THE BEGINNING OF FILIPINO

NATIONALISM

Up to the 1700's, Filipino revolts were fragmented and local with various and
oftentimes unrelated purposes among which are:
 To retake one's lost kingdom or chiefdom.
 To resist forced labor that separated the men for a long periods from their
families.
 To get rid of the oppressive tribute.
 To return to their ancient religion, the worship of Bathala and the anitos.

BRITISH INVASION AND OCCUPATION

In 1761 Spain and France entered into a treaty of alliance against England's
ambition for supremacy. During the seven year war in Europe between France and
England, Spain naturally drawn into the conflict.
Archbishop Manuel Rojo was acting governor-general when the British, with
6000 men including sepoys from Babayu, bombarded intramuro, Malate, Ermita,
Bagum Bayan(now Luneta)on September 22,1762.

Basco's Economic Plans

The economy developed slowly for several reasons such as:

 The incompetence of Spanish officials

 Graft and greed of the merchants and religions corporations engaged in the
galleon trade
 Restrictive economic policies which closed part of the country to other
foreign countries
 The constant quarrels between the civil and ecclesiastical authorities
assigned in the colony

In the 1778, Jose Basco y Vargas who was appointed governor-general in the
Philippines, surveyed the economic condition of the colony and found it to be far
from satisfactory. The Governor Basco encouraged the cultivation of crops for
export like indigo, coffee, cocoa, sugar, hemp, mulberry trees and cotton.
Governor Basco founded the economic society of friends of the country in 1781
and established the royal company in 1785.
Basco's established of government monopolies in 1782 apparently negated
most of his positive economic project.
The monopolies for tobacco and wine in particularly, while turning out to be
profitable for the government had devastating effect on the people. In the
1807,some rebels in Ilocos revolted against the government monopoly of a locally
produce wine sugarcane called Basi.
 THE RISE OF "FILIPINO" MIDDLE CLASS
As export in agriculture's increased, inquilinos or the tenant of haciendas and
their families began to accumulate wealth. As member of the middle class, they
will able to send their children to colleges and universities in Manila and even to
Europe. Hence, the wealthy and highly educated Filipinos called ilustrados
compose the middle class in Philippines colonial society under Spain. Spaniards
born in Spain, working or residing in the country were called Españoles or
peninsulares. The rest either mestizos or Indio's. Belonging to the middle class
also meant changing their former lifestyle, clothing, houses forms of amusement
and cultural activities to those that were similar or closer to what Spaniard and
Europeans did and maintained which were comfortable and expensive.

LIBERALISM IN THE PHILIPPINES

In 1868, a revolutions took place in Spain. The revolutionists were against

autocratic reign of Queen Isabel II. It lasted from 1868, the triumph of the Spanish
revolutionists who fought for popular suffrage and freedom or speech the press
and of religions, brought to the country same liberal and progressive Spaniard.
One of them was Governor- General Carlos Maria de LA Torre. When he arrived in
Manila in 1869, he put into practice the liberal principles of the revolutionists in
Spain. The educated Indio's, mestizos and Spaniards born in the Philippines who
sympathized with liberalism and Governor de la Torre, serenaded him to show
their appreciation of the governor's kind attention and democratic ways.

THE EXECUTION OF GOMBURZA

The priest, Gomez, Burgos, Zamora were jailed in Fort Santiago before they
were tried for rebellion. Priest, both regulars and seculars were allowed to see
them. During the trials, the government failed to prove convincingly with the
January mutiny. The Governor-General promise to present documents to prove
that the three priest were guilty of "rebellion" which to many was actually a
mutiny. But he never presented any documents and to this day, no documents has
been found to show that Gomez, Burgos, Zamura were in any way, connected with
the munity. On February 17, 1872, the three priest marched from Fort Santiago to
Bagumbayan Field (now Luneta).

It is said that Zamora lost his mind and silently accepted to e garroted. While they
being executed one by one, first, Zamora then Gomez, and lastly Burgos, the
witnesses of the event took off their hats and knelt to pray for the souls of the
innocent priests. The importance of execution of the three priests rested on the
fact the Filipinos who witnesses the execution began to thinks and feel as a
Filipinos not a Ilocano's, Tagalog, Visayan, Bicolanos, and others. Rizal who was
eleven years old at that time, would later dedicated his second novel El
Filibustirismo ( the Rebel) to the memory for the three martyred priest.