observed in this province of Pampanga, in that of Bulacan, and in
those of Tondo and Laguna de Bay (which he has visited personally),
cannot any longer permit such extortions and injuries as are caused,
among all classes of persons, to the farmers and poor Indians in the
said provinces, and in the other districts to which this decree will
also be made to extend: I command that in future the implements of
labor--such as carabaos, plows, hemp-combs, and other field utensils
belonging to the Indians, mestizos, creoles, Spaniards, or any other
class of persons--shall not be seized for a civil debt, any more than
their lands, since most of them have no ownership in these. Moreover,
they shall not be arrested at the times when they must work in the
fields, such as plowing, and gathering their harvests: and, at the
times when they can be arrested, authority shall be given to the
alcaldes-mayor so that they can grant them a respite of six months,
without loading them with fees or other exactions.
And, as the backward state of agriculture in Filipinas proceeds
also from the fact that, notwithstanding there are many industrious,
laborious and charitable persons in the villages, there are also many
others in whom sloth and idleness reign--for instance, many chiefs and
their sons, and the heads of barangay; and generally these who have
exercised the office of magistrate (who, on account of having served
in these employments, afterward refuse through a sort of vanity and
pride to go back to field work), all these caring only to subjugate the
common people by compelling them to work without pay in their fields,
and trying to exempt themselves from the common labor, and from the
other burdens to which those who pay tribute are subject--likewise
this chief executive has resolved to declare that such exemptions
ought not to be understood for the classes of persons who are mentioned
above, unless they possess at least eight cabalitas of their own land
cultivated and worked by their servants or day-laborers, expressly
forbidding that they rent these lands to others--always provided that
they are not prevented by age or infirmities from carrying on their
farm-work in person, since in this case they are allowed to rent them.
And although, in regard to the contract of casamajan [217] which
they commonly practice, absolute prohibition ought to be made to
them on account of the burden which ensues from it to the poor, and
also to their own consciences, on account of the many usurious acts
which are committed therein, [yet] considering, as has been already
stated, that there will be many who, on account of age and sickness,
cannot themselves attend to the cultivation of their land, this chief
executive consents to grant such persons a contract of that sort,
under the condition that whatever loan is made to the farmers by
their partners, it shall be in the form of palay, and they shall
collect it in the same; that is, if they shall lend, for example,
four cavans [of rice], they shall receive four others. And the same is
ordained in regard to money, so that if they shall lend, for example,
two pesos they shall receive only two pesos; and, if they shall lend
cloth, if it is not returned they may only receive its just value at
the time when the bargain was made--under the penalty that no judge
shall admit any claim in contravention of this ordinance, and the
complainants shall lose what they had lent.
Besides this, I have in the same manner heard of the unjust and vile
bargains which the usurers make in regard to the cultivated lands,
and even the trees which the farmers cultivate in their gardens, and
their houses, binding them with the agreement of retrovendendi, [218]
as it is commonly called, exacting from him who is bound--sometimes
for many years, and sometimes forever--the produce and the ownership
[of those possessions], for a small amount which the lender has
furnished. They also exact a premium for the money which they lend,
sometimes in valuables, and sometimes besides these. This is done by
a multitude of usurers who overrun the island, with great offense to
God and injury to their neighbors. In order to redress such evils,
which provoke divine justice against the islands, this chief executive
has also resolved to ordain that in future such contracts shall not
be made, either by writing or in words; for they are null and void,
and usurious. And we forbid all the magistrates of these islands
to give hearing to any claim arising from these contracts; if they
contravene this order, they remain responsible for all losses and
injuries, with the penalty, besides, of a fine of five hundred pesos.
