Who is Dean Conant Worcester?(Part I)

Who is Dean Conant Worcester? (Part I)}
Photo: Worcester among the Ifugaos)

In 1874, Joseph B. Steere, a zoology professor at the University of Michigan, stopped at the Philippine Islands while touring remote corners of the globe for the University Museum. The Islands fascinated Steere and he returned for further explorations in 1887. Among the members of this party was a zoologist, Dean Conant Worcester. From 1890 to 1893, Worcester studied and traveled throughout the Islands and acquired a thorough knowledge of Philippine affairs.

Few Americans knew of the explorations by Steere and Worcester. For them, only the heroics of Admiral Dewey entering Manila Harbor put the Philippines on the map. Once under control, however, the Philippines became a leading topic of conversation for all Americans. The successful conclusion of the "splendid little war" sparked a major debate on whether the Philippines should become a permanent American colony. Proponents of expansionism, including Theodore Roosevelt, Henry Cabot Lodge, and Alfred T. Mahan, relished the idea of a colonial empire in the Pacific. Advancing strategic, political, economic, and moral arguments, the American imperialists reasoned that the United States had a moral duty to govern the Philippines and elevate her people to "civilized" democratic standards.

Opposing the imperialists was an impressive array of anti-colonial spokesmen, including Grover Cleveland, William Jennings Bryan, Andrew Carnegie, and Mark Twain. They insisted that an American controlled government in the Philippines, a foreign land far off in the Pacific, violated both the tradition of government by consent and the intent of the Declaration of Independence.

On February 6, 1899, the Senate decided in favor of the imperialists. With the ratification of the Treaty of Paris, the Philippine Islands officially passed into American control. In lofty tones, President McKinley spoke of the new colony. "The Philippines are ours," he stated, "not to exploit, but to develop, to civilize, to educate, to train in the science of self-government .

For this purpose, the President solicited the support of experienced teachers and administrators to serve as his political missionaries in the Philippines. Drawing from the nation's colleges and universities, the President and his advisers selected men who seemed intent on serving the "best interests" of the Philippine people by awakening them to American institutions and preparing them for eventual self-government.

Dean C. Worcester stood high on the President's list of Philippine experts. Recognizing Worcester's special knowledge of Philippine affairs, McKinley selected him to be a member of the First Philippine Commission in 1899. Worcester remained in the Philippines for more than fourteen years, being reappointed to the Second Philippine Commission and serving as Secretary of the Interior of the Philippine Insular Government and as Superintendent of Public Instruction.

Worcester's reasons for coming to the Islands were primarily scientific and political. He wrote the University of Michigan president: "We need especially at the present time good primary and secondary schoolteachers, and we shall soon need strong and energetic, and above all, honest, young men for positions which will pay better than similar positions pay at home and will give opportunity for advancement should it be merited." Many young university graduates, in this day before the Peace Corps, came to teach.

(Excerpts from the University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library. http://bentley.umich.edu/research/guides/philippines/philint.php; and other sources).