Here’s a trivia question for history buffs:
Who said, “I would rather have a Philippines run like hell by Filipinos than a Philippines run like heaven by the Americans”?
Answer: Manuel L. Quezon, president of the Philippine Commonwealth, speaking in exasperation with American colonial rule of his country, probably in the 1920s.
Manuel L. Quezon also is known as “the father of the national language”, Filipino.
In view of his exasperation with the Americans, it is ironic that Quezon died on Aug. 1, 1944, as a patient in a tuberculosis clinic in Saranac Lake, New York, never to see his dream of an independent Philippine nation come true. He was 65.
Today Manuel L. Quezon comes to mind because August is “Buwan ng Wikang Pambansa”, National Language Month, widely viewed as a general tribute to Quezon for his pivotal role, beginning in 1937, to establish Filipino as a national tongue.
His birthdate, Aug. 19, is known up north as Quezon Day and is a non-working holiday in Quezon City and Quezon Province, both of which are named after the former president.
Filipino was formally designated as the national language in Article XIV, Section 6, of the 1987 Constitution: “The national language of the Philippines is Filipino. As it evolves, it shall be further developed and enriched on the basis of existing Philippine and other languages.”
However, Section 7 states: “For purposes of communication and instruction, the official languages of the Philippines are Filipino and, until otherwise provided by law, English.”
So, the Constitution makes a distinction between “national language” and “official language”.
National Language Month was established through proclamation by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo — Proclamation No. 1041, s. 1997.
Republic Act No. 10533, the “K-12 Law”, explicitly requires Filipino as a core subject and a medium of instruction in primary and secondary schools. An exception is made for grades K-3, in which the mother tongue is mandated.
To promote Filipino in schools, a “Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino”, or Filipino Language Commission, collaborates with the Department of Education to set the theme and activities every year for the observance of National Language Month in all primary and secondary schools.
This year the theme is “Cultivating Filipino and Indigenous Languages” — and it provides a list of suggested activities such as essay writing, poster competitions, poetry recitals and exhibits showcasing Filipino literature.
Among the family of nations, the Philippines is unique in having a national language month, although Thailand has a National Thai Language Day on July 24, and India celebrates Hindi Dawas on Sept. 14 to promote Hindi. A few other nations have language days that celebrate diversity.
The creation of an official Philippine language was a nationalistic move to build a unitary Philippine identity, and, being based on Tagalog rather than another of the 170 languages spoken in the Philippines — especially, Ilocano or Cebuano — the outcome was not without controversy.
Tagalog was chosen as the basis for Filipino because it was the primary language of Manila, also the center of power, and it was spoken by a large percentage of the population. Historically, it was the main language of nationalists during the Philippine Revolution against the Spanish in 1896, in which Quezon himself played a role.
Controversy over the selection of Tagalog as the basis of Filipino continues today because some educators view the heavy nationwide promotion of Filipino as a threat to the existence of smaller local languages like Bikol.
As for Quezon, after the Japanese invasion of the Philippines in December 1942, the president fled from Manila with his family, travelling first by American submarine to Palay, Western Visayas, and then to Mindanao. They subsequently travelled by air to Australia and then to the United States, landing in the U.S. in May 1942. In America, Quezon oversaw the Philippine Commonwealth Government-in-Exile in Washington, D.C., during the Japanese occupation.
Quezon had been diagnosed with tuberculosis in the 1930s, and some have speculated that he contracted the disease as a child while living in the remote coastal municipality of Baler in Aurora, where he was born and where TB was not uncommon.
In the United States, as the disease progressed, Quezon sought treatment at a clinic in Saranac Lake, where the cool, dry air of the Adirondack Mountains was considered therapeutic.
There were no antibiotics for TB in the early 1940s — streptomycin was still undergoing trials — and Saranac Lake was small community with a renowned health resort for tuberculosis patients.
Quezon’s arrival in the little village from Washington, D.C., by train and limousine, accompanied by his wife and children and a slew of dignitaries, reportedly caused quite a stir in the little village
The family spent three or four months there in 1943 and 1944 until his death on Aug. 1.
Manuel L. Quezon was buried in the prestigious Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C., because of his status as a wartime leader and an ally of the United States.
After the war, his remains were repatriated to the Philippines and are now interred beneath the obelisk of Quezon Memorial Shrine in Quezon City.
Quezon’s wife, Aurora, and daughter Maria Aurora were murdered in a 1949 machine gun ambush by the Hukbalahap rebels in Nueva Ecija, Luzon.
Bryce McIntyre, PhD, resides San Andres. He holds a doctoral degree from Stanford University, Palo Alto, California, USA.