Note 27 — Chapter IX · THE AUDIENCIA AND THE GOVERNOR: THE AD INTERIM RULE

A complete understanding of the governmental functions and authority of the audiencia, and the relation of the latter to the other departments of government under these conditions may best be obtained by a review of the circumstances and conditions of the audiencia’s rule during vacancies in the Philippines. The first occasion which in any way approached the temporary rule of an audiencia in the Philippines was in 1593, after the murder of Governor Gómez Pérez Dasmariñas. Pedro de Rojas, who had been a magistrate of the audiencia when it was suppressed in 1589, was at that time sole judge, with the additional rank of lieutenant-governor and asesor, standing next to the governor in authority.27 After the death of Gómez Pérez Dasmariñas, Rojas had occupied the governor’s chair less than a year when he was succeeded by the deceased governor’s son, Luís Pérez Dasmariñas, who became governor on the authority of a royal order found among the papers of his father, whereby he was given the power to name his successor.28 His tenure seems to have been only temporary, however, for as soon as news reached the court of the death of the elder Dasmariñas, Francisco Tello de Guzmán was appointed permanent governor and an audiencia was sent to the Islands, arriving at Manila in 1596.29 Meanwhile Rojas was succeeded as lieutenant-governor and asesor by Antonio de Morga. According to Montero y Vidal, Dasmariñas turned over the government to Morga in 1595, but it is more probable that Morga assumed the temporary governorship when Dasmariñas was in Cambodia and elsewhere fighting against the Dutch. In fact, this conclusion is confirmed by Zúñiga.30 At any rate, Morga administered both governmental and military affairs on several occasions when the various governors were absent from the Islands, engaged in expeditions of conquest.