Apolinario Mabini

Apolinario Mabini was born on July 23, 1864[1] in Barangay Talaga in Tanauan, Batangas.[4] He was the second of eight children of Dionisia Maranan, a vendor in the Tanauan market, and Inocencio Mabini, an illiterate peasant.[5]

In 1881 Mabini received a scholarship to go to the Colegio de San Juan de Letran in Manila. An anecdote about his stay there says that a professor there decided to pick on him because his shabby clothing clearly showed he was poor. Mabini amazed the professor by answering a series of very difficult questions with ease. His studies at Letran were periodically interrupted by a chronic lack of funds, and he earned money for his board and lodging by teaching children.[5]

Mabini's mother had wanted him to enter the priesthood, but his desire to defend the poor made him decide to study law instead.[4] A year after receiving his Bachiller en Artes with highest honors and the title Professor of Latin from Letran, he moved on to the University of Santo Tomas, where he received his law degree in 1894.[4][5]

Comparing Mabini's generation of Filipino intellectuals to the previous one of Jose Rizal and the other members of the propagandista movement, Journalist and National Artist of the Philippines for Literature Nick Joaquin describes Mabini's generation as the next iteration in the evolution of Filipino intellectual development:[6]

Europe had been a necessary catalyst for the generation of Rizal. By the time of Mabini, the Filipino intellectual had advanced beyond the need for enlightenment abroad[....] The very point of Mabini’s accomplishment is that all his schooling, all his training, was done right here in his own country. The argument of Rizal’s generation was that Filipinos were not yet ready for self-government because they had too little education and could not aspire for more in their own country. The evidence of Mabini’s generation was that it could handle the affairs of government with only the education it had acquired locally. It no longer needed Europe; it had imbibed all it needed of Europe.[6]

Mabini joined the Guild of Lawyers after graduation, but he did not choose to practice law in a professional capacity. He did not set up his own law office, and instead continued to work in the office of a notary public.[6]

Instead, Mabini put his knowledge of law to much use during the days of the Philippine Revolution and the Filipino-American war. Joaquin notes that all his contributions to Philippine history somehow involved the law:

"His was a legal mind. He was interested in law as an idea, as an ideal[...] whenever he appears in our history he is arguing a question of legality."[6]

Mabini joined the fraternity of Freemasonry in September 1892, affiliating with lodge Balagtas, and taking on the name "Katabay".[7][8][9]

The following year, 1893, Mabini became a member of La Liga Filipina, which was being resuscitated after the arrest of its founder José Rizal in 1892. Mabini was made secretary of its new Supreme Council.[10] This was Mabini's first time to join an explicitly patriotic organization.[5][7]

Mabini, whose advocacies favored the reformist movement, pushed for the organization to continue its goals of supporting La Solidaridad and the reforms it advocated. When more revolutionary members of the Liga indicated that they did not think the reform movement was getting results and wanted to more openly support revolution, La Liga Filipina split into two factions: the moderate Cuerpo de Compromisarios, which wanted simply to continue to support the revolution, and the explicitly revolutionary Katipunan.[5][7]

Mabini joined the Cuerpo de Compromisarios.[7]

When José Rizal, part of the "La Liga Filipina", was executed in December that year, however, he changed his mind and gave the revolution his wholehearted support.[5]

Mabini was struck by polio[3] in 1895, and the disease gradually incapacitated him until January 1896, when he finally lost the use of both his legs.[7]

When the plans of the Katipunan were discovered by Spanish authorities, and the first active phase of the 1896 Philippine Revolution began in earnest, Mabini, still ill, was arrested along with numerous other members of La Liga Filipina.

Thirteen patriots arrested in Cavite were tried and eventually executed, earning them the title of "Thirteen Martyrs of Cavite." Jose Rizal himself was accused of being party to the revolution, and would eventually be executed in December that year.

When the Spanish authorities saw that Mabini was paralyzed, however, they decided to release him.[11][12]

Sent to the hospital after his arrest,[13] Mabini remained in ill health for a considerable time. He was seeking the curative properties of the hot springs in Los Baños, Laguna in 1898 when Emilio Aguinaldo sent for him, asking him to serve as advisor to the revolution.

