14 June, 1941

TODAY IN PHILIPPINE HISTORY:

President Manuel L. Quezon y Molina signs the maternity-leave bill giving women in government service 60 days maternity leave with full pay on top of the usual sick and vacation leaves during the period of imperialist American Occupation and several months before the Japanese occupies the Philippines in World War II.

Quezon’s advisers had recommended against the bill on economic grounds but the President, perceived to be a champion of the underdog, remarked “I’ll sign that bill if it bankrupts the treasury,” before promptly reaching for a pen. Quezon’s American-sponsored “Commonwealth period” presidency had exhibited progressiveness in terms of women’s rights and welfare as he earlier supported the women’s suffragist movement declaring about a decade earlier: “I have always been and always will be in favor of woman suffrage.”

(Ref: philippine-islands-lemuria.blogspot.co.nz)