Note 44 — THE COLLEGE OF SAN JOSÉ

With the signing of the treaty of Paris, December 10, 1898, the American government found itself face to face with a delicate and difficult problem, namely, that of the settlement of the properties of the friars. Of this problem, the question of the ultimate disposal of the college of San José was properly a part, since it was under the direction of the Dominican university of Santo Tomás, it having become, as we have seen above, the medical and pharmaceutical adjunct of the university. The question to be solved in this case narrowed down to whether the college of San José was primarily a government or an ecclesiastical pious foundation [obra pia], and hence, whether it could be legally administered by the government or the Church. In 1899, General Otis forbade the rector of the university of Santo Tomás to continue to maintain a school of medicine and pharmacy in the buildings of the college of San José, and to use its name and income for that purpose—an order made at the instance of the president and directors of the Philippine Medical Association. Shortly after their arrival the commissioners were consulted by General McArthur, as to the proper course for him to take on the petition of the rector of the university asking him to rescind the order. As the issue involved the question of the control of Church property, the commission deemed it its duty to investigate it and to bring it to a legal settlement.44