During this convalescent period, Mabini wrote the pamphlets "El Verdadero Decálogo" and "Ordenanzas de la Revolución." Aguinaldo was impressed by these works and by Mabini's role as a leading figure in La Liga Filipina, and made arrangements for Mabini to be brought from Los Baños to Kawit, Cavite. It took hundreds of men taking turns carrying his hammock to portage Mabini to Kawit.

He continued to serve as the chief adviser for General Aguinaldo after the Philippine Declaration of Independence on June 12. He drafted decrees and edited the constitution for the First Philippine Republic, including the framework of the revolutionary government which was implemented in Malolos in 1899.[14]^:546

Shortly after Aguinaldo's return to the Philippines from exile in Hong Kong in May 1898, he tasked Mabini with helping him establish a government. Mabini authored the June 18, 1898, decree which established the Dictatorial Government of the Philippines. After the Malolos Constitution, the basic law of the First Philippine Republic, was promulgated on January 21, 1899, Mabini was appointed Prime Minister and also Foreign Minister. He then led the first cabinet of the republic.[15]

Mabini found himself in the center of the most critical period in the new country's history, grappling with problems until then unimagined. Most notable of these were his negotiations with Americans, which began on March 6, 1899. The United States and the Philippine Republic were embroiled in extremely contentious and eventually violent confrontations. During the negotiations for peace, Americans proffered Mabini autonomy for Aguinaldo's new government, but the talks failed because Mabini's conditions included a ceasefire, which was rejected. Mabini negotiated once again, seeking for an armistice instead, but the talks failed yet again. Eventually, feeling that the Americans were not negotiating 'bona fide,' he forswore the Americans and supported war. He resigned from government on May 7, 1899.

The Philippine–American War saw Mabini taken more seriously as a threat by the Americans than he was under the Spanish:[16] Says National Artist for Literature F. Sionil Jose:

"The Spaniards underestimated Mabini primarily because he was a cripple. Had they known of his intellectual perspicacity, they would have killed him earlier. The Americans did not. They were aware of his superior intelligence, his tenacity when he faced them in negotiations for autonomy and ceasefire."[16]

On December 10, 1899, he was captured by Americans at Cuyapo, Nueva Ecija, but granted leave to meet with W.H. Taft.[14]^:546–547 In 1901, he was exiled to Guam, along with scores of revolutionists Americans referred to as insurrectos (rebels) and who refused to swear fealty to the United States. When Brig. Gen. Arthur MacArthur Jr. was asked to explain by the U.S. Senate why Mabini had to be deported, he cabled:

Mabini deported: a most active agitator; persistently and defiantly refusing amnesty, and maintaining correspondence with insurgents in the field while living in Manila, Luzon...[17]

Mabini returned to the Philippines after agreeing to take the Oath of Allegiance to the United States[14]^:547 on February 26, 1903, before the Collector of Customs. On the day he sailed, he issued this statement to the press:

After two long years I am returning, so to speak, completely disoriented and, what is worse, almost overcome by disease and sufferings. Nevertheless, I hope, after some time of rest and study, still to be of some use, unless I have returned to the Islands for the sole purpose of dying.[18]

To the chagrin of the American colonial officials, Mabini resumed his work of agitating for independence for the Philippines soon after his return from exile.[19]

Not long after his return, Mabini died of cholera in Manila on May 13, 1903, at the age of 38.[14]^:547

Because of his role as advisor during the formation of the revolutionary government, and his contributions as statesman thereafter, Mabini is often referred to as the "Brains of the Revolution," a historical moniker he sometimes shares with Emilio Jacinto, who served in a similar capacity for the earlier revolutionary movement, the Katipunan.[22]

Mabini is also famous for having achieved all this despite having lost the use of his legs to polio just prior to the Philippine revolution.[23] This has made Mabini one of the Philippines' most visually iconic national heroes, such that he is often referred to as "The Sublime Paralytic" (Tagalog: Dakilang Lumpo). Contemporary historians, however, point out that the title obscures Mabini's many achievements.

