[Congressional Bills 114th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 1555 Enrolled Bill (ENR)]

        S.1555

                     One Hundred Fourteenth Congress

                                 of the

                        United States of America


                          AT THE SECOND SESSION

           Begun and held at the City of Washington on Monday,
           the fourth day of January, two thousand and sixteen


                                 An Act


 
   To award a Congressional Gold Medal, collectively, to the Filipino 
veterans of World War II, in recognition of the dedicated service of the 
                      veterans during World War II.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
    This Act may be cited as the ``Filipino Veterans of World War II 
Congressional Gold Medal Act of 2015''.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
    Congress finds the following:
        (1) The First Philippine Republic was founded as a result of 
    the Spanish-American War in which Filipino revolutionaries and the 
    United States Armed Forces fought to overthrow Spanish colonial 
    rule. On June 12, 1898, Filipinos declared the Philippines to be an 
    independent and sovereign nation. The Treaty of Paris negotiated 
    between the United States and Spain ignored this declaration of 
    independence, and the United States paid Spain $20,000,000 to cede 
    control of the Philippines to the United States. Filipino 
    nationalists who sought independence rather than a change in 
    colonial rulers clashed with forces of the United States in the 
    Islands. The Philippine-American War, which officially lasted for 3 
    years from 1899 to 1902, led to the establishment of the United 
    States civil government in the Philippines.
        (2) In 1901, units of Filipino soldiers who fought for the 
    United States against the nationalist insurrection were formally 
    incorporated into the United States Army as the Philippine Scouts.
        (3) In 1934, the Philippine Independence Act (Public Law 73-
    127; 48 Stat. 456) established a timetable for ending colonial rule 
    of the United States. Between 1934 and Philippine independence in 
    1946, the United States retained sovereignty over Philippine 
    foreign policy and reserved the right to call Filipinos into the 
    service of the United States Armed Forces.
        (4) On December 21 1935, President of the Philippine 
    Commonwealth, Manuel Quezon, signed the National Defense Act, 
    passed by the Philippine Assembly. General Douglas MacArthur set 
    upon the task of creating an independent army in the Philippines, 
    consisting of a small regular force, the Philippine Constabulary, a 
    police force created during the colonial period of the United 
    States, and reservists. By July 1941, the Philippine army had 
    130,000 reservists and 6,000 officers.
        (5) On July 26, 1941, as tensions with Japan rose in the 
    Pacific, President Franklin D. Roosevelt used his authority vested 
    in the Constitution of the United States and the Philippine 
    Independence Act to ``call into service of the United States . . . 
    all of the organized military forces of the Government of the 
    Philippines.'' On July 27th, 1941, in accordance with a War 
    Department directive received a day earlier, the United States 
    Forces in the Far East (USAFFE) was established, and Manila was 
    designated as the command headquarters. Commander of the USAFFE, 
    General Douglas MacArthur, planned to absorb the entire Philippine 
    army into the USAFFE in phases. The first phase, which began on 
    September 1, 1941, included 25,000 men and 4,000 officers.
        (6) Filipinos who served in the USAFFE included--
            (A) the Philippine Scouts, who comprised half of the 22,532 
        soldiers in the Philippine Department, or United States Army 
        garrison stationed in the Islands at the start of the war;
            (B) the Philippine Commonwealth Army;
            (C) the new Philippine Scouts, or Filipinos who volunteered 
        to serve with the United States Army when the United States 
        Armed Forces returned to the island;
            (D) Filipino civilians who volunteered to serve in the 
        United States Armed Forces in 1945 and 1946, and who became 
        ``attached'' to various units of the United States Army; and
            (E) the ``Guerrilla Services'' who had fought behind enemy 
        lines throughout the war.
        (7) Even after hostilities ceased, wartime service of the new 
    Philippine Scouts continued as a matter of law until the end of 
    1946, and the force gradually disbanded until it was disestablished 
    in 1950.
        (8) On December 8th, 1941, not even 24 hours after the bombing 
    of Pearl Harbor, Japanese Imperial forces attacked bases of the 
    United States Army in the Philippines.
        (9) In the spring of 1942, the Japanese 14th Army overran the 
    Bataan Peninsula, and, after a heroic but futile defense, more than 
    78,000 members of the United States Armed Forces were captured, 
    specifically 66,000 Filipinos and 12,000 service members from the 
    United States. The Japanese transferred the captured soldiers from 
    Bataan to Camp O'Donnell, in what is now known as the infamous 
    Bataan Death March. Forced to march the 70-mile distance in 1 week, 
    without adequate food, water, or medicine, nearly 700 members of 
    the United States Armed Forces and an estimated 6,000 to 10,000 
    Filipinos perished during the journey.
        (10) After the fall of the Bataan Peninsula, the Japanese Army 
    turned its sights on Corregidor. The estimated forces in defense of 
    Corregidor totaled 13,000, and were comprised of members of the 
    United States Armed Forces and Filipino troops. Of this number, 800 
    were killed, 1,000 were wounded, and 11,000 were captured and 