Besides this, the inhabitants of all the islands ought to have
understood that the lands which they obtained are all royal [realengas]
or communal, with the exception of those which they possess through
inheritance, or through legitimate purchase from the native chiefs
[caciques] who were cultivating them at the time when the Catholic
faith was established in Filipinas, and when they rendered fidelity,
obedience, and vassalage to the august Spanish monarchs; and of those
which were purchased from his Majesty with title of ownership from
the royal Audiencia. [They should also understand] that for this
reason the royal lands cannot be absolutely sold or alienated, since
they only enjoy the use and usufruct of them; consequently, those
who fail to cultivate them for the years appointed by the Audiencia
lose this right of use, and the magistrates ought to assign these
lands immediately to another person. As for the rest of the lands,
no one can obtain them except by right of purchase and agreement
with the tribunal of indults and compositions [219] of lands, which
his Majesty has established for this purpose. In the same manner, the
lands which they hold by this tenure, as those inherited, or purchased
from native chiefs, they cannot sell without the intervention of
the court of justice. For this reason, warning is given that in the
house-lots of the villages also they have no more than the use of the
land; on this account, whenever the term of three years has passed
without those who had formerly lived on them building houses on these
lots, it has been and is the duty of the court to assign these lots
to other persons--without allowing or accepting lawsuit or claim,
when this neglect is evident, either through general report or by the
verbal deposition of witnesses who have resided there a long time and
are conscientious; for these house-lots are common property of the
villages in which they are located, and for this reason the ownership
of them cannot be sold, because this title does not belong to those
who dwell in them. In regard to this matter, and with observation
and knowledge of the injuries connected with it, this chief executive
(having been actually present in this, province of Pampanga, and in
the others that have been named) likewise ordains that the house and
house-lot cannot be seized from any debtor, of whatever class he may
be, as is commonly done--leaving in the street, and exposed to beggary
and other evils, a multitude of Indians who perhaps would again be
self-supporting, if they could have recourse to their own sheltering
roof (which hardly would be worth as much as ten pesos), and the trees
which they enjoyed on their own land. Proceedings must be taken only
against their goods, without leaving them or their wives destitute;
for it is very well known (as those who lend ought to know) that no
one can lend to a native more than five pesos--an amount which he
can easily pay with his work, or with some article of luxury which
he may possess. This regulation must serve for the magistrates,
as they are ordained and commanded, in order that they may conform
to it; and, in virtue of the ordinance by his Majesty that in cases
involving from one to five hundred pesos formal claim shall not be
brought into court, the alcaldes-mayor shall decide these verbally,
without receiving formal complaints, or anything else except the
[original] documents, or the verbal declaration or confrontation of
the parties. It must be noted that in cases where this is necessary,
and the complaining party shall name some valuable article which is
worth the amount of his demand, the magistrate shall proceed to sell
it in the public square; and by selling it to the highest bidder,
in one day (which shall be announced by the public crier), payment
shall be made to the claimant, handing over the rest to the debtor,
and deducting only such fees as are proper for the few hours of
time which the judge may have spent on the case. By this, however,
must be understood that in such cases their wooden houses which may
have some value (as they actually do in most of the villages) shall
not remain exempt from seizure; for it is certain that the owners of
such houses, if through ill-luck or calamity they come to misfortune,
can never lack some means among their own relatives for establishing
themselves in some humble house, which they can erect as cheaply as
I have just stated.
In regard to the repartimientos of people for the royal works,
which are constructed in the provinces near Manila, as also in
regard to the domestic servants [tanores], and other people who are
assigned for work on the churches, government buildings, and jails,
and guards [bantayes], etc., various regulations have been made;
but, knowing that these are not sufficient to uproot so many wrongs,
injuries and oppressions as the Indians suffer from the magistrates
of their villages, and from the heads of barangay--making the villages
contribute a greater number of people than is needed and required, and
exempting from their turn of service those who should render it (both
of these proceedings serving to defraud the poor, who, in order not to
leave their grain fields, yield whatever the magistrates and chiefs
ask from them, according to their caprice and the extent of their
greed)--it is ordained and commanded that both these repartimientos
be carried out with the knowledge and consent of the parish curas. To
each individual cura must be sent a statement of the number of people
necessary, and of the quota from each village; and the headmen shall
be under strict obligation to obtain certificates from the said father
curas that they have carried out the repartimiento in conformity with
the decrees. It must be understood that these repartimientos cannot
be made in conscience, and without contravention of the law, among the
farmers and artisans who are occupied in their tasks, so long as there
are wandering and idle people, since these last are the ones assigned
by the law for these necessities. As little are the sons of the chief
exempt, or the heads of barangay who have no occupation, or those who
have held an official position, if, relying on this sort of privilege,
they do not return to their former occupation or duties in the field.
