- Little Brown Brother
Little Brown Brother was a term used by Americans to refer to Filipinos during the period of U.S. colonial rule over the Philippines, following the Treaty of Paris between Spain and the United States, and the
Philippine-American War . The term wascoined byWilliam Howard Taft , the first AmericanGovernor-General of the Philippines (1901-1904) and later the 27thPresident of the United States .The term was not originally intended to be derogatory, nor an
ethnic slur ; instead, in the words of historian Creighton Miller, it is a reflection of "paternalist racism", shared also by Theodore Roosevelt.ref|racismTaft told President McKinley that "our little brown brothers" would need "fifty or one hundred years" of close supervision "to develop anything resembling Anglo-Saxon political principles and skills." "Fillipinos are moved by similar considerations to those which move other men."ref|little
The phrase "Little Brown Brother" drew some sneers from both Americans and Filipinos, however,ref|burying due to the bloodshed of the
Philippine-American War . U.S. attacks in the Philippines reportedly included the burning of entire villages and the concentration of civilians into concentration camps; Filipinos taken prisoner by Americans were reportedly interrogated using thewater cure . American soldiers taken prisoner by Filipinos were reportedly tortured and their bodies mutiliated. Although the United States government declared the "insurgency" that was thePhilippine-American War over by 1902, guerilla resistance movements against the American occupation continued until 1913.Footnotes
# "Benevolent Assimilation: The American Conquest of the Philippines, 1899-1903",Stuart Creighton Miller , (Yale University Press, 1982): p. 134
# S Doc. 331, 57th Congress., 1st session., part 1, p.65-68; "(The Philippine hearings (A.K.A. Philippine Investigating Committee) and a great deal of documentation were published in three volumes as S. Doc. 331, 57th Cong., 1st Session An abridged version of the oral testimony can be found in: "American Imperialism and the Philippine Insurrection"; edited by Henry F Graff; Publisher: Little, Brown; 1969. ASIN: B0006BYNI8)"; Miller p. 134
# cite book | author=Wolff, Leon | title=Little Brown Brother : How the United States purchased and pacified the Philippine Islands at the Century's Turn | publisher=Doubleday | year=1961 | id=ASIN: B0006AWZ6Q p. 313;Stuart Creighton Miller describes the term being viewed by the military "with utter scorn". p. 134External links
* [http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1009.html Biography of William Howard Taft with the mention of the term Little Brown Brothers]
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