Although the Philippine War is probably the least remembered from American history (I didn’t know about it until I read this chapter), it did change the course of history on an international level. The US was developing its reputation of getting itself into wars it has no business in, and the Philippines were being suffocated by opressing governments. Even though Emilio Aguinaldo had managed to set up a functioning government modeled after the US, McKinley thought they had to be even more “Americanized”.

On one hand, The reason McKinley supposedly took over the islands and decided to micromanage everything was because he wanted to “uplift and civilize and Christianize” the people. I personally believe that he was driven by the common American ego. It seems to be common that Americans “know best” and feel the need to show everyone else how much they “know”. One the other handm he was allowed into the islands. The Filipinos welcomed him, but after they saw his intentions, they turned against him.

The two questions I would ask are the following:

1. Why did you think it was okay to try to take over every aspect of those people’s lives even though they had a constitution modeled after ours and were already Roman Catholics?

2. What would you think if England came over and did the same thing to us?