Delivered in the House of Representatives, Washington, June 19, 1902 It has been said that if American institutions had done nothing else than furnish to the world the character of George Washington, that alone would entitle them to the respect of mankind. So, sir, I say to all those that denounce the Filipinos indiscriminately as barbarians and savages, without possibility of a civilized future, that this despised race proved itself entitled to their respect and to the respect of mankind when it furnished to the world the character of José Rizal. [Mr. Cooper then recited to the House Rizal’s “Last Farewell” as described on a foregoing page. The profound silence that fell upon the chamber at the end of this recital he broke by saying:] Pirates! Barbarians! Savages! Incapable of civilization! How many of the civilized Caucasian slanderers of his race could ever be capable of thoughts like these, which on that awful night, as he sat alone amidst silence unbroken save by the rustling of the black plumes of the death angel at his side, poured from the soul of the martyred Filipino? Search the long and bloody roll of the world’s heroic dead, and where, on what soil, under what sky, did Tyranny ever claim a nobler victim? Sir, the future is not without hope for a people that, from the midst of such an environment, has furnished to the world a character so lofty and so pure as that of José Rizal. APPENDIX D RIZAL’S VIEWS ON THE RACE PROBLEM From an Article on Rizal in the “International Archiv für Ethnographie,” by Ferdinand Blumentritt, in part translated and abridged by R. L. Packard in the “Popular Science Monthly,” July, 1902. Rizal devoted himself particularly to the analysis of the sentiments with which the white and the colored races mutually regard each other. No one was so well qualified as he to study this question, which is of such importance to folk-psychology, for he was of himself of a colored race, had lived among his fellow-countrymen at his own home as well as among the whites, those of mixed bloods, and other classes at Manila, and had besides come to know Hong-Kong, Japan, Europe, and the United States and that in a thorough way and not as a mere tourist. His extensive acquaintance with languages opened for him the ethnological writings of all civilized nations, and his penetrating intellect prevented him from remaining content with the surface of things. It should be said, however, that Rizal concerned himself wholly with the relations between the white and the colored peoples of the Pacific because, as he explained, he knew nothing of the psychology of other colored races.