Handouts-in-EDVED-120-Filipino-Value-System.docx

**Handouts in EDVED 120 - Filipino Value System** **Lesson 1. A. Political Events** **A. Political Events** **1. Colonization** **In the Beginning** Although the details vary in the retelling, one Philippine creation myth focuses on this core element: a piece of bamboo, emerging from the primor...

**Handouts in EDVED 120 - Filipino Value System** **Lesson 1. A. Political Events** **A. Political Events** **1. Colonization** **In the Beginning** Although the details vary in the retelling, one Philippine creation myth focuses on this core element: a piece of bamboo, emerging from the primordial earth, split apart by the beak of a powerful bird. From the bamboo a woman and man come forth, the progenitors of the Filipino people. The genesis of the Philippine nation, however, is a more complicated historical narrative. During their sixteenth-century expansion into the East, Ferdinand Magellan and other explorers bearing the Spanish flag encountered several uncharted territories. Under royal decree, Spanish colonizers eventually demarcated a broad geographical expanse of hundreds of islands into a single colony, thus coalescing large groups of cultural areas with varying degrees of familiarity with one another as Las Islas Filipinas. Ruy Lopez de Villalobos, claiming this area for the future King Philip II of Spain in the mid-1500s, took possession of the islands while imagining the first borders of the future Philippine state. During Spanish rule, the boundaries of the empire changed as Spain conquered, abandoned, lost, and regained several areas in the region. Had other colonies been maintained or certain battles victorious, Las Islas Filipinas could have included, for example, territory in what is now Borneo and Cambodia. When, during the Seven Years' War, Spain lost control of Manila from 1762--64, the area effectively became part of the British Empire. The issue of shifting boundaries notwithstanding, the modern-day cartographic image of the Philippine archipelago as a unified whole was credited to Jesuit priest Pedro Murillo Velarde, Francisco Suarez, and Nicolas de la Cruz who, in 1734, conceptualized, sketched, and engraved the first accurate map of the territory. Explorers for Spain were not the first to encounter the islands. Chinese, Arabic, and Indian traders, for example, engaged in extensive commerce with local populations as early as 1000 AD. Yet it was the Spanish government that bound thousands of islands under a single colonial rule. The maps delineating Las Islas Filipinas as a single entity belied the ethnolinguistic diversity of the area. Although anthropological investigations continue, scholars believe Spain claimed territory encompassing over 150 cultural, ethnic, and linguistic groups. Within this colonial geography, however, Spain realized that the actual distance between the capital center of Manila and areas on the margins (as well as the very real problems with overcoming difficult terrain between communities) made ruling difficult. Socially and geographically isolated communities retained some indigenous traditions while experiencing Spanish colonial culture in varying degrees. Vicente Rafael's *White Love and Other Events in Filipino History* (2000) chronicles this disconnection between the rule of the colonial center and those within the territorial borders. His conclusions suggest in part that although the naming and mapping of Filipinas afforded the Spanish a certain legitimacy when claiming the islands, this was in some ways a cosmetic gesture. Instead of unifying the diverse local populations under one banner during the almost 400 years of Spanish rule, various groups remained fiercely independent or indifferent to the colonizer; some appropriated and reinterpreted Spanish customs,^2^ while others toiled as slaves to the empire. https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/1774\_map\_of\_the\_Philippine\_Islands-666x1024.jpg Map of the Philippine Islands, published by Pedro Murillo Velarde in 1774. Velarde published the first accurate map of the islands forty years earlier. Source: [[http://tinyurl.com/o22gamaюю]](http://tinyurl.com/o22gama%D1%8E%D1%8E). As they spread throughout the islands, Spanish conquistadors encountered a variety of religions; during the sixteenth century, the areas now referred to as the Luzon and Visayas cluster of islands were home to several belief systems that were chronicled by the Christian friars and missionaries who came into contact with them. Famed Philippine historian William Henry Scott (1994) recounts, for instance, examples of Visayans who "worshiped nature spirits, gods of particular localities or activities, and their own ancestors"; Bikolanos whose "female shamans called *baliyan* ... spoke with the voice of departed spirits, and delivered prayers in song";^5^ and Tagalogs whose pantheon included "Lakapati, fittingly represented by a hermaphrodite image with both male and female parts, \[who\] was worshipped in the fields at planting time."^6^ Over time, however, Spain's colonial hegemony, power, and influence used to consolidate their rule spread through the vehicle of Catholicism, supplanting or heavily influencing several of the local spiritual traditions, which were transformed to fit the new religious paradigm. In the 1560s, Spaniard Miguel López de Legazpi introduced Catholic friars to the north. Christianity redefined the worldview and relationships of some of the locals, implementing a social structure heavily based on Biblical perspectives and injunctions. By the eighteenth century, indigenous people caught practicing so-called pagan rituals were punished; local histories written on bamboo or other materials were burned, and cultural artifacts were destroyed. Church edifices dominated the landscape as the symbolic and psychological center of the permanent villages and towns that sprung up around them. Once firmly established, the Catholic Church, through various religious orders with their own agendas, clearly shared power with Spain, and the two jointly administered the colonization of the islands.  1887 portrait of Miguel López de Legazpi. Source: [[http://tinyurl.com/p3lojk6.]](http://tinyurl.com/p3lojk6.) https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/statue-of-rajah-sulayman.png Statue of Rajah Sulayman on Roxas Bouelvard, Manila. Source: http://tinyurl.com/lv95nwt. However, Spanish Catholic colonial rule was incomplete. Domination of the southern half of the archipelago proved impossible due in large part to the earlier introduction of Islam in approximately 1380. Muslim traders traveled in and around the southern islands, and over time, these merchants likely married into wealthy local families, encouraging permanent settlements while spreading Islam throughout the area. By the time of Spanish arrival in the sixteenth century, the Islamic way of life was already well-established; for example, the Kingdom of Maynila (site of present-day Manila) was ruled by Rajah Sulayman, a Muslim who fought against Spanish conquest. Scholars agree that the Spanish arrival profoundly affected the course of Philippine history. Had Magellan or other colonizers never arrived or landed much later, they may have encountered a unified Muslim country. As history would have it, however, Spain encountered serious resistance in the Filipinas south, sowing the seeds of one of the oldest and bitterest divisions in contemporary Philippine society. Spanish colonizers soon realized they were against a strong, although not entirely uniform or unified, Muslim people. The constant struggle to extend Spanish hegemony to the south spawned the Spanish-Moro Wars, a series of long-standing hostilities between Muslims and Spanish. From the late 1500s until the late 1800s, Spain attempted to gain a foothold in the area--- succeeding only to the extent that some soldiers were eventually allowed by local leaders to maintain a small military presence. Spanish colonial leaders, however, never dominated or governed the local area, despite laying claim to the territory.    