THAT title does not refer to any of our present crop of politicians. It is the gist of Chapter 13 of Leon Maria Guerrero's prize-winning biography of our national hero, Jose Rizal. The book is titled "The First Filipino," and it won first prize at the Rizal biography-writing contest during the centennial of Rizal's birth in 1961. The National Bookstore commissioned me to translate this book into Filipino.
Aside from the Spanish friars, Rizal had to contend with his fellow expatriates in Spain. The best among them was Marcelo Hilario del Pilar, who used the anagram of his surname for his pseudonym, Plaridel. Guerrero said that "Del Pilar is perhaps the nearest of all his generation to the modern Filipino. Modern in his concept of political activity, modern in his belief in organization, modern in his skillful and efficient use of mass propaganda methods, he was the prototype of the modern politician, lawyer, newspaperman and civic leader."
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