Now the Code of Civil Procedure grants them certain special remedies by which their rights can be made good.

To illustrate: Under the Spanish regime the only remedy for a man illegally detained was to bring a criminal action against the person illegally detaining him.

He did not have the remedy of the writ of habeas corpus nor the writ of prohibition against an official who attempted to make him the victim of some unlawful act.

His only remedy was to bring a criminal action against such official, or to sue him for damages.

He could not compel public officials to perform their ministerial duties by mandamus proceedings.
The individual rights conferred by the Philippine Bill, and the special remedies granted by the Code of Civil Procedure, assure to the inhabitants of the islands liberties and privileges entirely unknown to them during the days of Spanish sovereignty, and these liberties and privileges are adequately safeguarded.
Two things still greatly complicate the administration of justice in the Philippines.
The first is the dense ignorance of the people of the working class who for the most part have failed to learn of their new rights, and even if they know them are afraid to attempt to assert them in opposition to the will of the _caciques_, whose power for evil they know only too well.
The other is the unreliability of many witnesses and their shocking readiness to perjure themselves.