RIZAL AND HIS TIME

PROLOGUE
The world of Rizal’s Times
 Objectives
 1. Discuss the historical background of
the world and of the Philippines during
Rizal’s time.
 2. Identify the different evils done by the

Spanish authorities in the Philippines.

 3. Appreciate the events that led to the

positive change in the lives of the

Filipinos.
Before the birth of Rizal.
 Feb. 19, 1861 – the liberal Czar
Alexander II issued a proclamation
emancipating 22,500,000 serfs to
appease the rising discontent of the
Russian masses.
 June 19, 1861 the birth of Rizal, the

American Civil war was raging

furiously in the United States on the
negro Slavery.
 April 12, 1861 the negro slavery in
the United States erupted.
 September 22, 1863, President

Lincoln issued his famous

Emancipation Proclamation.
 June 1, 1861, Benito Juarez, a full

blooded Zapotec Indian was

elected president of Mexico.
 Emperor Napoleon III of the
Second French Empire with his
imperialistic desire to secure a
colonial stake in Latin America
invaded and conquered Mexico.
He installed Archduke Maximilian
of Austria as puppet emperor of
Mexico on June 12, 1864.
 Because of the raging American
Civil War President Juarez cannot
obtain military aid from his friend
president Lincoln.
 Battle of Queretaro – President
Juarez with the help of the US
troops defeated the Maximilian
forces and executed Emperor
Maximilian. Thus fizzled out
Napoleon’s ambition to colonize
Latin America.
 The Birth of Rizal
 Italians and Germans succeeded in
unifying their own countries
 The Italians under the leadership of

Count Cavour and of Garibaldi and his

army of “Red Shirts” drove out the
Austrians and French armies from Italy
and proclaimed the Kingdom of Italy
under King Victor Emmanuel with Rome
as Capital.
 The Prussians led by Otto von
Bismarck, the “Iron Chancellor”
defeated France in the Franco-
Prussian war and established the
German Empire on Jan. 18, 1871,
with King Wilhelm of Prussia as the
First Kaiser of the German Empire.
 With the defeat of Emperor Napoleon
his Second French Empire Collapsed
and over its ruin the Third French
Republic arose, with Adolph Thiers
as first President.
The times of Rizal saw the flowering
of Western Imperialism.

 England emerged as the world’s

leading imperialist power.
 During glorious reign of Queen
Victoria the British people asserted:
Britannia Rules the Waves.”
 Britain won in the First Opium war

(1840-1842) against the tottering

Chinese Empire under the Manchu
dynasty, and acquired the island of
HongKong (Fragrant Harbor)
 In the Second Opium War (1856-
1860) Britain won again and
forced the Manchu Dynasty to
cede Kowloon Peninsula.
 After suppressing the Indian
Rebellion and dismantling the Mogul
Empire, she imposed her raj (rule)
over the sub-continent of India.
(India, Pakistan and Bangladesh)
 By winning the Three Anglo-

Burmese war, she conquered Burma.

 Other lands in Asia that became
British colonies:
 Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Maldives,

Aden, Malaya, Singapore and

Egypt.
 In South Pacific they were able to

get Australia and New Zealand.

 Other Imperialist countries that
followed Britain’s example:
 France – Vietnam, annexed
Cambodia and Laos. Then
merged all these countries into a
federated colony under the name
French Indochina.
 Dutch – colonized the vast and
rich archipelago of the East Indies
and named it the Netherlands East
Indies (now Indonesia).
 Czarist Russia – conquered
Siberia, Kamchatka, Kuriles, and
Alaska ( which she sold in 1867
to the U.S. for $7,200,000.
 She also conquered the Muslim

Khanates of Bokhara, Khiva, and

Kokand in Central Asia.
 They also acquired Manchuria
and as a “sphere of influence”
they were able to build the 5,800-
mile Trans-Siberian Railway,
reputed to be “the world’s longest
railroad” linking Vladivostok and
Moscow.
 July 8, 1853, an American squadron
under the command of Commodore
Mathew C. Perry re-opened Japan to the
world. (214-year isolation)
 Emperor Meiji (Mutsuhito) modernized

Japan by freely accepting Western

Influences, including Imperialism.
Fought against the weak China in the
Sino-Japanese war, grabbed Formosa
(Taiwan), Pescadores and later annexed
Korea.
 Germany was late in scramble for
colonies in Asia and Africa,
turned to the Islands in the Mid-
Pacific world.
 Ilties a German warship entered

the harbor of Yap (an island in the

Carolines) seized the island and
hoisted the German flag.
 Strangely, the Spanish Governor of the
Carolines (Don Enrique Capriles) was
present in the island but showed no
resistance.
 The German seizure of Yap island

enraged Spain who claimed sovereignty

over the Carolines and Palaus by right of
discovery by Francisco Lezcano who
named it Carolina in Honor of King
Charles II.
 To abort the brewing conflict
between the two country, both
submitted the Carolina Question
to Pope leo XIII for arbitration .
 The Holy father recognized
Spain’s sovereignty over the
island but gave two concessions to
Germany:
 the right to trade in the disputed

islands
 the right to establish a coaling

station in Yap for German navy.

 Rizal was in Barcelona when
these things are happening and he
even wrote an article on the
Carolina Question at La
Publicidad, a newspaper owned
by Don Miguel Morayta.
 While imperialist powers were
enjoying the fruits of their
colonial rule Spain who was once
upon a time the “Mistress of the
World”, was stagnating as a
world power.
 She lost her rich colonies in Latin
America (Paraguay, Argentina,
Chile, Colombia and Ecuador.
 The Central American countries
(Costa Rica, Honduras,
Guatemala, El Salvador, and
Nicaragua, Venezuela, Peru,
Bolivia and Uruguay)
 Colonies that remained under her

rule was Cuba, Puerto Rico and

the Philippines.
The Philippines of Rizal’s Times
 During the times of Rizal, the
sinister shadows of Spain’s
decadence darkened the
Philippine Skies.
Evils during the Spanish rule in the
Philippines
 Instability of Colonial
administration
 Corrupt Officialdom
 No Philippine representation in
the Spanish Cortes
 Human rights denied to Filipinos
 No equality before the law
 Maladministration of justice
 Racial Administration
 Frailocracy
 Forced labor
 Haciendas owned by the friars
 Guardia civil