Aurora Quezon

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Aurora Aragón de Quezon (February 19, 1888–April 28, 1949), was the wife of Manuel L. Quezon, President of the Philippines. While today she is ranked as the second First Lady of the Philippines, she was actually the first spouse of a Philippine president to be called First Lady (the first wife of Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo was not known as a First Lady, the honorific being unknown in the Philippines at the time).

Quezon was born on February 19, 1888 to Pedro Aragón and Zeneida Molina, in Baler (then in Tayabas Province). During the Philippine Revolution her father was imprisoned in Fort Santiago, Manila, by the Spanish for being suspected as being a member of the Katipunan.

After the Philippine Revolution her father was reunited with her mother and young Aurora, and her sisters, who had been ironically kept with the Spanish garrison during the famous Siege of Baler.

In 1911, Aurora went to Manila to study in the Philippine Normal College but had to stop her studies due to her poor health. In December, 1918, she married her first cousin Manuel L. Quezon (Aurora's mother, Zeneida Molina, and Manuel L. Quezon's mother, Ma. Dolores Molina, were sisters) in Hong Kong. They had four children: Maria Aurora (born in 1919); Maria Zeneida (born in 1921); Luisa Corazon Paz (born in 1924); and Manuel, Jr. (born in 1926).

Her husband's career is well known: provincial fiscal from 1905-1907; Majority Leader of the First Philippine Assembly, 1907-1909; Resident Commissioner in the US House of Representatives, 1909-1916; first President of the Philippine Senate, 1916-1935; President of the Philippines, 1935-1944.

During her husband's political life, Aurora Quezon stayed in the background, involving herself with women's organizations such as the National Federation of Women's Clubs, of which she was honorary chairman. She was very active in the campaign to give Filipino women the right of suffrage (to vote), which was achieved in 1937. During her husband's term, she was particularly involved in managing their farm, Kaleidan, in Arayat, Pampanga, to demonstrate how Social Justice could be applied to landlord-tenant relationships in an agrarian setting.

She accompanied her husband to Corregidor in December, 1941, where her husband was inaugurated to a 2nd term as President, being sworn in by Chief Justice Jose Abad Santos on December 30, 1941.

Thereafter, in February, 1942, they began their long journey to escape the Japanese, finally reaching the United States in June of 1942.

Manuel L. Quezon died of tuberculosis on August 1, 1944. Thereafter, Mrs. Quezon moved to California to await their return to their native country. She and her daughters volunteered as nurses in the Red Cross.

When Mrs. Quezon returned to the Philippines in 1945, she was offered a slot in the Liberal Party slate for the May, 1945 elections, as a senator, but she declined. She however campaigned actively for Manuel Roxas who became the first president of the independent Philippine Republic. In 1946 she was voted a pension of 1,000 pesos a month by the Philippine Congress. She declined it: "I feel that on account of ... countless war widows and orphans ... I should waive collection of a pension . . ." her letter stated, "I cannot, in good conscience, receive ... Government assistance when so many of my less fortunate sisters and their children are not yet taken care of. . . I know [if I accepted] I would not be keeping faith with the memory of my beloved husband. . . ."

In 1947, the Philippine National Red Cross was established as an independent Red Cross organization, and she became the first Chairman of the Philippine National Red Cross, holding the position until her death in 1949.

She continued to be involved in civic work, such as the efforts to rebuild the Antipolo Church. As First Lady, she was the first First Lady to reside in Malacañan Palace, but she spent as little time as possible there, preferring to stay in a nipa house in Malacañang Park or in her farm in Arayat. She received honorary doctorates from the University of Santo Tomas, and from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. She received the Ozanam Award from the Ateneo de Manila University, and the Pro Ecclessia et Pontifice Cross from Pope Pius XII.

On April 28, 1949 as she was on her way to inaugurate the Quezon Memorial Hospital in her home town of Baler, Aurora Quezon, her eldest daughter Ma. Aurora, son-in-law Felipe Buencamino III, Quezon City Mayor Ponciano Bernardo and several others were ambushed and killed by renegade members of the Hukbalahap, in Bongabon, Nueva Ecija Province. Her death shocked the nation. Time Magazine, in 1949, had remarked that “thousands of Filipinos regard her as a combination queen-mother and patron saint.” The circumstances surrounding her death inflicted a severe propaganda defeat on the Socialist Hukbalahap movement, waging a rebellion against the Philippine government. Whether fairly or not, the movement was blamed for the brutality of her murder.

Strangely, while no Philippine President has ever been assassinated, Aurora Quezon is one of three presidential spouses who have been murdered. The other two were Alicia Syquia-Quirino, who was murdered along with three of her children by the Japanese during the Battle of Manila, and Senator Benigno Aquino, Jr..

She was survived by her daughter, Ma. Zeneida, who remarried later on and became Mrs. Avanceña, and her son, Manuel, Jr. (who himself died in 1998). Her youngest daughter Luisa Corazon Paz died as a baby.

Aurora Boulevard in Quezon City was named in her honor in 1951, and in the same year, President Elpidio Quirino created the Aurora sub-province, comprising Baler and surrounding areas in Quezon Province. In 1978, Aurora became a separate province.

The Concerned Women of the Philippines have named the Aurora Aragon Quezon Peace Awards after Mrs. Quezon to remind people of the fact that in times of violence, the first to suffer are the innocent.

Preceded by Hilaria Aguinaldo

First Lady of the Philippines 1935–1944

Succeeded by Pacencia Laurel