mindanao Region." Christians were also given preference in administrative appointments (as of 2026-08-27, the source has not been replaced: no primary source to substitute for the research summary cited by the earlier draft's English Wikipedia source could be identified in this session = needs re-verification).

This is the physical origin of today's Bangsamoro question. As of August 2026, the first Bangsamoro Autonomous Region (BARMM) parliamentary election, originally scheduled for 30 March 2026, has been postponed by the Commission on Elections (Comelec), and, following a Supreme Court ruling, is now set for 14 September 2026 (Comelec announcements, Daily Tribune, etc., January and July 2026). The unfinished business of the line drawn during the American period remains, still, a work in progress.

12. Filipino migration to the United States — the manong generation

Under the Treaty of Paris, Filipinos became "US nationals," which let them travel to the US mainland without being subject to the Asian exclusion laws. This loophole produced a major wave of migration in the early 20th century.

The layer known as the "manong generation" (manong, an Ilocano/Visayan honorific for an older man) consisted mostly of unmarried male agricultural seasonal workers, kept from forming families by anti-miscegenation laws. They form the foundation of Filipino American society, and are also the source of the labor movement that led to the 1965 Delano grape strike (led by figures such as Larry Itliong).

注 It's important to note that being a "US national" did not amount to citizenship. They had no voting rights and no path to naturalization, and in 1934 were overnight demoted to "aliens." This legal limbo was the essence of Filipino workers' vulnerability at the time.

13. Independence in 1946 and the Bell Trade Act — "the price of independence"

注"Full independence in 1946" is correct as a matter of legal form, but major elements of currency, trade, and resource development remained tied to the United States even after independence. The condition US High Commissioner McNutt described — "the Philippine economy is more dependent on the US market than any state of the Union" — carried straight through into the post-independence period. Today's 60/40 foreign-ownership restriction in the 1987 Constitution makes the most sense understood as a reaction against the experience of this parity clause.

14. The legacy that remains today (as of 2025–2026)

14-1. English

In the 2025 edition, the Philippines ceded its position as Asia's top-ranked country to Malaysia (BusinessWorld, 20 November 2025, among others). The premise that "the Philippines is Asia's foremost English-speaking country" no longer holds as of 2025 — at least on the EF EPI metric. 注 Note, however, that the EF EPI is based on self-selected online test-takers and is not representative of the population as a whole.

14-2. The education system

• Republic Act No. 12027 (RA 12027) took legal effect in October 2024, abolishing mother-tongue instruction (MTB-MLE) as a medium of instruction for kindergarten through grade 3. From the 2025–26 school year, instruction shifted to Filipino and English (Philippine Information Agency, Manila Bulletin, among others, October 2024 – July 2025). 注This amounts in substance to a return to "English-centered education," an American-period legacy, and has drawn strong opposition from teachers' organizations.
• The Philippine Statistics Authority's 2024 FLEMMS (published 2025) found basic literacy of 90.8% and functional literacy of 70.8% (ages 10–64). Reports have also cited "about 18 million high-school graduates who are functionally illiterate," and the gap between the quantity and quality of education became central to 2025 policy debate. BARMM had the country's worst illiteracy rate, at 14.4% (GMA, 31 July 2025).

14-3. The legal system

Elements derived from the United States and from Spain coexist in layers. Confusing them leads to practical errors.

注 Philippine law is not "American law" but rather a mixed jurisdiction. A Japanese company that assumes "it's in English, so it's the same as US law" can be caught out on family law, inheritance, and substantive criminal law.

14-4. IT-BPM — the biggest "legacy industry" of all

The central issue of 2026 is the displacement of voice work by generative and agentic AI. IBPAP lowered its 2028 revenue and employment targets in July 2026. The 2026 picture is that English proficiency — an American-period legacy — is, for the first time, becoming "an asset that technology can render relative."

14-5. The impact of the 2026 Middle East conflict (from 28 February)

The structure created during the American period — "an economy dependent on a single external market" — has persisted in different forms, from sugar exports to the US, to OFW remittances, IT-BPM, and imported energy. The 2026 Middle East conflict struck directly at this vulnerability.

注The general assumption that "the Philippines, being a domestically driven economy, is resilient to external shocks" did not hold in 2026. Petroleum is almost entirely imported, and BusinessWorld (4 March 2026) reported that the impact of the oil shock hit the Philippines harder than its Asia-Pacific peers. 注 The reliance on remittances — "exporting people" — is also structurally analogous to the American-period dependence on sugar.

14-6. Historical memory today

• The National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) held commemorative events on 2–5 February 2026 marking the 127th anniversary of the outbreak of the Philippine–American War (Philippine Information Agency, February 2026).
• In February 2025, historical markers related to the Philippine–American War were installed at sites including the Pamintuan Mansion in Angeles City (Daily Tribune / SunStar, 7–8 February 2025).
• On 13 May 2026, Rappler reported "124 years after the Battle of Bayang, the Moro struggle continues," illustrating that Muslim-side memory is preserved along a separate track.
• On 12 June 2026, a large-scale military parade was held for the 128th Independence Day.

15. 注 Summary of points commonly gotten wrong

日本語の詳細版: 分野「歴史」「米国統治期」（本サイト日本語版）。