I have been furnished a list, made up with all possible care by competent persons, from which it appears that there were eighty-five delegates actually present at the opening of congress, of whom fifty-nine were Tagalogs, five Bicols, three Pampangans, two Visayans, and one a Zambalan.  For the others there are no data available.  Yet it has been claimed that this was a representative body!  It was a Tagalog body, without enough representatives of any other one of the numerous Philippine peoples to be worth mentioning.

With a congress thus organized, Aguinaldo should have had no difficulty in obtaining any legislation he desired.

The committee of congress appointed to draw up a constitution set to work promptly, and by October 16,1898, had proceeded so far with their work that Buencamino was able to write to Aguinaldo that while he had been of the opinion that it would have been best for him to continue as a dictator aided by a committee of able men, yet it would now be a blow to the prestige of congress to suspend its sessions.  Aguinaldo noted upon this letter the fact that he did not approve of a constitution. [383]

Apparently early in December the committee submitted their project.  In presenting it to congress they said [384] that—­

“The work whose results the commission has the honour to present for the consideration of congress has been largely a matter of selection; in executing it not only has the French constitution been used, but also those of Belgium, Mexico, Brazil, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Guatemala, as we have considered those nations as most resembling the Filipino people.”

The most important difference between this project and the actual constitution adopted was that, although the project provided that the Dominican, Recollect, Franciscan and Augustinian friars should be expelled from the country and that their estates should become the property of the state, yet it recognized the Catholic religion as that of the state and forbade state contribution to the support of any other, although it permitted the practice in private of any religion not opposed to morality, which did not threaten the safety of the country.  The government was authorized to negotiate a concordat with the Pope for the regulation of the relations between church and state.  A strong party was in favour of this recognition, but it finally failed of adoption, and the constitution as promulgated provided for the freedom and equality of religion and for free and compulsory education which had not been provided for in the original project.  The constitution as approved forbade the granting of titles of nobility, decorations or honorary titles by the state to any Filipino.  This paragraph did not exist in the original project, which merely forbade any Filipino to accept them without the consent of the government.