The Philippines: Past and Present (Volume 1 of 2)Worcester, Dean C. (Dean Conant)
History
The Philippines: Past and Present (Volume 1 of 2)
Worcester, Dean C. (Dean Conant)
Philippines; Philippines -- History -- 1898-1946
There is a legislature composed of two houses known respectively as
the Philippine Commission and the Philippine Assembly. The Philippine
Commission is composed of nine members; five are the governor-general
and the four secretaries of department _ex officio_, and four are
appointed by the President subject to confirmation by the Senate. Four
of the members are Filipinos and five are Americans. [483]
The Philippine Assembly is composed of eighty-one elected members,
all of whom are Filipinos. They represent thirty-four of the
thirty-nine provinces into which the archipelago is divided. The two
houses of the legislature have equal powers. Neither has any special
privilege in the matter of initiating legislation, and affirmative
action by both is required in order to pass it. The Moro Province,
the Mountain Province and the provinces of Nueva Vizcaya and Agusan
are not represented in the assembly, nor are they subject to the
jurisdiction of the Philippine Legislature. The Philippine Commission
alone has legislative jurisdiction over them, their population being
largely composed of Moros, or members of other non-Christian tribes.
The provinces may be divided into regularly organized provinces
governed under the provincial government act, and specially organized
provinces, which include the Moro Province, the Mountain Province
and the provinces of Mindoro, Palawan, Agusan and Nueva Vizcaya, of
which the first is governed under a special law and the remaining four
are governed under a different one known as "The Special Provincial
Government Act."
Regularly organized provinces have a governor and a treasurer. The
governor is elected, and the treasurer is appointed by the
governor-general with the approval of the commission. These two
officials, with another known as the third member, constitute
a provincial board. The third member is elected. As the Filipinos
usually elect to office men from among their own people, practically
all of the elective provincial officers are Filipinos, as are ten
of the appointive officers, it having been the policy to appoint
Filipinos whenever possible.
Regularly organized provinces are divided into municipalities
which elect their own officers and control their own affairs for
the most part. Provincial treasurers have intervention in municipal
expenditures, which are approved in advance for each fiscal year,
and municipal officers may be removed for misconduct by the
governor-general.
All officers of the six special government provinces are appointed
by the governor-general with the approval of the commission.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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