Gabriela Silang Monument on Ayala Avenue, Manila. Source: Ayala Triangle website at [[http://tinyurl.com/kf5teob]](http://tinyurl.com/kf5teob). The Catholic Church, through various religious orders with their own agendas, clearly shared power with Spain, and the two jointly administered the colonization of the islands. https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/images-from-an-old-20-peso-bill.png Images from an old 20peso bill that feature Emilio Jacinto and Andrés Bonifacio. Source: [[http://tinyurl.com/oyohpwr]](http://tinyurl.com/oyohpwr). **Revolutionary Narratives** During the late eighteenth century, revolutionaries such as Gabriela and Diego Silang fought for a free Ilocano nation in the northern Philippines. Other revolutionaries emerged, and by the end of the nineteenth century, leaders such as Andrés Bonifacio and Emilio Jacinto were pressuring Spanish leadership on several fronts. Future national hero José Rizal incurred the wrath of the colonial government with the publication of Noli Me Tángere (Touch Me Not, 1887) and El Filibusterismo (The Filibustering, 1891). Rizal, born to a relatively prosperous family of Filipino, Spanish, Chinese, and Japanese descent, was well-educated in the Philippines and in parts of Europe. A true renaissance man, Rizal was an ophthalmologist, scientist, writer, artist, and multilinguist whose works were written in several languages, including Spanish and Latin. *Noli Me Tángere* and *El Filibusterismo*, first published in Germany and Belgium, respectively, brought international attention to the abuses of the Filipino people by the colonial government and Catholic Church. Throughout Rizal's life, he continued writing and advocating reforms such as the recognition of Filipinos as free and equal citizens to the Spanish. Rizal's popularity grew amongst Filipinos fighting against Spanish oppression, drawing the suspicion of local officials who accused him of associating with armed insurgents. In 1896, Rizal was arrested and convicted of several crimes, including inciting rebellion, and was executed by firing squad on December 30. However, rather than suppressing the revolution, Rizal's death cast him as a martyr for the cause, and his works were more widely disseminated and read by leaders fighting for an independent Philippines. Today, Rizal's immortality extends to national hero status, with numerous awards, national monuments, parks, associations, movies, poems, and books dedicated to his memory.  Philippine government poster from the 1950s. Source: National Archives and Records Administration at [[http://tinyurl.com/moosqsu]](http://tinyurl.com/moosqsu). Today, Rizal's immortality extends to national hero status, with numerous awards, national monuments, parks, associations, movies, poems, and books dedicated to his memory. Rizal's writings proliferate on the Internet. His works, once considered seditious propaganda by some, are now available as free downloads.^7^ Admirers who take to social media characterize Rizal as their hero and post facts about his background and achievements or quotes from his texts.^8^ The power of Rizal's narratives transcend the paper documents handwritten 125 years ago. He is remembered as a Filipino writing for his people, a native son who used the tools of storytelling to expose the truth about life under colonial rule. **Colonialism: The Sequel** Scholars argue that the execution of Rizal inspired a broader fight for freedom from the Spanish government. Led by heroes such as Bonifacio, the Philippine Revolution began in 1896 and included numerous battles against Spanish forces on multiple fronts. By 1898, as Spain was fighting to quell the uprisings in the Philippines, it became embroiled in the Spanish-American War. After losing to the United States in several land and naval battles, Spain released the Philippines and other colonies to the US in exchange for US \$20 million, as agreed upon in the Treaty of Paris of 1898. During the negotiation of the treaty, the American Anti-Imperialist League opposed the annexation of the Philippines. Composed of social, political, and economic luminaries of the era (for example, activist Jane Addams and former President Grover Cleveland), the league organized a series of publications criticizing the US government's colonial policies. Mark Twain, prominent author, wrote for the* The New York Herald* in 1900: *I have read carefully the Treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Philippines. We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem.... It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.*^9^ https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/John\_Hay\_signs\_Treaty\_of\_Paris\_1899-300x242.jpg John Hay, Secretary of State, signing the memorandum of ratification for the Treaty of Paris on behalf of the United States, from p. 430 of Harper's Pictorial History of the War with Spain, Vol. II, published by Harper and Brothers in 1899. Source: *Wikimedia Commons *at [[http://tinyurl.com/p6fowzm]](http://tinyurl.com/p6fowzm). The treaty was hotly debated by the Senate. Ultimately, ratification of the treaty was approved on February 6, 1899, by a vote of fifty-seven in favor and twenty-seven against---a single vote more than the required two-thirds majority. Meanwhile in the Philippines, Emilio Aguinaldo, a Filipino leader in the fight for freedom, declared an independent Philippine government---which neither the Spanish nor United States governments acknowledged. When the final version of the Treaty of Paris was enacted, the islands once again became subject to the laws and policies of another distant nation. Americans who supported annexing the Philippines viewed the archipelago as a doorway through which the United States could gain more of a financial foothold in Asia while extending its empire overseas. Before the US could begin fully establishing control of the islands, a new war began. Some scholars have termed it "the first Việt Nam," referencing the extended armed conflict which ended in 1975 between North Việt Nam and the US, whom many North Vietnamese also perceived as an imperialist aggressor. The Philippine-American war began on February 4, 1899, when American soldiers opened fire on Filipinos in Manila. In the first years of US occupation, the battles were fought between the new US colonizers and Filipino guerrilla armies tired of existing under any foreign rule. James Hamilton-Paterson, a British travel writer and commentator on the Philippines, estimates that the war's death toll included over 4,000 American and 16,000 Filipino soldiers, as well as almost one million civilians who perished from hunger and disease.^10^ Although the war officially ended in 1902, skirmishes continued for several years afterward.  President Aguinaldo. Page 71 of Harper's *History of the War in the Philippines.* Source: The McCune Collection at [[http://tinyurl.com/l8hqfo7]](http://tinyurl.com/l8hqfo7). Under the rule of the United States, a plethora of people, ideas, and changes to the infrastructure flooded the archipelago. During this era, Christian groups flourished as Protestants and other denominations began proselytizing via missionary expeditions. Organizations such as the Salvation Army and the YMCA began operations in the Philippines; the so-called "Big Three" of American voluntary associations, the Lions Club, Kiwanis, and Rotary, also quickly spread throughout the islands. The United States military sponsored the establishment of hospitals and funded improvements to roads and bridges. Prominent urban planner Daniel Burnham visited the Philippines in 1904 and designed the capital city of Manila for redevelopment.^11^ US culture dominated Philippine life. Linguist Bonifacio P. Sibayan, for example, discusses the introduction of English by American colonial authorities as the medium of instruction in schools: "English thus became the only medium of instruction in the schools, the only language approved for use in the school, work, in public school buildings, and on public school playgrounds."^12^ Sibayan further explains that while English-only eventually changed to bilingual instruction, English usage had become pervasive throughout the whole of society. Throughout the business and government sector, English became the dominant language, as well as the language that bridged communication gaps between regional Filipino cultural groups who did not share an indigenous language. Today, English, along with Filipino, is recognized as a national language of the Philippines. Renato Constantino, Filipino scholar, characterized the introduction of English as a detriment to Filipino society: "With American textbooks, Filipinos started learning not only the new language but also a new way of life, alien to their traditions... This was the beginning of their education, and at the same time, their miseducation."