The Mabini Shrine, now located in the PUP campus in Santa Mesa, Manila

• Two sites related to Mabini have been chosen to host shrines in his honor:
  • The house where Mabini died is now located in the campus of the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP) in Santa Mesa, Manila, having been moved twice. The simple nipa retains the original furniture, and some of the books he wrote, and also contains souvenir items, while hosting the municipal library and reading facilities.[27]
  • Mabini was buried in his town of birth - what is now Talaga, Tanauan City, Batangas. An interactive museum containing historical artifacts, his personal properties, books he wrote, and it also provides historical information about him, the Philippines during his time, and some of his town's historical background was constructed, and was recently renovated and improved, on this site. It also sells books about him and souvenir items. A replica of the house Mabini was born in was also constructed on the site.

The BRP Apolinario Mabini (PS-36).

2014 Philippine stamp showing Mabini

• Four Philippine municipalities are named after Mabini:
  • Mabini, Batangas,
  • Mabini, Bohol,
  • Mabini, Compostela Valley, and
  • Mabini, Pangasinan
• The Mabini Academy is a school in Lipa City, Batangas named after Mabini. The school logo carries Mabini's Image.
• Southern Tagalog Arterial Road or Apolinario Mabini Superhighway is an expressway that connect the province of Batangas to the SLEX.
• Apolinario Mabini Bridge, formerly known as Nagtahan Bridge in the City of Manila, was renamed in his honor.
• Mabini reef, also referred to as Johnson South Reef, is a reef claimed by the Philippines in the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. It is currently controlled by the People's Republic of China (PRC). In addition to the Philippines and China, its ownership is also disputed by Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan, and Vietnam.

• The Philippine Navy's Jacinto class corvette, BRP Apolinario Mabini (PS-36), is also named after Mabini.

• Mabini's face adorns the Philippine ten peso coin, along with that of Andrés Bonifacio.
  • The newer series (New Generation Currency Series) only has Mabini.
  • He was also featured on the ten peso bill that circulated or printed starting with the Pilipino Series in 1972 and continued until the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas stopped printing these notes (New Design series version) in 2002. From 1972 to 1997, he was the only one to portray on the front of the banknote until it added Andres Bonifacio that were printed from 1997 to 2002.

• The Gawad Mabini is awarded to Filipinos for distinguished foreign service, or promoting the interests and prestige of the Philippines abroad. It was established by Presidential Decree No. 490, s. 1974 in Mabini's honor since he was the first Secretary of Foreign Affairs of the First Philippine Republic.
• The Philippine government presents the annual Apolinario Mabini Awards to outstanding persons with disabilities.[28]

• Describing his cabinet:

...it belongs to no party, nor does it desire to form one; it stands for nothing save the interest of the fatherland.

• On Emilio Aguinaldo and his cabinet members:

The Revolution failed because it was badly directed, because its leader won his post not with praiseworthy but with blameworthy acts, because instead of employing the most useful men of the nation he jealously discarded them. Believing that the advance of the people was no more than his own personal advance, he did not rate men according to their ability, character and patriotism but according to the degree of friendship or kinship binding him to them; and wanting to have favorites willing to sacrifice themselves for him, he showed himself lenient to their faults. Because he disdained the people, he could not but fall like an idol of wax melting in the heat of adversity. May we never forget such a terrible lesson learned at the cost of unspeakable sufferings![32]

• By former Military Governor of the Philippines, Gen. Arthur MacArthur, describing Mabini before the US Senate's Lodge Committee of 1902:

Mabini is a highly educated young man who, unfortunately, is paralyzed. He has a classical education, a very flexible, imaginative mind, and Mabini's views were more comprehensive than any of the Filipinos that I have met. His idea was a dream of a Malay confederacy. Not the Luzon or the Philippine Archipelago, but I mean of that blood. He is a dreamy man, but a very firm character and of very high accomplishments. As said, unfortunately, he is paralyzed. He is a young man, and would undoubtedly be of great use in the future of those islands if it were not for his affliction.[33]

• By President Benigno Aquino III, reacting to Philippine students' apparent lack of familiarity with Mabini in 2015, when Mabini was portrayed in the film Heneral Luna:

We cannot question the depth and breadth of the contribution to our country of the man we call the ‘Sublime Paralytic’ and the ‘Brains of the Revolution.’ He represented the intelligence and convictions of the Filipino people. His sharp mind was his weapon to strengthen the foundation of our democratic institution."[30]

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  Apolinario Mabini Memorial (Cuyapo, Nueva Ecija)
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  Bust
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  Historical marker
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  The Memorial