LOS ANGELES—Filipinos across the United States have started preparing for May 28 when they will begin to display the Philippine flag for 16 days, displaying the country’s tricolors which has become part of a revered tradition and culture of the Philippines, a multi-ethnic, multi-lingual country of 106 million people.
The display will not be as widespread as it will be at home in the Philippines, but Filipinos in the United States, according to consular office sources in the West Coast, are certain to display in their residential windows the Philippine flag.
In Southern California, nearly 480,000 Filipinos (over one out of every four Filipino-Americans) make their home in the Los Angeles and San Diego areas, with the Los Angeles County holding the largest Filipino settlement in the United States, with more than 262,000 members of the group.
The Los Angeles-Riverside-Orange County Metropolitan Area has over 370,000 Filipinos. The city of Los Angeles alone contains well over 120,000 Filipinos, according to latest available figures.
There are also Filipinos in Daly City, in Vallejo, in San Francisco, Fontana in San Bernardino County in California, Dallas in Texas, Chicago in Illinois, Colorado and Hawaii, among other states.
The national flag, displayed with the blue field on top in times of peace, and with the red field on top in times of war, is a horizontal bicolor with equal bands of blue and red, and with a white equilateral triangle based at the hoist side.
In the center of the triangle is a golden yellow sun with eight primary rays, each containing three individual rays.
At every corner of the triangle is a five-pointed golden yellow star.
The flag is horizontally divided into two basic colors—royal blue and scarlet red—with a white equilateral triangle based at the hoist side.
At the center of the triangle is a golden-yellow sun with eight primary rays, each containing three individual rays, and at each corner of the triangle is a five-pointed golden-yellow star.
The flag’s length is twice its width, which translates into an aspect ratio of 1:2. The sides of the white triangle are equal to the width of the flag.
Each star is oriented such that it points towards the tip of the vertex at which it is located.
The flag’s colors are specified by Republic Act 8491 in terms of their cable number in the system developed by the Color Association of the United States.
The Philippine flag, designed in 1897 by Emilio Aguinaldo while he was in exile in Hong Kong, is unique since it can indicate a state of war when the red field is displayed on top, or on the observer’s left when the flag is displayed vertically, with the white equilateral triangle at the top end.
According to official sources, the white triangle stands for equality and fraternity; the blue field for peace, truth, and justice; and the red field for patriotism and valor.
The eight primary rays of the sun represent the eight provinces which declared a state of war as soon as the first revolt was initiated in the 1896 Revolution of independence from Spain, and placed under martial law by the colonial government.
The eight provinces were Manila, Cavite, Bulacan, Pampanga, Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Laguna, and Batangas.
The three stars represent the three major geographical divisions of this Southeast Asian archipelagothe: Luzon, the Visayas, and Mindanao.
Some have noted that the symbolism given in the 1898 Proclamation of Philippine Independence differs from the current official explanation.
One school of thought says the white triangle signifies the emblem of the Katipunan, the secret society that opposed Spanish rule which was ushered in by Fernando Magallanes in 1521 until the Spanish armada was beaten by the troops of US Admiral George Dewey in 1898.
Another school of thought says the flag’s colors celebrate the flag of the United States as a manifestation of Philippine gratitude for American protection against the Spanish during the Philippine Revolution.
Still another says that one of the three stars represents the island of Panay, not the entire Visayan islands.
Historians say it has been common since the 1960s to trace the development of the Philippine flag to the various war standards of the individual leaders of the Katipunan, a pseudo-masonic revolutionary movement that opposed Spanish rule in the Philippines and led the Philippine Revolution.
But while some symbols common to the Katipunan flags would be adopted into the iconography of the Revolution, historians say it is inconclusive whether these war standards can be considered precursors to the present Philippine flag.
The first flag was sewn by Marcela Marino de Agoncillo with the help of her daughter Lorenza and Delfina Herbosa de Natividad (a niece of reformist leader José Rizal).
Agoncillo’s remains are interred at the Dominican-run Sanctuario del Santo Cristo in San Juan City.
The flag, while it was displayed in battle on May 28, 1898, was formally unfurled during the proclamation of independence on June 12, 1898 in Kawit, Cavite.
However, Augusto de Viana, chief history researcher of the National Historical Institute, suggests in an article in the English language The Manila Times that the flag was first raised in Alapan, Imus, Cavite, on May 28, 1898.
He cites Presidential Proclamation No. 374, issued by then President Diosdado Macapagal on March 6, 1965.
The flag was first flown with the red field up on Feb. 4, 1899 to show that a state of war existed. Aguinaldo was captured by the Americans two years later Palanan, Isabela, and swore allegiance to the United States.
The defeat of the Philippine Republic ushered in American colonial rule which made the display of the Philippine flag an illegal move by the Sedition Act of 1907.
Mr. Cabie is night editor for this newspaper. He is currently on travel.