an adaptation of the administrative machinery of Spain.  In accordance with this procedure the Philippine islands were constituted a kingdom and placed under the charge of a governor and captain general, whose powers were truly royal and limited only by the check imposed by the Supreme Court (the Audiencia) and by the ordeal of the residencia at the expiration of his term of office.  Among his extensive prerogatives was his appointing power which embraced all branches of the civil service in the islands.  He also was ex officio the President of the Audiencia. [53] His salary was $8,000 [54] a year, but his income might be largely augmented by gifts or bribes. [55] The limitations upon the power of the Governor imposed by the Audiencia, in the opinion of the French astronomer Le Gentil, were the only safeguard against an arbitrary despotism, yet Zuniga, a generation later pronounced its efforts in this direction generally ineffectual. [56] The residencia to which reference has been made was an institution peculiar in modern times to the Spanish colonial system, it was designed to provide a method by which officials could be held to strict accountability for all acts during their term of office.  Today reliance is placed upon the force of public opinion inspired and formulated by the press and, in self-governing communities, upon the holding of frequent elections.  The strength of modern party cohesion both infuses vigor into these agencies and neutralizes their effectiveness as the case may be.  But in the days of the formation of the Spanish Empire beyond the sea there were neither free elections, nor public press, and the criticism of the government was sedition.  To allow a contest in the courts involving the governor’s powers during his term of office would be subversive of his authority.  He was then to be kept within bounds by realizing that a day of judgment was impending, when everyone, even the poorest Indian, might in perfect security bring forward his accusation. [57] In the Philippines the residencia for a governor lasted six months and was conducted by his successor and all the charges made were forwarded to Spain. [58] The Italian traveler Gemelli Careri who visited Manila in 1696 characterizes the governor’s residencia as a “dreadful Trial,” the strain of which would sometimes “break their hearts.” [59]

On the other hand, an acute observer of Spanish-American institutions of the olden time intimates that the severities of the residencia could be mitigated and no doubt such was the case in the Philippines. [60] By the end of the eighteenth century the residencia seems to have lost its efficacy. [61] The governorship was certainly a difficult post to fill and the remoteness from Europe, the isolation, and the vexations of the residencia made it no easy task to get good men for the place.  An official of thirty years experience, lay and ecclesiastical, assures us in the early seventeenth century that he had known of only one governor really fitted for the position, Gomez Perez Dasmarinas.  He had done more for the happiness of the natives in three years than all his predecessors or successors.  Some governors had been without previous political experience while others were deficient in the qualities required in a successful colonial ruler. [62]