The Sulu Archipelago and its people, by Sixto Y. Orosa ...

110 SULU ARCHPELAGO AND ITS PEOPLE

Twelfth District, representing Mindanao and Sulu
in the Philippine Senate, on October 13, 1916, by
Governor-general Harrison.
Upon the appointment of Hadji Butu as senator,
the sultan and many other leading Mohaimmedans
wrote to the Philippine legislature expressing their
satisfaction at the choice made by the governorgeneral. adji Butu's first bill- to provide for
the establishment of a Philippine Military Academy
and a Naval Academy, and for compulsory military
instruction in colleges and other institutions of learning
in the Philippines was commented on by the press
as showing its author's farsightedness. Some said
that it removed the basis for the claim that the Moros
would never want to have a common life with the
Christian Filipinos; and this view was substantiated by
some of Hadji Butu's utterances, such as: "MindanaoSulu is like a small vinta towed by the Philippine ship
of state. Wherever the bigger ship goes, the vinta
follows." "We want to be side by side with our Christian
brothers, laboring for the welfare of the Philippines,
guided by one common ideal and bound by one common
tie"
When asked to give his opinion on the prohibition
of polygamy, Hadji Butu said in part' "I believe it
would be unwise to stop the practice by legislation, but
that my people should be educated to outgrow it. The
present-day Moros should not be made to give up this
practice, which they have seen from infancy, and which
is in keeping with their religion. When the boys and
young men who are in school today grow up, the practice
will necessarily die out, and I think that the matter
should be given tine."