^13^ Filipino linguists and other social scientists continue researching and debating the extent to which indigenous cultural values and traditions were lost with the change in language.^14^ Nevertheless, English proved beneficial to at least some Filipinos. The US government sponsored some students from the elite upper class to study in American schools and, upon their return, work in the government. Other Filipinos, recruited by US companies beginning in the colonial era, migrated to California, Hawai\`i, and other states, lured by the promise of lucrative work compared to wage rates picking sugarcane and pineapple in the Philippines. With at least some familiarity with the language, Filipinos were able to communicate with their foreign employers. https://www.asianstudies.org/wp-content/uploads/philippines-222x300.jpg "Big Boot": Clifford Berryman's cartoon published in *The Washington Post* depicts Aguinaldo's futile attempt to oust the US from the Philippines. The sign in the background reads: "Notice: The US is requested to withdraw P.D.Q. (signed) Aguinaldo." Source: From the National Archives via *MIT Visualizing Cultures* website at [[http://tinyurl.com/mmuytqk]](http://tinyurl.com/mmuytqk). In 1935, the United States designated the Philippines as a commonwealth and established a Philippine government that was meant to transition to full independence. During World War II, however, Japan attacked the Philippines and held the country from 1941 to 45. Lydia N. Yu-Jose in "World War II and the Japanese in the Prewar Philippines" (1996) describes an immigrant population of approximately 20,000 Japanese people living in the islands prior to the war.^15^ Some were temporary migrants, content to work in the Philippines for several years and then return to Japan with their earnings. Others were permanent settlers, many of whom would go on, for example, to establish agricultural operations, open factories, and begin logging operations. Some of these Japanese business owners, Yu-Jose explains, were utilized as advisers and installed as local leaders by the occupying army. Initially, some regarded the Japanese as liberators, freeing the Philippines from the United States and bringing the islands into the Japanese empire. However, in light of the subsequent war atrocities, harsh realities came to light. In October 1943, the Japanese established what is now referred to as the Second Philippine Republic, with José P. Laurel as president. Widely recognized as simply a puppet government, the dominating Japanese military continued occupying the area. Local factories under Japanese control produced goods for the war effort while Filipinos suffered food shortages. Against this backdrop, Filipinos once again organized widespread resistance throughout the islands. Over 250,000 people used guerrilla warfare tactics against Japanese occupiers, who steadily lost control as the war continued. During the war, famed General Douglas MacArthur also organized American troops to fight alongside the Filipinos. From February to March 1945, Filipino soldiers and US troops fought in the Battle of Manila, which would eventually mark the end of the occupation. During this month, at least 100,000 civilians died at the hands of Japanese soldiers. Overall, scholars estimate between 500,000 and one million deaths of Filipinos during the World War II Japanese occupation. After the end of the war, the United States and the Philippines signed the Treaty of Manila on July 4, 1946; Manuel Roxas transitioned from the President of the Commonwealth of the Philippines to first President of an independent Philippine Republic.  General Douglas MacArthur wades ashore during initial landings at Leyte, Philippine Islands. Source: *Wikimedia Commons* at [http://tinyurl. com/p8cuqju]. National Archives and Records Administration. Photo by U.S. Army Signal Corps officer Gaetano Faillace. **Guide to the Present** Yet while "independent" implied a Philippines officially free from foreign rule, many contemporary narratives of Filipino identity, citizenship, and statehood are inevitably influenced by the colonial past and, some say, the continuing undue influence of other countries. The political, social, and economic elites of the country, for example, are often members of the same families that have held power in the country for generations. Gavin Shatkin's "Obstacles to Empowerment: Local Politics and Civil Society in Metropolitan Manila, the Philippines"^16^ traces how Spanish and US colonial authorities granted extensive rights and privileges to favored landowners. Many of these families later leveraged their power into political and economic dynasties, leading to a contemporary Philippine government mired in nepotism, cronyism, and corruption.^17^ After war reparations were paid in the 1950s, Japanese businesses and investors soon returned to the islands. Today, Japan is a strategic economic and political partner of the Philippine government. However, as in the aftermath of Spanish and United States colonialism, Filipinos still struggle with defining a national identity after such widespread traumas. Other challenges for the Philippine state today include settling a territorial dispute regarding areas of the South China Sea with the People's Republic of China; allowing the return of the United States military to the islands; brokering a lasting peace with the historically Muslim-dominated south; coping with the increasing number of Filipinos working overseas, as well as the subsequent social and economic consequences of this migration; and reducing poverty. These realities, juxtaposed against the Philippine Department of Tourism slogan, "It's more fun in the Philippines," suggests that understanding today's Republic of the Philippines means studying the historical roots of power and influences born from the imposition of colonial structures. **Major Contemporary Issues** *Security:* The Philippine government has been dealing with insurgent groups throughout the past couple of decades. Peace talks with the Moro insurgents have brought some stability to the islands, but the government also must deal with the New People's Army, a Communist insurgent group inspired by Maoist principles. The Philippines and China are also in a dispute over sovereignty for the Spratly Islands. *Drugs:* The Philippines are a major consumer and producer of methamphetamines, as well as a producer of marijuana. The government has attempted crackdowns on both but has been unsuccessful so far. 2\. Martial Law In September 1972 Marcos declared [martial law](https://www.britannica.com/topic/martial-law), claiming that it was the last defense against the rising disorder caused by increasingly violent student demonstrations, the [[alleged]](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/alleged) threats of communist insurgency by the new Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), and the Muslim separatist movement of the [Moro National Liberation Front](https://www.britannica.com/topic/Moro-National-Liberation-Front) (MNLF). One of his first actions was to arrest opposition politicians in Congress and the [Constitutional Convention](https://www.britannica.com/event/Constitutional-Convention). Initial public reaction to martial law was mostly favourable except in Muslim areas of the south, where a separatist rebellion, led by the MNLF, broke out in 1973. Despite halfhearted attempts to negotiate a cease-fire, the rebellion continued to claim thousands of military and civilian casualties. Communist insurgency expanded with the creation of the National Democratic Front (NDF), an organization embracing the CPP and other communist groups. Ferdinand Marcos **Ferdinand Marcos** Ferdinand Marcos, 1972.