Proceedings of the first Independence congress : held in the city of Manila, Philippine islands, February 22-26, 1930 / Published under the direction of Dean maximo M. Kalaw, executive secretary, University of the Philippines.

POLITICAL SECTION

143

Something must be said about the activities of our diplomatic representatives in foreign lands. All the Filipinos abroad,
as soon as the revolution broke out, offered to serve in any
capacity with raving enthusiasm. From among these Filipinos
the high personnel of our diplomatic service were principally
recruited. Felipe Agoncillo, Galicano Apacible, Jose Alejandrino, Tomas Arejola, Antonio Regidor, Vicente Ilustre, Rafael
del Pan, Juan Luna, Isidoro de Santos, Cayetano Lukban,
Ramon Abarca, Isabelo de los Reyes, Mariano Ponce, Sixto
Lopez and many others served in one way or another in such
capacity. Felipe Agoncillo, the ambassador plenipotentiary,
wrote a series of important documents in which he ably defended the independence of the Philippines and urged for her
international recognition. He worked in Washington and in
Paris. Galicano Apacible published from Canada a manifesto
to the American people, on the eve of the presidential elections
in 1900, that was warmly and cordially received by 'the
enemies of imperialism. Those at the head of the central committee in Hongkong, like those of the Filipino republican
committee in Paris, Madrid, London and Japan, were unexcelled in their activities on behalf of the recognition of Philippine independence.
Soon after the beginning of hostilities between the powerful
American army and the unequipped Filipino army, the Filipino government had to be dispersed. In less than two months
of fighting, Malolos fell into the hands of the enemies. Soon
afterwards, Tarlac, the second capital of the republic also fell.
The guerrilla system, approved in the meeting of the Generals
in Bayambang, could have stood the fight a few months more,
or at most for a few years,-as was really the case,-but the
Philippine republic was already a dead thing. Its name only
remained for history.
However, the physical defeat of the republic, that which
occasioned the persecution of Aguinaldo as a wandering leader
in the mountains of the North, almost without an army of his
own, and only representing a pale shadow of a great ideal, still
remains to this day an act of most sublime heroism on the
part of the Filipino army. It was the last superhuman effort
of the Revolution before entering into its agony. I refer to