THE PHILIPPINES: The Charge: Murder

In Negros Occidental, second most populous province in the Philippines, everything ran on time: the buses, sugar production and the voters. The Huks were nonexistent; the roads at night were made as safe as Dewey Boulevard in Manila at high noon; sugar output, hard hit by war, had been quickly restored; and the voters knew exactly what to do —or else. Special police, armed with carbines, made sure there were no slipups.

All in all, Negros Occidental was a well-run little police state and its Mussolini was Governor Rafael Lacson. He was, that...