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.

EDUCATIONAL SECTION

177

tinguished contender differs fundamentally from the criterion
of Mr. Romualdez and from almost all the others who answered
the questionnaire. For him "it is useless to establish a national
language without procuring the slow death of the diverse dialects' while the distinguished magistrate establishes his hope
of finding a common language for all on the vigorous living
of each and every one of our dialects.
Outside of these two propositions deciding only on the
preparatory plan, in all the others they coincide, much more
in the appreciation that, besides the English as official language,
we should have a common language properly strengthened to
safeguard the substantive qualities, the peculiar culture, and
other spiritual interests of our race against the rolling avalanche
of Occidentalism and the always absorbent power of any
conquering country.
I hold, therefore, a strong conviction that if the proposition
of adopting a national language be submitted to a free and
general plebiscite the vote for the affirmative will be unanimous
in the whole country as is the unanimous desire for a national,
free and independent life.
By following the law of the majority we may save academic
discussions about the plans adverse to the principal proposition
chosen favorably by almost all the contenders. The adoption of a common language for a country linguistically semiheterogenous but ethnologically homogenous, is an eminently
practical problem and cannot be solved with more or less
artificial means or with theoretical plans which require the
longest time for the elaboration and experiment of its practicability.
The principal proposition which consists in the adoption
of Tagalog as the basis of the national language is undoubtedly
a practical proposition of immediate effects, and besides, it is
favored by historical precedents of the human race. Outside
of the jealousy which regionalistic sentiments insinuate in the
susceptible mind of the Filipinos, I do not believe that there
might be other serious and reasonable motives to deny the
goodness and practicability of the cited proposition.