Under such circumstances the organization of a rural police force was imperatively necessary.  Unfortunately the most critical situation which it was to be called upon to meet had to be faced at the very outset, when both officers and men were inexperienced and before adequate discipline could be established.

The law providing for its establishment was drawn by the Honourable Luke E. Wright, at that time secretary of commerce and police and later destined to become governor-general of the Philippines and secretary of war of the United States.

It was intended that the constabulary should accomplish its ends by force when necessary but by sympathetic supervision when possible, suppressing brigandage and turning the people towards habits of peace.  The fact was clearly borne in mind that the abuses of the guardia civil had not been forgotten and the new force was designed to meet existing conditions, to allay as rapidly as possible the existing just rancour against the similar organization established under the Spanish regime, and to avoid the evils which had contributed so much toward causing the downfall of Spanish sovereignty.  The law was admirably framed to achieve these ends.

The officers of the constabulary were selected chiefly from American volunteers recently mustered out and from honourably discharged soldiers of the United States army.  Some few Filipinos, whose loyalty was above suspicion, were appointed to the lower grades.  This number has since been materially augumented, and some of the original Filipino appointees have risen to the rank of captain.

It was inevitable that at the outset there should be abuses.  The organization was necessarily born at work; there was no time to instruct, to formulate regulations, to wait until a satisfactory state of discipline had been brought about.  There were not barracks for housing the soldiers; there were neither uniforms, nor arms, nor ammunition.  There was no system for rationing the men.  All of these things had to be provided, and they were provided through a natural evolution of practical processes, crystallizing into form, tested by the duties of the day.  The organization which grew up was a true survival of the fittest, both in personnel and in methods.  The wonder is not that some abuses occurred, but that they were so few; not that there were occasional evidences of lack of efficiency, but that efficiency was on the whole so high from the beginning.

The several provinces were made administrative units, the commanding officer in each being designated as “senior inspector.”  The men who were to serve in a given province were by preference recruited there, and a departure was thus made from the usual foreign colonial practice.

In 1905 the total force was fixed at one hundred companies with a nominal strength of two officers and fifty men each.  Under special conditions this rule may be departed from, and the size of the companies or the number of officers increased.