*Slim Aarons/Getty Images* Under martial law the regime was able to reduce violent urban crime, collect unregistered firearms, and suppress communist insurgency in some areas. At the same time, a series of important new [[concessions]](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/concessions) were given to foreign investors, including a prohibition on strikes by [organized labour](https://www.britannica.com/topic/organized-labor), and a land-reform program was launched. In January 1973 Marcos proclaimed the ratification of a new constitution based on the [parliamentary system](https://www.britannica.com/topic/parliamentary-system), with himself as both president and [prime minister](https://www.britannica.com/topic/prime-minister). He did not, however, [[convene]](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/convene) the [[interim]](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/interim) legislature that was called for in that document. General disillusionment with martial law and with the consolidation of political and economic control by Marcos, his family, and close associates grew during the 1970s. Despite growth in the [country's](https://www.britannica.com/topic/nation-state) [gross national product](https://www.britannica.com/topic/gross-national-product), workers' real income dropped, few farmers benefited from [land reform](https://www.britannica.com/topic/land-reform), and the sugar industry was in confusion. The precipitous drop in sugar prices in the early 1980s coupled with lower prices and less demand for coconuts and coconut products---traditionally the most important export commodity---added to the country's economic woes; the government was forced to borrow large sums from the international banking [[community]](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/community). Also troubling to the regime, reports of widespread corruption began to surface with increasing frequency. Elections for an interim [National Assembly](https://www.britannica.com/topic/National-Assembly-historical-French-parliament) were finally held in 1978. The opposition---of which the primary group was led by the jailed former senator Benigno S. Aquino, Jr.---produced such a bold and popular campaign that the official results, which gave Marcos's opposition virtually no seats, were widely believed to have been illegally altered. In 1980 Aquino was allowed to go into exile in the [United States](https://www.britannica.com/place/United-States), and the following year, after announcing the suspension of martial law, Marcos won a virtually uncontested election for a new six-year term.  Ferdinand Marcos waving, 1983.*A1C Virgil C. Zurbruegg//U.S. Department of Defense* **The downfall of Marcos and return of democratic government** The assassination of Benigno Aquino as he returned to [Manila](https://www.britannica.com/place/Manila) in [[August]](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/August) 1983 was generally thought to have been the work of the military; it became the focal point of a renewed and more heavily supported opposition to Marcos's rule. By late 1985 Marcos, under mounting pressure both inside and outside the Philippines, called a snap presidential election for February 1986. [Corazon C. Aquino](https://www.britannica.com/biography/Corazon-Aquino), Benigno's widow, became the candidate of a coalition of opposition parties. Marcos was declared the official winner, but strong public outcry over the election results precipitated a revolt that by the end of the month had driven Marcos from power. Aquino then assumed the presidency. **3. EDSA Revolution** 2016 marks the 30th anniversary of the People Power Revolution. During those momentous four days of February 1986, millions of Filipinos, along Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA) in Metro Manila, and in cities all over the country, showed exemplary courage and stood against, and peacefully overthrew, the dictatorial regime of President Ferdinand E. Marcos. More than a defiant show of unity---markedly, against a totalitarian rule that had time and again proven that it would readily use brute force against any and all dissenters---People Power was a reclaiming of liberties long denied. The millions that gathered for the 1986 People Power Revolution---the culmination of a series of public protests, often dispersed if at all given leave---was a nation wresting itself, as one, back from a dictator. The four-day demonstration along EDSA was a manifestation of the discontent and furies that began with the parliament of the streets during Marcos' totalitarian rule, as Filipinos began, determinedly, to shake off the subjugation. But, the players of this revolution, at the start, knew only to gather; only in EDSA, at the height of the marches and within the multitude of citizens, did standing as one begin to coalesce as a campaign. From its beginnings as an immediate response to the rigged results of the snap elections, and then as a vigil to guard defecting top military men from Marcos' vengeful machinations, a show of support heartily encouraged by the Catholic Church; to streets gradually teeming with people to quietly face off with armored tanks, a confrontation of linked arms and prayers and flowers and songs---the four days of EDSA People Power in itself was an exemplar of the evolution of the Philippine protest. On February 20, 1986, Marcos proclaimed himself victor of the snap elections, and was set to retain the presidency; on the same day, Corazon C. Aquino led a people's victory rally at Luneta and called for civil disobedience, which included the boycotting of known Marcos-crony institutions. Two million people took up the cause with her at that rally; stocks of singled-out companies fell the very next day. Marcos responded with the threat of reinstating Martial Law, should Cory Aquino lead a nationwide strike; he, too, orchestrated a mass demonstration of support---reports emerged that twelve million pesos had been earmarked to pay supporters to attend a proclamation rally in his honor at Luneta. On February 22, Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile, who was once at the center of the declaration of Martial Law in 1972, discovered a plot to implicate him and officers involved in the Reform the Armed Forces Movement in a coup. Faced with only two options---dispersing or regrouping---Enrile chose the latter as the "more honorable" option. He announced his defection from Marcos, alongside Chief of Staff Fabian Ver's deemed successor, Lieutenant General Fidel V. Ramos, from within Camp Aguinaldo and Camp Crame. The Catholic Church announced their support of the two, and enjoined people via radio broadcast to provide aid and, for all purposes, a human cordon to guard them against anticipated counter-offensives. Soon enough, the base and its surroundings were teeming with citizens. Marcos denounced Enrile and Ramos, but speedily changed the venue of his inauguration to Malacañan Palace; there he would be sworn in as president yet again, but this time surrounded by nothing more than courtiers tied to his pursestrings. Back in EDSA, that first night: Close to a hundred thousand held vigil---a number that would only swell. Citizens continue to march to EDSA as individuals or as organized groups with their own safety rope, provisions and banners. Photo by Nestor Barido, People Power: The Philippine Revolution of 1986 On February 23, Enrile and Ramos met along EDSA, surrounded and protected by a growing number of supporters eager for what already seemed then as a fomenting revolution. But Marcos and his remaining officials had mobilized forces still under his command: Columns of armored tanks formed barricades along EDSA, with heavily armed battalions as escort. Thus began the banded Filipinos' show of force---through song and slogans; through earnest extensions of friendship to hard-faced soldiers; through the flashing of the Laban sign---symbol of Cory Aquino's campaign and of the movement that carried her; through prayers and linked arms and rosaries, human barricades and flowers. On February 25, Corazon C. Aquino was sworn in as the elected President, effectively reinstating democracy following decades of the totalitarian rule of the Marcoses. Democracy was swept in through the swell of a unified crowd---and it was this tide of the populace that would fully drive out the dictator from his Palace, stealing out of the country that wanted it no longer and that which could finally act on it. Revolutions often do not erupt and resolve in a matter of days---but the events of February 1986 forever altered the course of our nation's history; it showcased to the world the singular strength of the Filipino people. That pivotal national march along EDSA is only foremost among a long tradition of political demonstrations**.