Copy of U.S. Senator Albert J. Beveridge’s Speech on Taking the Philippines as a Manifest Duty at the NHCP Serafin D. Quiason Resource Center
Date Published: March 3, 2025
Copy of U.S. Senator Albert J. Beveridge’s Speech on Taking the Philippines as a Manifest Duty at the NHCP Serafin D. Quiason Resource Center
By Reymann L. Guevarra
“The Philippines are ours forever, ‘territory belonging to the United States,’ as the Constitution calls them. And just beyond the Philippines are China’s illimitable markets. We will not retreat from either. We will not repudiate our duty in the archipelago. We will not abandon our opportunity in the Orient.” This was part of Senator Beveridge’s speech at the first session of the U.S. 56th Congress on 9 January 1900, months after Spain ceded the Philippines and her other territories to the United States under the 1898 Treaty of Paris. This lengthy speech appeared in “Beveridge Talks on the Philippines” in The Manila Times on 27 February 1899.
In his address, Beveridge asserted the United States to fulfill its moral duty to govern and uplift the Filipino people and to take this as an opportunity to realize its destiny as a global power. He ended his speech at 2:28 p.m. by saying: “Mr. President and Senators, adopt the resolution offered and peace may quickly come and that we may begin our saving, regenerating, and uplifting work. Adopt it, and this bloodshed will cease when these deluded children of our islands learn that this is the final word of representatives of the American people in Congress assembled. Reject it, and the world, history and the American people will know where to forever fix the awful responsibility for the consequences that will surely follow such failure to do our manifest duty. How dare we delay when our soldier’s blood is flowing?”
And the Senator’s speech was met with applause from the galleries. Meanwhile in the Philippines, the revolution continued. General Aguinaldo was moving in the Cordilleras of northern Luzon trying to save the Philippine Republic.
This document is available at the NHCP Serafin D. Quiason Resource Center. You may also visit the National Memory Project website at https://memory.nhcp.gov.ph/?s=beveridge.
