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.

168 INDEPENDENCE CONGRESS PROCEEDINGS

violating them up to the present? In our Islands reigns a
rigorous exclusion of all languages of the people. English has
been founded on them as an absolute and only master, when
this language has been recommended only as a general means
of communication among the diverse regional groups of the
country.
The Filipino people, it is true, responded immediately and
faithfully to the call for the study and the use of the proposed
common language; but this does not mean that they have completely renounced the right to cultivate and qualify their own
language for the general benefit of all the Filipinos not only by ^
means of popular spirit and private organizations, but also
under the protection and help of the government itself which
is established here with the duty of respecting and consecrating
such right.
Neither the Organic Iaw of July 1, 1902, nor that of
August 29, 1916, known popularly as "Jones Law," nor any
other special law dictated by the Congress of the United States
for these Islands, contains any provision which makes English
the only and exclusive language to be spoken and perpetuated
among the Filipinos. All the laws that have so far imposed
the obligatory and exclusive use of said language as a basic
element of instruction in all the country are Filipino. In the
hands, therefore, of the Philippine Legislature is the power to
dictate positive laws which would dignify the vernaculars and
which would provide that from among them be gathered
the common language of the Filipinos.
Having existed together up to the present two official
languages both foreign in this land and of different com-
plexions, as the English and Spanish languages, it is incomprehensible that a vernacular language, well chosen and adapted,
could not share with the English in the cultural and liberalizing
mission which the United States has imposed upon itself in
assuming the government of these Islands.
The day is not far when the elimination of Spanish in the
official dependencies would be decreed or it may of its own
accord automatically cease its official use. A vernacular lan-
guage can replace it with great utility and efficacy in the