** For more than a century, Filipinos have been taking their grievances to the streets. One of the earliest recorded protests was in 1903, staged by the first workers' union in the country, calling for an eight-hour working day and for the recognition of May 1 as a public holiday. In the decades that followed, in a Philippines under American rule, the streets were the stage to air grievances about unfulfilled promises of upward mobility from the benevolent colonizer. In the 1920s and the 1930s, the protests were manifestations of racial tensions between Filipinos and and Americans: When a Filipino lettuce picker in California died at the hands of Caucasian workers, 15,000 people flocked to Luneta for a memorial service that turned into a protest rally demanding independence from the United States; students of the Manila North High School instigated rallies for the dismissal of an American teacher who insulted her students. These rallies would serve as the foundation of unified and more centralized movements grounded on civil disobedience, calling for Philippine liberty. On July 31, 1931, before the United States Congress passed [[the Hare-Hawes-Cutting Act of 1933]](http://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/the-commonwealth-of-the-philippines/)---the law that would set in motion the decolonization of the Philippines---U.S. Senator Harry B. Hawes of Missouri traveled to Manila to gauge the people's sentiment firsthand. What he found was a demonstration and testimonial calling for national independence held in front of the Legislative Building. In a few years, the Legislative Building (now the National Museum) would be itself witness to the inauguration of [[the Commonwealth of the Philippines]](http://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/the-commonwealth-of-the-philippines/), and the swearing in of the first elected Filipino President and Vice President. Two hundred and fifty thousand men, women, and children turned out to meet the new Commonwealth, either as marchers in the parade or as spectators on the sidelines. The protest stands as a crucial part of Philippine political---of *democratic*, exercise. In their finer moments, the demonstrations were a populace banding together; else, they were stages upon which one fought for rights deemed maligned. Throughout the American Occupation, workers in the provinces would take to the streets to demand better treatment and to air outrage against the state. The protesters were inspired by the civil disobedience movement in India, choosing to boycott pro-American establishments and refusing to pay taxes to what they deemed as an impostor government. Some protests, however, degenerated into armed conflict. At one point, they faced off with the Philippine Constabulary in and around Manila in a violent uprising, which resulted in heavy casualties and the organic disbandment of workers' unions. The Japanese Occupation did what it could to stifle demonstrations feebly coming to life. But this crackdown on unions often drove members who'd evaded arrest to join the larger Hukbong Bayan Laban sa Hapon movement (HUKBALAHAP; The Nation's Army Against the Japanese). With democracy reinstated after the war, the laborers' protests speedily gained strength: a 50,000-strong delegation marched to Malacañan Palace only a month after the Japanese surrendered, demanding better conditions for workers, the release of imprisoned union leaders, and a 60--40 profit sharing system in the provinces. President Sergio Osmeña met their demands. The onset of the Marcos administration would witness a more dynamic philosophy to protests; these demonstrations would continue to evolve as the Marcos presidency transformed into a dictatorship. On April 28, 1969, the Filipino Agrarian Reform Movement (FARM)---composed of intellectuals, journalists, and professionals who were sympathetic to the workers' cause---launched a massive protest known as the Land Justice March in Tarlac, calling for land reform in Central Luzon. The protest march was supposed to end at Malacañang, but President Marcos flew to meet the protesters at Camp Aquino, Tarlac. After he agreed to most of their demands, the Land Justice March dissolved. During this time, FARM also staged a 93-day sit-in in front of Congress for better conditions in peasant communities. Just two years later, in May 1967, Lapiang Malaya---a movement David Sturvenant describes as "a 40,000-member organization much given to ornate uniforms, patriotic posturing, and martial Rizal Day rallies"---called on Marcos to step down; they wanted to take his place. On May 20, more than 500 members were gathered at Lapiang Malaya's headquarters along Taft Avenue in Pasay City, supposedly to participate in a parade-demonstration. The Philippine Constabulary repeatedly attempted to break up the assembly, but eventually tensions rose to the point of violence. In what *The Manila Times* referred to as "Bloody Sunday," 32 bolo-wielding members were slaughtered by Constabulary troops armed with rifles. 358 more were arrested and taken by the Constabulary to Camp Crame in Quezon City. In an attempt to stave off the criticism that it had overreacted, the Constabulary came out with a series dubious of intelligence reports linking the sect to the communists. The Marcos administration's treatment of the Lapiang Malaya protest---turning it into a massacre of 32 farmers, with the Constabulary revealed to be virtually unchecked---was the first major item in the administration's track record against free assembly. Lewis E. Gleeck Jr. writes of Bloody Sunday: "The significant accomplishments of the administration were suddenly diminished by a grave failure in judgment on the part of the Philippine Constabulary \[PC\], which massacred 32 members of Lapiang Malaya, a bolo-armed group of uneducated fanatics who had carelessly been allowed to set up headquarters only a few kilometers distant from Malacañang. When the misguided group was called upon to sheath their bolos and disperse, they refused, and the PC charged them with rifles blazing, destroying not only the bolomen, but staining the reputation of the Constabulary and the Marcos government. This was an example of mistaken judgment that should have cost those who issued the order at least reduction in rank, but no visible disciplinary measures were taken. As \[Rafael\] Salas and later \[Francisco\] Tatad would lament, no Filipino official ever accepted responsibility for failure or errors, let alone resigned as a result of disasters suffered under his command." It was the Lapiang Malaya massacre that impelled staunch Marcos critic Senator Benigno S. Aquino Jr. to describe the Philippines thusly: "A land consecrated to democracy but run by an entrenched plutocracy. Here, too, are a people whose ambitions run high, but whose fulfillment is low and mainly restricted to the self-perpetuating élite. Here is a land of privilege and rank---a republic dedicated to equality but mired in an archaic system of caste." Democracy had, observes Manuel L. Quezon III, "survived the Huk rebellion; and yet, even the beneficiaries of the relative stability of the mid-Fifties to mid-Sixties left an increasingly better-educated and cosmopolitan urban middle class in discontent." Students, who would eventually form a key cornerstone of the Philippine political protest, did not take to demonstrations until the late 1960s. For the most part, they were politically passive---a condition cultivated by the prevailing political culture then; the marked conservativism of the era, itself bolstered by Filipino values; as well as an education system that strongly promoted harmony between the citizenry and the government, especially considering that the latter signed on 15,000 new hires every year. Quirino Samonte writes: "---what are the prospects of an activist *vis-à-vis* the *status quo*? For those who defy the law, the price can be high indeed as exemplified by those who chose to cast their lot with the 'Huks'---a rebellious movement of peasants that had its roots in the social and economic injustices of agriculture's tenancy system, but which has since become the feeding ground of Communist agitators." And yet, with changing political currents and shifting social mores, campuses would soon thrive as activist hubs. The 1960s saw a resurgence of nationalism among college students, who demonstrated against a spectrum of issues---from US imperialism, as seen in the deployment of Philippine troops to the Vietnam War, to the US military bases dotting the Philippines; to specific, sector-based issues that paralleled workers' movements decades prior. The relatively insular but undoubtedly more sweeping issue at the heart of many a student outrage were individual school policies: School administrations would fail to respond to demands of lowered tuition fees, of granting independence to student organizations and publications, of improving facilities and the curriculum. Campus activism found campaigns in the widening gap between the rich and the