A glance at selected Philippine Political Caricature in Alfred McCoy’s Philippine Cartoons.

1. A GLANCE AT SELECTED
PHILIPPINE POLITICAL
CARICATURE IN ALFRED MCCOY’S
PHILIPPINE CARTOONS:
Political Caricature of the American Era (1900-1941)

2.  Political cartoons and caricature are a rather
recent art form, which veered away from the
classical art by exaggerating human features
and pocking fun at its subjects. Such as genre
and technique became a part of the print media
as a form of social and political commentary,
which usually targets persons of power and
authority. Cartoons became an effective tool of
publicizing opinions through heavy use of
symbolism, which is different from a verbose
written editorial and opinion pieces.

3. The unique way that a caricature
represents opinion and captures the
audience imagination is reason enough for
historians to examine these political
cartoons. Commentaries in mass media
inevitably shape public opinion and such
kind of opinion is worthy of historical
examination.

4.  In his book Philippine Cartoons: political
Caricature of the American Era (1900-1941),
Alfred McCoy, together with Alfredo Roces,
compiled political cartoons published in
newspaper dailies and periodicals in the
aforementioned time period. For this part, we
are going to look at selected cartoons and
explain the content of each one.

5. PICTURE 1

6. The first example shown above was published
in the independent on May 20, 1916. The
cartoon shows a politician from Tondo, named
Dr. Santos, passing his crown to his brother-in-
law, Dr. Barcelona. A Filipino guy as depicted
wearing Salakot and Barong Tagalog was
trying to stop Santos, telling latter to stop giving
Barcelona the crown because it is not his to
begin with.

7. PICTURE 2

8.  The second was also published by The
Independent on 16 June 1917. This was
drawn by Fernando Amorsolo and was aimed as
a commentary to the workings of Manila Police
at that period. Here, we see a Filipino child who
stole a skinny chicken because he had nothing
to eat. The police officer was relentlessly
pursuing the said child. A man wearing
Salakot, labelled Juan de la Cruz was grabbing
he officer telling him to leave a small-time
pickpockets and thieves instead. He was
pointing to huge warehouses containing bulks
of rice, milk and grocery products.

9. PICTURE 3

10.  The third cartoon was a commentary on
the unprecedented cases of colorum
automobiles in the city streets. The
Philippine Free Press published this
commentary when fatal accidents
involving colorum vehicles and taxis
occurred too often already.

11. PICTURE 4

12.  This fourth cartoon depicts in a cinema.
A blown-up police officer saying that
couples are not allowed to neck and
make love in the theatre. Two youngster
looked horrified while an older seemed
amused.

13.  The next cartoon was published by The
Independent on 27 November 1915
 Here, we see the caricature of Uncle Sam
riding a chariot pulled by Filipinos wearing
school uniforms. The Filipino boys were
carrying Americans objects like baseball
bats, whiskey, and boxing gloves. McCoy,
in his caption to the said cartoon, says that
this cartoon was based on an event 1907
when William Howard Taft was brought to
the Manila pier riding a chariot pulled by
students of Liceo de Manila such was
condemned by nationalist at the time.

14. PICTURE 5

15. PICTURE 6

16.  The last cartoon was published by
Lipang Kalabawon 24 August 1907. In
the picture, we can see Uncle Sam
rationing porridge to the politicians and
members of the Progresista Party
(sometimes known as the Federalista
Party) while members of the
Nationalista Party look on and wait for
their term. This cartoon depicts the
patronage of the United States being
coveted by politicians from either party.

17. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
 The transition from the Spanish Colonial
period to the American Occupation period
demonstrated different strands of changes
and shifts in culture, society and politics.
The Americans drastically introduced
democracy to the nascent nation and the
consequences were far from ideal. Aside
from this, it was also during the American
period that Filipinos were introduced to
different manifestation of modernity like
healthcare, modern transportation, and
media.

18. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
This ushered in a more open and free
press. The post-independent and the post-
Filipino-American period in the
Philippines were experienced differently by
Filipinos coming from different classes.
The upper Principalia class experienced
economic prosperity with the opening up
of the Philippines economy to the United
States but the majority of the poor Filipino
remained poor, desperate, and victims of
state repression

19. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
 The selected cartoons illustrate not only
the opinion of certain media outfits about
the Philippine society during the American
Period but also paint a broad image of
society and politics under the United
States. In the arena of politics, for example
we see the price that Filipinos paid for the
democracy modelled after the American.
First, it seemed that Filipino politician at
that time did not understand well enough
the essence of democracy and the
accompanying democratic institutions and
processes.

20. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
This can be seen in the rising dynastic policy in
Tondo as depicted in the cartoon published by
The Independent patronage also became
influential and powerful not only between clients
and patrons but also to the newly formed political
parties composed of the elite and the United
States, represented by Uncle Sam, provided dole
out for members of the Fediralista while the
Nationalista politicians looked on and waited for
their turns, thus the essence of competing
political parties to enforces to enforce choices
among the voters was cancelled out.

21. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
The problems continuous up to the
present where politicians transfer from
one party to another depending on which
party was powerful in specific periods of
time.

22. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
The transition from as Catholic-centered.
Spanish-Filipino society to an imperial
American-Assimilated one and its
complications, were also depicted in the
cartoons. One example is the
unprecedented increase of motorized
vehicles in the city. Automobiles become
popular mode of transportation in the city
and led to the emergence of taxis. However
the laws and policy implementation was
mediocre.

23. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
This resulted in the increasing colorum and
unlicensed vehicles transporting people
around the city. The rules governing the
issuance of driver’s licence was loose and
traffic police could not be bothered by
rampant violations of traffic rules. This is
direct consequence of the drastic
urbanization of the Philippine society.
Another example is what McCoy called the “
sexual revolution” that occurred in the 1930s
young people as early as that period,
disturbed the Filipinos mind set by engaging
daring sexual activities in public spaces like
cinemas.

24. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
Here, we can see how that meeting point
between the conservative past and liberated
future of the Philippines.

25. ANALYSIS OF THE POLITICAL CARICATURE
DURING THE AMERICAN PERIOD
Lastly, the cartoons also illustrated the conditions
of poor Filipinos in the Philippines now governed
by the United States. From the looks of it, nothing
much has changed. For example, a cartoon
depicted how police authorities oppress petty
Filipino criminals while turning blind eye on the
hoarders who monopolized goods in their huge
warehouse (presumably Chinese merchants). The
other cartoons depicts how American controlled
Filipino through seemingly harmless American
objects. By controlling their consciousness and
mentality, Americans got control and subjugate
Filipinos