Note 18 — Chapter XII · Otis and the War (Continued)

And now let us concentrate our attention upon Luzon as Mr. Root no doubt did, with infinite pains, in the fall of 1899. Of the 7,600,000 people of the Philippines18 almost exactly one-half, i.e., 3,800,000,19 live on Luzon, and these are practically all civilized.20 It so happens that the State of our Union which is nearer the size of Luzon than any other is the one which furnished the first American Civil Governor for the Philippine Islands, Governor Taft. President Taft’s native State of Ohio is 41,061 square miles in area, and Luzon is 40,969.21 Roughly speaking, Luzon may also be said to be about the size of Cuba,22 though it is about twice as thickly populated as the latter, Cuba, having something over 2,000,000 people to Luzon’s nearly 4,000,000.23