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Webmaster's Note: Guillermo Gomez Rivera is a Premio Zobel awardee, a member of the Academia Filipina and former National Language Committee Secretary, Philippine Constitutional Convention 1971-73. Part
1: What is a ‘state’? 1. What is a ‘state’? A small dictionary defines state as "a territory with laws". The word "laws" in this definition naturally implies that there are people living in that "territory". This also means that the "territory" is the patrimony of the people living in it for which they have laws. And the very fact that a territory has its own laws, it also implies that it has a basic attribute of sovereignty to make such laws for itself. Thus, the word "laws" in this definition also implies that there is a government, with defending soldiers or policemen, existing in the same and referred to territory that enforces those laws upon the people living in it. That government may be monarchial because the ruler is a Chieftain or a King or by whatever title such a ruler may be called. Let us now find out the origin and evolution of the State that locals, as well as foreigners, now call as the Filipino State. Ang Estado ng Filipinas. 2. When was the origin, or birth, of the Filipino State? When Philippine history is taught now-a-days, the origin, or birth, of the Filipino State is not discussed. It is deliberately omitted. By whom? - You would ask. And we would answer pointblank: ----- by our White Anglo Saxon Protestant (WASP) masters who by their undue interference in the language and economic policies of the Filipino State threaten, or violate, its attribute of sovereignty. Why? - You would again ask. In order to turn Filipinos into strangers in their own country for the purpose of better exploiting them economically in the midst of their confusion about themselves. And this charge can be proved true by the un-Filipino results of the educational system principally conducted in English which most often makes relative, or insecure, the attribute of sovereignty of the Filipino State. But let us go back to the main question. When was the birth of the Filipino State? The answer is very easy. At the same instant that Manila was founded and established as its capital city. And the date given to that event is June 24, 1571. It is, therefore, a fact that the Filipino State was simultaneously founded with the founding of Manila. For, why should there be a capital city, seat of a Central Government and Law, without a corresponding State to govern? And due to this fact, we come across a grave error being committed in the manner Philippine history is taught in our schools. We often tell our students and children that Manila was founded on June 24, 1571 as the Capital City of the Philippines but we always fail to teach that with its founding the Filipino State was also founded and established. We also fail to underscore that from that day onward, the Filipino State began to exist as a jurisdictional reality up to the present time as we find ourselves talking about it in this year 2000. continue >> RELATED: 17 September 2001 |
The
Filipino State