Finally, it is ordained and commanded to all the governors,
corregidors, alcaldes-mayor, and other magistrates throughout the
island, that they most punctually observe and fulfil whatever is here
decreed, in order thus to render greater service to God, and to the
king--who has entrusted to the carefulness, conscience and vigilance
of this supreme government the welfare of these islands and of all
their inhabitants; also their social condition, just government,
promotion, and reputation. And the said governors, corregidors,
alcaldes-mayor and other magistrates here mentioned are warned to
fulfil whatever is here decreed, under a penalty of five hundred
pesos fine; and on the alcaldes of the natives, the mestizos, and
others of their class a fine of twenty pesos is imposed, both fines
to be applied in the usual manner. These fines shall be exacted from
them whenever any application shall be presented that is founded upon
any transgression of this decree, or when its infraction shall be
proved in any manner. And as it is necessary that the parish priests
shall aid, on their side, and shall be zealous for its fulfilment,
the reverend and illustrious archbishops and bishops and the devout
provincials of the islands shall be urgently requested to incite
and oblige their parish priests to the observance of these wholesome
regulations and ordinances, charging upon their consciences that if
they know of any failure to observe the decree, they shall communicate
it to the supreme government. The said reverend prelates shall also be
notified that this supreme government expects--from their well-known
zeal and love for their flocks, and because they have resigned all
else for the greater service of God and of the king--that they will
coöperate by their utterances and with their effective persuasions in
fulfilling by all means the desires and intentions of the governor,
who considers himself under the strictest obligation to issue this
ordinance, and to command that it be carried out until his Majesty
shall be pleased to confirm it. Before his royal throne will be
presented the merit and activity of each one of those who excel
in solicitude for its observance, a full account of which will be
given to his Majesty in our next despatches. And, in order that this
decree may be known in all the villages and in all the districts of
the island, and published with all possible fulness and clearness,
it shall be translated into all the dialects; and as many copies as
shall be necessary shall be printed, in two columns, the first in
Castilian, and the second in the respective idiom of the province to
which it shall be sent. Copies of these shall be posted everywhere
in the magistrates' offices of the villages, and printed copies shall
be supplied to all the courts of the capital, in order that they may
observe and fulfil the decree, so far as it belongs to them.
At the village of Arayat, on the twentieth day of the month of March,
1784,
Don Joseph Basco y Vargas
By command of his Lordship:
Vizente Gonzales de Tagle, notary-public ad interim of the
government. [220]
AGRICULTURAL CONDITIONS IN 1866
[The following article is taken from Jagor's Reisen, pp. 303-306.]
Excepting some large estates acquired in earlier times through
donation, landed property originated mainly through the right of
occupation by the possessor and his rendering the land productive which
even now is a common right recognized in the laws of the Indias in
favor of the indigenous inhabitants. In the exercise of this right,
the native takes possession of such unused land as is necessary
for his house and tilled fields, and loses it only when it remains
uncultivated for two years. Setting aside these native (and likewise
very poor) landed proprietors, landed property is legally acquired in
the following manner: through purchase from the state of a certain
area of unimproved crown lands [Spanish, realengas]; through actual
purchase from the natives who possess property; through contracts
(called pactos de retro) concluded with the natives; and through
the pledging or hypothecation of bonds, which even these natives are
accustomed to agree to, especially in commercial dealings.
The first of these means ought to be a source of wealth; but it is
not, for various reasons. At present very few persons are familiar
with the legislation regarding the unused crown land, which consists
of numberless single decrees forming a casuistical, disconnected,
complicated, and confused mass.... By a royal order of 1857, the first
offer for untilled crown lands was fixed at fifty dollars a quiñon;
and the concession could not be secured without a previous public
auction. From that time private persons held aloof from such demands;
to the former evils are added the high price, and the danger of being
outbidden in the auction, and thus of losing one's trouble and expense
for the examination of the lands. In 1859 the decree was modified, and
the former price of four reals a quiñon as first offer was established;
but this decree is not yet published.
In order that capital may flow into agriculture--without which that
industry cannot possibly be developed to the production of grain
and colonial products for exportation--it is absolutely necessary
to overcome all obstacles which discourage men of wealth. Among
these hindrances stands in the first rank the local administration,
in regard to the granting of untilled crown lands; in the second,
the obstructions which are placed in the way of both [Spanish]
natives and foreigners who wish to acquire rights of settlement and
citizenship in the community. Besides the difficulty of acquiring large
possessions, still others exist. The planter can easily find laborers,
to whom he must make considerable advances in food, cattle, and money;
but the Indians pay little attention to fulfilling their contracts,
and the legal means at the command of the planter for compelling
them to fulfill their past engagements are as burdensome and ruinous
as even the abandonment of his rights. Unless the alcalde is active
and shows good-will, the planters usually prefer not to press their
claims; they endure the loss, and many are thus induced to abandon
their enterprises. This cancer on agriculture will disappear as soon
as every Indian possesses a certificate of citizenship [Bürgerbrief;
Spanish, cédula de vecindad]. If one weathers the first year, storms,
locusts, and business crises are to be expected later, all of which
depress the price of his product. In such cases it is for the planter
the greatest evil that no credit exists. There are no mortgages, at
least there is no compulsory registration of mortgages; accordingly,
no one dares to lend his money on such estates, or he does it only at
crushing rates of usurious interest. An improvement in this respect is
urgently demanded by the agricultural interests, both great and small,
by the mercantile class, and by large and small estates; it would place
a limit to the pacto de retro, as well as to the usurious contracts
which are called in Luzon tacalanan, in Bisaya alili--the furnishing
of loans on the proceeds of the next harvest--to which must be ascribed
the misery and the backward conditions that prevail in many places....
