At Quora, a social media site where people ask and answer questions, someone asked an interesting question about statehood. “Why did the Philippines not become the USA’s 51st state?” the questioner asked. “I think if it was so, the USA today would be even more powerful.” We won’t speculate on the possible power difference, but we are intrigued by the question.
The Philippines was ceded by Spain to the United States at the same time as Puerto Rico. They became independent in 1946. That didn’t work out exactly as they expected, but we have never seen much indication that the Philippines has regretted not asking for statehood instead.
So why did the Philippines go for independence? And why did the United States agree?
The Quora answers
Wes Frank, who has a Masters in American History from Northwestern University, said, “No one was interested in the Philippines becoming the USA’s 51st state in 1898.”
The Philippines had been fighting for independence from Spain before they came under U.S. rule. They continued to fight for independence through years, first with physical violence and then politically in Washington.
“Americans, for their part, saw their nation as a republic with most citizens of northern European ancestry,” Frank continued, “and also with no monarch, no aristocracy, no state church, no military class, and no peasants.” He connects these feelings with anti-Catholic sentiment and several political battles of the time.
“With these factors in play in 1898,” he goes on, “there was no support at all for making the Philippines, a Catholic and Moslem land of Asians and peasants, an American state. Indeed, the most powerful American reaction to the acquisition of the Philippines was outrage that the American government had somehow triggered a colonial war like those that plagued European imperial powers in the late 19th Century. They did not see the Philippines as a potential state, just as something different and distant and a source of trouble.”
In 1934, the Tydings-McDuffie-Act declared independence for the Philippines following a ten year transition. Japan, as it turns out, was already planning to invade as soon as the U.S. left the Philippines. In league with Nazi Germany, Japan invaded and occupied the Philippines but the U.S. and the Filipino people were able to repel them. The date for independence was extended because of World War II, but the Philippines became independent in 1946.
Other commenters pointed out the racist attitudes of many in the U.S., which are visible in the Supreme Court decisions in the Insular Cases, and one person from the Philippines added, “This opposition was EXPLOITED by local Filipino landed oligarchs who opposed US colonialism so local resources can be monopolized and exploited by the existing landed elite.”
Alternate history
Since the reasons for the Philippines lack of statehood seemed to the responders to come down to…well, nobody wanted it, we could imagine a situation in which the statehood movement in the Philippines (which did exist) got together with supporters in Congress and achieved statehood instead of independence.
Jon Dixon, a writer from Indiana, suggested the possible outcomes. Japan would not have invaded the Philippines, he said, the people would be far better off economically, and the Philippines would be a political powerhouse with enough representation in Congress to push legislation in any direction they chose.
What about Puerto Rico?
Why isn’t Puerto Rico independent? Well…nobody wants it. But the experience of the Philippines is probably a good example to look at if we want to see what an independent Puerto Rico would be like.
6 Responses
I’m not at all surprised that “no one was interested in the Philippines becoming the USA’s 51st state in 1898.” – there were only 45 states then, so it would’ve been a little strange…a rather arbitrary interest…
Even when the Philippines gained independence, there were only 48 US states, so, really, at no point would there have been a strong push for the Philippines to be the 51st state…
You are absolutely right. I think the Quora questioner had an interesting question nonetheless.
With people of over a hundred million it would easily make a quarter of the US population. This not good.
Almost certainly if the statehood movement had successfully petitioned Congress for a pathway to statehood, that pathway would have involved the Philippines entering as several states–not a single state constituting 25% of the total combined population.
Maybe if we became a US state there will be less corruption and more jobs.
If the Philippines had become a state at the time of WWI, after the state of New York it would have had the second largest delegation in the House of Representatives. No wonder Congress declared in 1916 that it would not grant citizenship or statehood, and that U.S. administration of the territory would end in independence.
In one sense, the unincorporated territory status doctrine of the Insular Cases actually worked in the case of the Philippines, although ironically the result was more consistent with Harlan’s dissent than the plurality ruling in the 1901 lead Insular Cases ruling (Downes v. Bidwell).
James Bradley’s “The Imperial Cruise” provides some unorthodox and provocative analysis of the Philippines saga, but also provides quite revealing insight into how American leaders viewed the Philippines during the 20th century.
My own historical assessment is the global re-adjustment to the new post-WWII world order saw the U.S. wisely abandon the age of imperialism colonial model in the case of Philippines, Hawaii and Alaska, based on completion of transition from the Insular Cases unincorporated territory status to non-colonial status options. Hawaii was the most aggressive annexation but delivered on equality of national citizenship denied under unincorporated and even incorporated territorial status.
Tragically, out of personal and political self-interest of Puerto Rico “autonomist” party leaders in Puerto Rico during that decade after WWII, the anti-statehood and anti-independence autonomy movement in Puerto Rico intervened to prevent decolonization. Instead, the autonomists enabled and abetted U.S. failure to implement the U.S. Constitution, Atlantic Charter, U.N. Charter in the case of Puerto Rico. Absurdly and anachronistically an heir to the “autonomist” elites elected by voters in Puerto Rico to lobby but not vote in the U.S. House of Representatives is attempting without success to promote revival of the failed autonomy model for perpetual territorial status.
That remains and always will be a political and economic dead end for Puerto Rico. As it has been since the modern era Insular Cases starting with Reid v. Covert in 1957 gave Congress a green light continue to preside over a colonial status with statutory citizenship but not equality for Puerto Rico. Those modern era Insular Cases also now extend non-incorporation doctrine’s insidious diversion from and perversion of the Northwest Ordinance tradition to four smaller territories.
Of those four smaller territories, only American Samoa has found a status model preserving a retained authentic local culture. The other three have citizenship in name but not fully, unless the option of moving to a state is chosen. Only American Samoa has adopted a model of local control superseding grievance-based federal-territorial relations.
Like unincorporated territory status, incorporation, statehood, or Puerto Rico’s “autonomy” in name only, the American Samoa status model of might have been a better fit for the Philippines. But that model works in American Samoa only because it has remarkable social cohesion and small scale territory and population. In contrast, the Philippines territory had the geographic, population, economic and political critical mass for nationhood, which was clearly inevitable. Even the Congress got it right and recognized that in 1916.