Though these natives could afford college education, they were still the object of racial discrimination by their Spanish classmates and friar mentors. They had to suffer the epithet of “monkey” as their parents were refered to as “beasts loaded with gold.” The creoles or mestizos were caught in the middle of a situation charged with the racial antagonism between the indios and the Spaniards. This racial antagonism was nothing but a manifestation of the colonial relationship. Even among the Spaniards, there was the foolish distinction made between the Philippine-born Spaniards and the Spanish-born Spaniards, with the former being derisively called Filipinos by the latter.
As more and more indios joined the ranks of the educated or the ilustrados, there came a point when the colonial authorities were alarmed and they entertained fears that they would be taken to task on the basis of the colonial laws whose idealist rhetoric they did not all practice. What appeared to the colonial rulers as the first systematized movement among the native ilustrados to attack the social and political supremacy of the Spaniards was the secularization movement within the clergy. The overwhelming majority of those who participated in this movement were indios and creoles and they demanded taking over the parishes held by the religious orders whose members were overwhelmingly Spanish.
When the Cavite Mutiny of 1872 occurred, Fathers Burgos, Gomez and Zamora who were the most outspoken leaders of the secularization movement were accused of conspiring to overthrow the Spanish colonial regime and they were garrotted. The mutiny was essentially an act of rebellion of the oppressed masses initiated by workers at the Cavite naval stockyard who were subjected to low wages and various forms of cruelty. Many of the rebellious workers and their genuine supporters were tortured and murdered. The three clerics who were condemned by the Spanish governor-general and the friars pleaded their innocence until their end. The style of pleading political innocence characterized the ilustrados from then on.
Nevertheless, even as the yoke of colonial oppression was carried mainly by the toiling masses, the principalia also suffered political and economic oppression at the hands of the colonial tyrants. The principalia joined in the exploitation of the toiling masses but in turn it was subjected to certain oppressive demands made by the governor-general, the provincial governor and the friars who increasingly reduced its share of exploitation. These colonial tyrants arbitrarily increased the quota in tribute collection, the taxes for the privilege of engaging in commerce, the land rent on leaseholdings, the quota in agricultural production and interest on loans. Failure to keep up with ever-increasing levies resulted in bankruptcy especially among the cabezas de barangay. The employment of civil guards for the confiscation of property and the enforcement of colonial laws became a common sight. Towards the end of the 19th century, the principalia became most offended when it was forcibly ejected from its leaseholds on friar lands because the friars preferred to turn over the management of their lands to various foreign corporations.
The extremely frequent change of governors-general in the Philippines during the 19th century reflected the sharp struggle between the “liberal republicans” and the “absolute monarchists” in Spain.
This had the general effect of aggravating the Filipino people’s suffering. Every governor-general had to make the most of his average short term of a little over a year to enlarge the official as well as his personal treasury.
The ilustrados became increasingly dissatisfied with the colonial regime and some of them fled to Spain where they hoped to get higher education and get more sympathy from Spanish liberal circles for their limited cause of changing the colonial status of the Philippines to the status of a regular province of Spain. They were desirous of representation in the Spanish parliament and the enjoyment of civil rights under the Spanish Constitution. In carrying out their reform movement, they established the newspaper La Solidaridad. It was the focus of activity for what would be called the Propaganda Movement, of which the chief propagandists were Dr. Jose Rizal, M.H. del Pilar, Graciano Lopez Jaena and Antonio Luna.
The Propaganda Movement failed and was condemned as “subversive” and “heretical” by the colonial authorities. Trying to carry out propaganda work in the Philippines itself, Rizal organized the short-lived La Liga Filipina which called on the Filipino people to become a national community and yet failed to state categorically the need for revolutionary armed struggle to effect separation from Spain. Putting his trust in the enemy, he was subsequently arrested and exiled to Dapitan in 1892.
When the Philippine Revolution of 1896 broke out, he was held culpable for it by the colonial tyrants and yet he betrayed it by calling on the people to lay down their arms a few days before his execution.