Identifier: philippinelifein00lero (find matches)
Title: Philippine life in town and country
Year: 1905 (1900s)
Authors: LeRoy, James A. (James Alfred), 1875-1909
Subjects:
Publisher: New York : Putnam
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

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ionaccording to legal procedure, it still remains truethat these landholders themselves are in largepart really but tenants. From time immemorial,the small cultivators have been dependent on thelarge proprietors for advances of money, or food andseed, if not of both, during the cropless season. This system of loans, with a lien on the futurecrops, is but one way in which, under the Span-ish rSgirne, the slavery of the Filipino massesto their caciques has been continued, differingslightly in outward form, but in substance thesame, as the feudal slavery which existed at thetime of the Spanish conquest. The old Malayslavery originated commonly in debt, and despitethe thundering of the Laws of the Indies againstthis slavery, and its abolishment in round terms,the obligation to serve off a debt, coupled withusury as it invariably is, is still an unwrittensocial law of the Philippines, binding even uponthe succeeding generation. The proprietor whomade the advances commonly imposed a rate of
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Typical Filipino Community 73 interest in kind equivalent to thirty or forty percent., in addition to which he had the percentageto be gained from the fact that he had loanedrice, for instance, in the season when it wasscarcest and hence highest in price and received ,it back at the harvest-time, when the borrowerhad to pay to him not the exact amount receivedand the interest, but an amount equal at the cur-rent price to the amount which he had loaned.To some extent abuses of this sort have beencurbed in recent years, and will continue to becurbed more and more, by the better educationand growing sophistication of the labouringclasses. But they are deep-rooted in the condi-tions of the Philippines, and the usurious pro-prietor is not to be condemned as entirely toblame for the practice. Its continuance has beenmade possible, of course, by the improvidence ofthe masses of labourers, who look only to thepleasures and profits of the moment, and whoquite frequently squander the accumulati

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