poor, best exemplified by the divide between the working students of the proletariat and the collective elite of a handful of Manila schools, both public and private---hand in hand with this were the proliferation of "diploma mills" within the capital. Eva Lotta-Hedman and John Sidel observe: "As the demand for formal qualifications and accreditation increased on the urban employment market, privately-run specialist colleges and technical institutes packed unprecedented numbers of fee-paying students into overcrowded and sometimes seriously dilapidated classrooms and even condemned buildings in downtown Manila. For example, the Philippine College of Commerce counted among its rapidly growing student population 'mostly children of the lowest-income groups---laborers, janitors, carpenters, even laundrywomen.'" Manila was overrun with the children of the laboring classes, outraged at institutions, at society, and at the state. All of this roundly grew into a pitch, the calls for reform and demonstrations of discontent galvanizing into solid movements. By the late 1960s, Lotta-Hedman and Sidel note, students would, as collectives, picket campuses, march in the streets of Manila, and demonstrate outside Congress: "Whilst this wave of student activism focused but brief attention on 'dialogue' and 'reform' at the top of college administrations as well as national government, it also left behind a battle-scarred downtown area where buildings with broken and boarded-up windows remained a powerful testimony to the moment of struggle, thus recalling fragments of collective memory from the amnesia of history through lived experience itself." The culture of activism, with its reformists and its radicals, would only strengthen; there was power in the demonstration, of making one's voice heard in a disruptive mass; one would not be ignored. Soon enough, campus activism would branch out, coalesce among classes, and reach out to integrate plights other than theirs: The provincial poor, the working class. The power of the masses, led by a youth made aware of their ability to compel the state to stop and listen, would reach a bloody climax in 1970, with what would be recorded in our history books as the First Quarter Storm. Toward the end of 1969; Ferdinand E. Marcos won an unprecedented full second term as president in, Lewis Gleeck Jr. writes, "the most violent and fraudulent campaign the country had ever seen." At this point, fervent calls for a revolution were not isolated to reformists and radicals, but involved conservative circles as well. Discontent was building solidarity: Sympathizers from all walks of life would link arms and protest an increasingly unpopular and thoroughly objectionable administration. The reelection of a president no one wanted any longer brought in a tide of outrage, one that lasted and lingered for three months, marked by often violent demonstrations: "The radical students, already disdainful of a political system dominated by elitist, ideologically indistinguishable parties, reacted to Marcos' tainted reelection with a vengeance." The First Quarter Storm officially began on January 26, 1970, on the streets surrounding Congress, where Marcos delivered the first State of the Nation Address (SONA) of his second term. Student organizations, spearheaded by the National Union of Students of the Philippines and with the support of workers and members of the urban poor, crafted a manifesto in preparation for the SONA; a permit to rally was applied for, and some 20,000 people trooped to Congress. They were met, however, by a cadre of uniformed men in battle gear garlanding the streets, patrolling entry points. The rally went on peacefully beneath the blare of the sound system carrying Marcos' SONA, which boasted of the country's improved peace and order situation. But when Marcos and his wife Imelda exited the halls of Congress, demonstrators---spurred on by agitators and harassed by uniformed personnel---rushed at them, throwing bottles and placards and stones as they entered their limousine. The security force pushed back at the demonstrators. The mob was broken up by the police with batons; students were beaten with truncheons. Two accounts give opposing views of the January 26 protest. Jose F. "Pete" Lacaba sympathizes with the student demonstrators in his classic, "The January 26 Confrontation: A Highly Personal Account." Lacaba was outside with the students and described the violence in detail: students were chased by the police, hauled out of jeepneys, and beaten with rattan sticks. Lacaba himself took a blow to his waist from a policeman. Kerima Polotan's account, "The Long Week," tells a different story. From inside Congress, she took fashion notes---a who's who in barong, coat and tie, or terno---and offered snide remarks at the expense of members of the opposition, such as Senators Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino Jr. and Gerardo "Gerry" Roxas. Her account of the violence outside was taken from Manila Police District chief Colonel Gerardo Tamayo: one cop lost four teeth, another received ten stitches on his head, another sustained a nail in his knee. On January 30, to protest the violent dispersal of the January 26 student-led rally, another demonstration was held in front of Malacañan Palace---candles burned beside an effigy of a coffin, to symbolize the death of democracy. In the streets that radiated from the Palace, more and more protesters were gathering, marching toward the breach in the gates; as security tried to break up the mobs, doors would open to the rallyists, second-floor windows opened revealing strangers serving as frantic look-outs. The "clean-up" of the street protests took some seven hours, with shows of solidarity in an increasingly bloody evening punished by a police force that did not distinguish between protesters and sympathizers. (In the meantime, Nick Joaquin, notes: "That night, an exodus of privilege made ghost towns of the exclusive villages in the suburbs; the chi-chi crowd, fear in their guts and guilt in their hearts, holed up with their hysteria in the big hotels, driven there by the certainty that Forbes Park and Bel-Air and Dasmariñas and Magallanes would be set afire by an avenging people.") Rallyists retaliated with force. They started fires and destroyed property; a fire truck was rammed into the Palace gates. At Mendiola, students armed with bamboo sticks faced off against a battalion wielding heavy artillery. Demonstrators were killed---one 23-year-old student, performing in a mock trial of a Marcos effigy, was shot in the head---several others wounded in clashes that ran late into the night. Marcos, in his diaries, wrote about the siege of his Palace: "...demonstrators numbering about 10,000 students and laborers stormed Malacañan Palace, burning part of the medical building, crashing through Gate 4 with a fire truck that had been forcibly commandeered by some laborers and students amidst shouts of 'Mabuhay Dante!' and slogans from Mao-Tse-Tung, the new Communist Party of the Philippines and the New People's Army. The rioters sought to enter Malacañang but the Metropolitan Command (METROCOM) of the Philippine Constabulary and the Presidential Guards repulsed them towards Mendiola Bridge, where in an exchange of gunfire, hours later, four persons were killed and scores from both sides injured. The crowd was finally dispersed by tear gas grenades." Though the protracted battle between authorities and students who stormed the Palace would conclude by dawn, the First Quarter Storm would only escalate, sustained by a citizenry disillusioned and outraged by the state's intolerant and violent responses to expressions of democracy. A year after the First Quarter Storm, in the lead-up to the 1971 midterm elections, UP students, supported by faculty members and non-academic personnel, staged a sympathy strike in support of *Pasang Masda*, an organization of jeepney drivers that protested gas price hikes. The students occupied the Diliman campus and blockaded its main roads through the use of a new weapon of protest: the human barricade. This nine-day uprising was known as the "Diliman Commune." Some residents in the area banded together and hunted down the radical students in the defense of order and their property rights. President Marcos ordered the Philippine Constabulary Metropolitan Command to retake the campus. The Philippine Constabulary went to UP and dismantled the barricades; three students died in the violence that ensued. The