[180] Andrés García Camba resided in Manila during 1825-35, and became so popular that he was elected a deputy to the Spanish Cortes; he was afterward (August, 1837-December, 1838) governor of the Philippines, and wrote a book (published at Cádiz, 1839) regarding his experiences while holding that office. Himself liberally inclined, he was constantly opposed by reactionary influences. Although his name does not appear in the pamphlet Filipinas y su representación en Cortes, he is generally considered as its author; and he alludes to it in the memoir above mentioned. (Vindel, Cat. bib. filip., nos. 1881, 1886.) [181] Foreman says that Lecaros was a mestizo; and Montero y Vidal that he was a Filipino lawyer. The board of electors was mainly composed of peninsulars. [182] Camba proposed (Filipinas y su representación en Cortes, 1836) a special mode of election to Cortes for the Philippines, which was to be by the Manila Ayuntamiento, as that was the only political organization in the islands worth mentioning, and was in direct contact with affairs. The law to be adopted for Ultramar, Camba argued, must take into account the condition of the country and the inhabitants. During this session, the Philippine representatives presented two petitions to the Secretario, del Despacho de Hacienda, asking in one for a moderation of the excessive duties on the introduction of Spanish brandy into the Philippines, and in the other the sending of few pensioners and subaltern employes to the islands, as this was a prejudice to the native Philippine Spaniards. Lecaros presented a plan to Mendizábal, the provisional president of the Consejo de Ministros, for the suppression of the monopoly on tobacco in the Philippines, but Mendizábal took measures to make the monopoly more remunerative to the state. See Montero y Vidal, Historia general, ii. pp. 554, 555, note. [183] He wrote Memoria sobre las Islas Filipinas (Valencia, 1842). [184] July 31, 1837, the new commercial treaty made September 22, 1836, between the governor of the Philippines and the sultan of Joló was referred to the committees on State and Commerce, was reported on favorably on October 4, and was accordingly approved on the twelfth of October. This treaty stipulated that every three-masted schooner porting at Joló with Chinese passengers from Manila was to pay 2,000 pesos fuertes, and lesser boats in proportion to their size. As the most important cargo ever sent to Joló from Manila never exceeded 2,500 pesos in value, it is hard to see the value of this treaty so greatly lauded in Madrid. No Joloan vessels went to Manila. In this matter the officials showed a woful ignorance of the Philippines, the minister of the navy stating that all vessels stopped at Joló on their way to the Philippines. This treaty, as well as the one made by the governor of Zamboanga with the chief of Maluso near Basilan, only made the Moros bolder in their piracy. See Montero y Vidal, Historia general, ii, pp. 557-560.