sident and
a republic, without knowing, and probably without caring very much,
what it all meant, except that they hoped that taxes would cease with
the departure of the friars. A determined and well-organized minority
had succeeded in imposing its will upon an unorganized, heterogeneous,
and leaderless majority.

As soon as a province was occupied by the Insurgents it was divided
into territorial zones within which command was exerted by military
officers. On July 20, 1898, Cavite had been divided into four zones,
and next day Brigadier-General Artemio Ricarte was placed in command
of the province and the first zone.

By July 7 Bulacan Province had been divided into six zones, and Nueva
Ecija into four zones, with a separate commander for each zone. These
men established the government prescribed by Aguinaldo's decrees of
the middle of June. Probably by the end of July Aguinaldo's municipal
governments had been established in the greater part of the towns
of Luzon. These governments were not established by the mass of the
people. The mass of the people were not consulted, but they were not
in the habit of being consulted in such matters and probably saw no
necessity for it in this case. As an evidence of this we have the fact
that from the beginning the acts of election were almost always drawn
up in Spanish, although by far the greater portion of the people of
the archipelago spoke only the native dialects.

The method of establishing these municipal governments employed in
Cavite in June, 1898, was continued to the end of Aguinaldo's rule. It
was the same in different places and at different times. Data obtained
from reports and documents written in towns far removed from each
other follow. They must be considered together in order to obtain an
idea of what this method really was.

When the Insurgent movement had progressed sufficiently far, the
leaders collected their adherents and obtained recognition as the
heads of their provinces or districts. For example, representatives
of the towns of Pampanga assembled at San Fernando on June 26,
1898, and under the presidency of General Maximo Hizon agreed to
yield him "complete obedience as military governor of the province
and representative of the illustrious dictator of these Philippine
Islands." [368] The town of Macabebe refused to send any delegates
to this gathering. Commissioners, in almost every case officers of
Aguinaldo's army, were empowered by him to esta