demonstrations in UP Diliman ended only after the school administration accepted some of the demands of the students. The military siege was put to a halt following a recommendation made by university president Salvador Lopez to President Marcos. One contemporary observer noted that after the Diliman commune, "protest classes, boycotts, demonstrations became almost a daily spectacle that would beset the University until the declaration of martial law." Lotta-Hedman and Sidel note that, given "the mounting political activism that swept Manila campuses during this decade, students increasingly left their classrooms throughout the University belt not only to shop for food or school supplies, or watch movies, but to join in the mass demonstrations that filed through or converged upon downtown. As students, faculty members, workers, and peasants alike---and sometimes, together---launched new radical organisations and engaged in concerted collective campaigns during the course of the decade. Plaza Miranda---'the crossroads of the nation'---became a familiar destination not just for Nazareno devotees, downmarket clients, and during election years, political candidates, but also for mass activists--as well as the Metropolitan Anti-Riot squads organised for the occasion." Located no more than a kilometer from Malacañan Palace, Plaza Miranda was the largest venue from which rallyists could be physically close to the residence of the country's chief executive, whether in loyal support or oppositionist denunciation. In the era of grand demonstrations and mass mobilizations, National Artist for Literature Nick Joaquin, in his *Almanac for Manileños*, described Plaza Miranda as "the crossroads of the nation, the forum of the land." President Ramon Magsaysay, arguably the most popular of our postwar chief executives, famously recognized the square as a gauge of public opinion when he asked a proponent of a policy or project: [["Can we defend this at Plaza Miranda?"]](http://malacanang.gov.ph/75022-defend-it-at-plaza-miranda-a-history-of-the-countrys-foremost-public-square/) Far removed from the closed, air-conditioned rooms of Congress or cushioned seats in public buildings, bringing an issue to Plaza Miranda was the ultimate act of transparency and accountability, where the people, any Juan or Juana de la Cruz, could question their government. A year following the First Quarter Storm, the political situation in Manila and throughout the country was at a fever pitch. Growing disenchantment with Marcos put his political future at stake with the 1971 midterm Senatorial elections---the traditional dividing line between a president's continued political relevance or reduction to lame duck. The sons of Presidents Osmeña and Roxas, united under the Liberal Party, led the opposition to President Ferdinand Marcos. Senators Sergio Osmeña Jr. and Gerardo Roxas were both victims in the Plaza Miranda bombing, which would indelibly link the Liberal Party of the Philippines to the public square's identity as the forum of Philippine democracy. On August 21, 1971, at the miting de avance of the Liberal Party in Plaza Miranda, the square became the scene of two simultaneous grenade attacks that nearly liquidated the party's leadership, just as Senator Roxas, Liberal Party President, was proclaiming his party's candidates for the City of Manila. Among those who sustained serious injury were: Roxas, Osmeña, Senators Jovito Salonga, Genaro Magsaysay, Eva Estrada-Kalaw (a Nacionalista guest candidate of the LP), and senatorial bets John Henry Osmeña and Ramon Mitra Jr. Roxas would hold President Marcos responsible for the attack: "The Plaza Miranda incident has illustrated beyond doubt that there is not a safe place in the country where people may express their views without having to face the perils of assassination. I have only one message to leaders, followers and the electorate: Nothing will deter the LP nor dampen its determination to win the mandate of the people this election. We shall continue to fight for the right of our citizenry. I am grateful to the Almighty for those of us who were fortunate to have been spared." Widely considered the most blatant assault on free speech and guaranteed democratic rights at the time, many quarters believed it to be masterminded by Marcos himself, which led to increased opposition to his administration. Three months later, the polls resulted in a Senate sweep by the Liberals, with only two Marcos allies making it into the winner's circle. The President's alter egos---Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile and Secretary of Labor Blas Ople---were among the losers. The Marcos years, characterized by the Machiavellian exercise of power preservation, fomented political unrest: Alleged graft and corruption by the administration and her cronies would worsen the disparity of wealth and grow the gap between the extremely wealthy and the very poor. Civilians took to rioting, which fed the administration's hunger to be on the defensive and thus respond with aggression. This heightened sense of control meant the suppression of civil liberties and before long, President Ferdinand Marcos found himself addressing the public, justifying the need for power to be vested solely in his hands. [[On the afternoon of September 21, 1972]](http://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/featured/declaration-of-martial-law/), the last protest before the declaration of Martial Law was held in Plaza Miranda. Sponsored by Concerned Christians for Civil Liberties, the demonstration was attended by a crowd of 30,000 people from different sectors---civic, religious, labor, student, and activist. [[The September 23, 1972 declaration of Martial Law]](http://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/featured/infographic-day-marcos-declared-martial-law-september-23-1972/) planted the seeds of discontent that would make dissent and revolution necessary---even vital---to the restoration of democracy. Urban protest did not vanish entirely, even under Martial Law. On the day before the Interim Batasang Pambansa elections, for example, residents of Metro Manila organized a show of support for the incarcerated ex-Senator Ninoy Aquino, who was the leader of the opposition candidates: the noise barrage held on April 6, 1978, would become one of the most famous protests of the era. At 8:00 p.m., people went out into the streets, making whatever noise they could "to let Ninoy Aquino in his prison cell know that the people had heard his message." They banged on pots and pans, honked their car horns, and shouted their throats sore in support of Ninoy and his party, Lakas ng Bayan (LABAN; the People's Power). A period of relative quiet followed; but in 1983, the assassination of the foremost critic of the Marcos dictatorship---the man who was among those first arrested in the declaration of Martial Law---revived the nation out of inaction. Fifteen minutes after Ninoy Aquino returned to the country after three years of exile in the United States, he was dead on the tarmac of the Manila International Airport. Chairman of the National Historical Commission of the Philippines, Maria Serena I. Diokno, writes, "It was the Aquino assassination, more than any other event in the Marcos regime's long history of repression and violence, which moved countless Filipinos, especially the once-timid middle class, to awaken and jointly fight the reality of dictatorship. For many it was, in the words of a Makati businessman '... the spark that gave us the courage to speak up.' Indeed, from that shocking moment on the tarmac in August 1983 until the EDSA Revolution in February 1986, numerous organizations emerged to protest the iron strength of the Marcos dictatorship." Until then, the country's demonstrators had been stilled under Martial Law, with the regime unrelenting in its campaign to stifle free speech, much less audacious displays of opposition. But with Aquino's assassination, Filipinos took to the streets to honor the dead, to cast their lot with the fallen hero. It was in the streets of Manila, with Ninoy Aquino's funeral cortege escorted by millions, that the Filipino people themselves undertook what the dictatorship denied: The flag in front of [[the Rizal Monument]](http://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/rizal-monument/) was lowered to half-mast, in symbolic tribute from the Republic's protomartyr to its new martyr of democracy. Diokno writes of the sea-change regarding popular outrage that gained strength on August 31, 1983: "On that day, about two million Filipinos turned out to be counted; they joined the procession, lined the streets, displayed banners and ribbons, and chanted all throughout an eleven-hour journey. The unprecedented funeral set the tone for the protest movement that was to evolve. It was a movement that in the next two years increasingly challenged the Marcos regime's stockpile of teargas, bullets, and repressive presidential decrees. In subsequent rallies and varied mass actions, demonstrators, linking arms and bearing no weapons, bravely faced the U.S.