The pacto de retro is one of the most usual modes in which landed
property passes from the possession of the natives to others. A
considerable part of Pampanga, Bataan, Manila, Laguna, Batangas,
and other provinces has, within a few years, changed owners in this
way. Thus also do the inexpressibly cunning and thrifty mestizos
usually acquire their landed possessions, the cultivation of which
they then improve; but that does not prevent this custom from being
detrimental to the public welfare. The native who possesses a piece of
land through placing it under cultivation and actually occupying it,
but almost never (or very seldom) by purchase from another owner, when
he finds himself in pressing need of money offers his land as a pledge
for the desired loan from a capitalist; but where he has no document to
establish and prove his just claim, no foundation exists for a loan on
mortgage under moderate conditions, since the applicant is free from
all burdens and obligations. The capitalist therefore looks for his
own security in immediate possession. The hypotheca is converted into
an antichresis security (prenda pretoria), and as it is with great
difficulty (or at least it very seldom occurs), that the Indian who
receives the money consents to pay it back at the appointed time,
and it is not to the lender's interest to force him to pay it, the
result is, that for a sum corresponding to the secured loan--that is,
for a half or a third of the value of the security--the piece of land
finally changes proprietors. Not seldom it happens that the former
proprietor remains on the land as a farmer (that is, as a laborer,
in reality as a slave to his debts). Often the Indian is seduced into
contracts of this sort by his passion for cockfighting and gambling.
The laws of the country require the Indians to live in villages,
uniting their farms into hamlets, so that they can be watched over
and their tributes collected. In ordinary circumstances, the Indian
builds for himself a hut in his field, where he lives while he is
working his land, and goes on Saturday evenings to the village in
order to hear mass on Sunday. His field has no great value for him,
since he can always put another piece of land into cultivation,
so great is the surplus of land in all the villages remote from
the capital. The facility with which he can abandon one tract to
take possession of another is very detrimental to the development
of agriculture. A small landed proprietor, who has planted a bit of
waste land with rice or potatoes without asking any one's permission,
raises an outcry if his garden is entered by a cow or a horse that
grazed there years ago; and, since the law stands in his favor, he
is allowed to receive from the owner of the cattle payment for often
imaginary damages, while the loss from such causes should be borne
by him who cultivates a field without enclosing it.
This same small proprietor avails himself for his own benefit, of
all the privileges and rights of an entire village of Indians, if a
wealthy man desires to lay out a plantation in his neighborhood. The
capitalist who has decided on such a plan often finds that on land
which was before entirely unfilled and waste, when he has after long
difficulties acquired control of his property, and has reckoned a
certain amount [of expense], some Indians have planted a grain field;
and through testimonies covered with signatures, which are presented
in the court, they assert that they inherited these very lands from
their fathers, and have never ceased to work them.
A remedy for these abuses would consist in the limitation of districts,
and the jurisdiction of the municipality, so that, for the purpose
of increasing the landed property for the inhabitants of a village,
so much land should remain free as they could at the time reasonably
claim--more or less than the so-called municipal field (legua comunal),
of which, besides, no law makes mention. All the remaining land
located within the jurisdiction should be declared the property of
the crown, and the title to all possessions then located outside of
municipal control should be valid; but in future all possessions that
shall not conform to the said rules shall be declared invalid. Within
the municipal limits or the legal property of the village (which may
not extend beyond the sound of the bell) the native farmer should be
allowed to dwell, [even] outside of the village, in the midst of the
lands cultivated by him; and only in case he alienates or abandons
these should he be compelled to live in the village. The natives
should bring new plots under cultivation within the municipality,
and be able to acquire these by paying to the communal treasury
a small ground-rent, or a moderate sum once for all. Such grants
should proceed, with all publicity, from the entire body of the
notables, with the cooperation of the parish priest, and be recorded
in a safely-kept book in every village, and should never contain
a greater area than the applicant can till with his own carabaos
[Büffeln]. If such grant of state land does not exceed a quinõn, it
should be issued, according to the aforesaid forms, by the alcalde
[221] of the province; if of greater extent, in the capital of the
colony; but all ought to be recorded in the land-register of the
province and village concerned. Those measures that were taken for
the benefit of the natives and the promotion of cattle-raising, but
which have an opposite effect, ought to be abolished. Agriculture,
like every other occupation, needs no protection save clearness and
security in its essential conditions of life.
ECONOMIC SOCIETY OF FRIENDS OF THE COUNTRY
[The following account of this association and the more notable of
its achievements is obtained from Fernandez and Moreno's Manual del
viajero en Filipinas (Manila, 1875), pp. 173-178. This subject is
presented here as being so largely connected with the progress of
agriculture in Filipinas.]