-supplied arms of the state." The indignation and the grief, fuelling the resurgence of democratic expression, spread across all sectors---the country had once again found a single banner from which it could unite and struggle, against the innumerable abuses of the Marcos regime. When before efforts to mobilize the masses would come to naught or prove at best to be ephemeral, the anti-government protests following Ninoy's death would last months, and once again bring to the fore movements that would usher in more definitive campaigns for the restoration of democracy in the Philippines. Mark Thompson shares government estimates of the upswell of protest inspired by Ninoy's murder: "165 rallies, marches, and other demonstrations took place between August 21 and September 30, 1983. The largest was Aquino's funeral procession in Manila, which took eleven hours and was attended by an estimated 2 million people. Protest demonstrations continued into the following year, with more than 100 held between October 1983 and February 1984. The biggest of these was the 120-kilometer 'Tarlac to Tarmac' run (from Aquino's home province to the international airport where he was murdered), attended by an estimated five hundred thousand people." The protest movement swept across socioeconomic strata---even, notably, among the country's middle-class and sympathetic elite. In Ayala Avenue, the country's foremost financial and business district, meetings, public demonstrations, and protest marches would be held weekly following the Aquino assassination to the beat of ati-atihan drums, and often under a blanket of yellow confetti drifting from the buildings. The murder of Ninoy Aquino during the Marcos regime would set in motion the beginning of the revolution that would reclaim the country from the dictatorship. Marcos would struggle to maintain his control over the people, even instigating charades of democracy: On February 7, 1986, nationwide snap elections were held for the presidency and the newly restored position of vice president. The contenders were the tandem of Marcos and Arturo M. Tolentino, versus Cory Aquino, widowed spouse of assassinated Ninoy, and Salvador H. Laurel. Aquino had proven her charismatic and emblematic sway over the people just months prior; the Cory Aquino for President Movement had ensured for her 1.2 million signatures calling for her candidacy alone---a feat rendered more remarkable given the suppressions of the times. However, as the votes were tallied, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) numbers showed Marcos and Tolentino the winners, a result made official by the Batasang Pambansa. As government tried to rubberstamp its way to victory, a series of astounding events began to grip the world's attention: computer operators tabulating Comelec votes walked out; the bishops of the Catholic Church issued a pastoral letter saying a government that cheated was devoid of legitimacy; Cory Aquino called for a civil disobedience campaign and a boycott of crony-owned corporations until the opposition victory was recognized. Within two weeks of the snap elections, multitudes of demonstrators would fill the vast expanse of EDSA calling for---and achieving---the peaceful ouster of a dictator. The Revolution of 1986 sparked a selfless sense of community in multitudes, rarely seen in such demonstrations. Edwin Lacierda, presidential spokesperson of Cory's son, Benigno S. Aquino III, was there to witness: "More than a rally," he recalls, "all of us came to EDSA to break bread and fellowship with all who were willing to stand in the line of fire and take the bullet, as it were, for freedom and change of government." When Jaime Cardinal Sin broadcasted his famous message to gather at EDSA over Radio Veritas, hundreds of thousands heeded the call. Food was never a problem, thanks to volunteer "food brigades"; there was always a pot of rice, a pan of pancit, tins of crackers to be passed around. When rumors spread of a potential teargas attack, residents near camps Crame and Aguinaldo scrambled to provide protesters with wet handkerchiefs and towels. People did not hesitate to sacrifice their cars to barricade the advance of the tanks; one owner simply shrugged off the threat of losing his automobile and said, "Some things are worth more." When the Malolos Congress---which ushered in the birth of the First Philippine Republic---was ratified, among the witnesses was a delegation of Filipino soldiers who had marched away from a Manila that they had won but which was barred to them: Spain refused to hand over the capital and stronghold to the Filipinos who had survived revolutions to overthrow 300 years of rule and had since forged uneasy alliances with Americans to secure victory. There, witnessing the foundation of a true modern state for Filipinos, was an army that had won back the country, to no recognition of two warring conquerors. The old trope of paths not taken is one examined by Nick Joaquin in his play *El Camino Real*: One Emilio Aguinaldo reflects upon his missed chance of taking back Manila from the Spaniards sans the aid of Americans by marching down El Camino Real, the royal road---now the Coastal Road that connects Manila's south to Cavite. There had lain before Aguinaldo the path of true conquest---a path that reclaimed what was rightfully the Filipinos', a path that could have been forged by Filipinos alone---and Aguinaldo had not taken it. Joaquin, through an imagining of Aguinaldo's inner life, opines on a Philippines that could have been wrought had one man, leading a host of others, marched down the path of kings. But we Filipinos have known to take confidently to the streets our devotions and our yearnings, our furies. On streets we gather to be heard, to be seen, by the powers that be. We gather in thoroughfares to welcome home triumphant athletes and venerated celebrities; we sanctify the celebrity, trailing after roving stages. When the sitting Pope visits with the country's Catholic faithful, the roads are lined with often rain-drenched thousands hopeful for a glimpse of, a wave from, a benediction. We honor the dead, close down arteries of the city to march after a coffin inching to its final resting place. We topple a dictator, even at the cost of our lives; we rise up when the state threatens to turn its back on its citizens. We rouse, we march, *we rally*. The same streets that we cross to go to our schools and offices and malls are the streets that hold us when we craft papier mâché facsimiles of public figures, unfurl canvas sheets emblazoned with slogans, and chant battle cries; it is these streets that hold us as we stand vigil. We stand upon the very streets we lament on the day-to-day---via debates, consciously made or otherwise, pitting inconvenience against development---when we need the Republic to listen; the volume of people we scorn in our daily tribulations become brothers- and sisters-in-arms when a goal must be won for the citizenry. The commonplace, the purely pragmatic---at its most fundamental: A line, be it straight or weaving, that conveys us from one point to another---becomes a stage upon which revolutions spark. For on and along roads---first cleared paths through foliage and terra, and then lined dirt and then gravel, and then asphalt and steel and concrete---shooting through our archipelago, Filipinos gather---collective movements within all these centuries creating a true cartography of Philippine democracy. **REFERENCES** Association for Asian Studies. The Philippines: An Overview of the Colonial Era [[https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/the-philippines-an-overview-of-the-colonial-era/]](https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/the-philippines-an-overview-of-the-colonial-era/) Martial Law [[https://www.britannica.com/place/Philippines/Martial-law]](https://www.britannica.com/place/Philippines/Martial-law) EDSA