    forced to march through the city of Manila, after which the 
    captured troops were distributed to various POW camps. The rest of 
    the captured troops escaped to organize or join an underground 
    guerrilla army.
        (11) Even before the fall of Corregidor, Philippine resistance, 
    in the form of guerrilla armies, began to wage warfare on the 
    Japanese invaders. Guerrilla armies, from Northern Luzon to 
    Mindanao--
            (A) raided Japanese camps, stealing weapons and supplies;
            (B) sabotaged and ambushed Japanese troops on the move; and
            (C) with little weaponry, and severely outmatched in 
        numbers, began to extract victories.
        (12) Japanese intelligence reports reveal that from the time 
    the Japanese invaded until the return of the United States Armed 
    Forces in the summer of 1944, an estimated 300,000 Filipinos 
    continued to fight against Japanese forces. Filipino resistance 
    against the Japanese was so strong that, in 1942, the Imperial Army 
    formed the Morista Butai, a unit designated to suppress guerrillas.
        (13) Because Philippine guerrillas worked to restore 
    communication with United States forces in the Pacific, General 
    MacArthur was able to use the guerrillas in advance of a 
    conventional operation and provided the headquarters of General 
    MacArthur with valuable information. Guerrillas captured and 
    transmitted to the headquarters of General MacArthur Japanese naval 
    plans for the Central Pacific, including defense plans for the 
    Mariana Islands. Intelligence derived from guerrillas relating to 
    aircraft, ship, and troop movements allowed for Allied forces to 
    attack Japanese supply lines and guerrillas and even directed 
    United States submarines where to land agents and cargo on the 
    Philippine coast.
        (14) On December 20, 1941, President Roosevelt signed the 
    Selective Training and Service Amendments Act (Public Law 77-360; 
    55 Stat. 844) which, among other things, allowed Filipinos in the 
    United States to enlist in the United States Armed Forces. In 
    February 1942, President Roosevelt issued the Second War Powers Act 
    (Public Law 77-507; 56 Stat. 176), promising a simplified 
    naturalization process for Filipinos who served in the United 
    States Armed Forces. Subsequently, 16,000 Filipinos in California 
    alone decided to enlist.
        (15) The mobilization of forces included the activation and 
    assumption of command of the First Filipino Infantry Battalion on 
    April 1, 1942, at Camp San Luis Obispo, California. Orders were 
    issued to activate the First Filipino Infantry Regiment and Band at 
    Salinas, California, effective July 13, 1942. The activation of the 
    Second Filipino Infantry Regiment occurred at Fort Ord, California, 
    on November 21, 1942. Nearly 9,000 Filipinos and Filipino Americans 
    fought in the United States Army 1st and 2nd Filipino Infantry 
    Regiments.
        (16) Soldiers of the 1st and 2nd Infantry Regiments 
    participated in the bloody combat and mop-up operations at New 
    Guinea, Leyte, Samar, Luzon, and the Southern Philippines. In 1943, 
    800 men were selected from the 1st and 2nd Regiments and shipped to 
    Australia to receive training in intelligence gathering, sabotage, 
    and demolition. Reorganized as part of the 1st Reconnaissance 
    Battalion, this group was sent to the Philippines to coordinate 
    with major guerrilla armies in the Islands. Members of the 1st 
    Regiment were also attached to the United States 6th Army ``Alamo 
    Scouts'', a reconnaissance group that traveled 30 miles behind 
    enemy lines to free Allied prisoners from the Cabanatuan death camp 
    on January 30, 1945. In addition, in 1945, according to the 441st 
    Counter Intelligence Unit of the United States Armed Forces, 
    Philippine guerrillas provided ``very important information and 
    sketches of enemy positions and installations'' for the liberation 
    of the Santo Tomas prisoner of war camp, an event that made front 
    page news across the United States.
        (17) In March 1944, members of the 2nd Filipino Infantry 
    Regiment were selected for special assignments, including 
    intelligence missions, and reorganized as the 2nd Filipino Infantry 
    Battalion (Separate). The 2nd Filipino Infantry Battalion 
    (Separate) contributed to mop-up operations as a civil affairs 
    unit.
        (18) Filipinos participated in the war out of national pride, 
    as well as out of a commitment to the Allied forces struggle 
    against fascism. 57,000 Filipinos in uniform died in the war 
    effort. Estimates of civilian deaths range from 700,000 to upwards 
    of 1,000,000, or between 4.38 to 6.25 percent of the prewar 
    population of 16,000,000.
        (19) Because Filipinos who served in the Commonwealth Army of 
    the Philippines were originally considered a part of the Allied 
    struggle, the military order issued by President Roosevelt on July 
    26, 1941, stated that Filipinos who served in the Commonwealth Army 
    of the Philippines were entitled to full veterans benefits. The 
    guarantee to pay back the service of Filipinos through veterans 
    benefits was reversed by the Rescission Acts of 1946 (Public Laws 
    79-301 and 79-391; 60 Stat. 6 and 60 Stat. 221), which deemed that 
    the wartime service of the Commonwealth Army of the Philippines and 
    the new Philippine Scouts was not considered active and, therefore, 
    did not qualify for benefits.
        (20) The loyal and valiant Filipino Veterans of World War II 
    fought, suffered, and, in many instances, died in the same manner 
    and under the same commander as other members of the United States 
    Armed Forces during World War II.
        (21) The Filipino Veterans of World War II fought alongside, 
    and as an integral part of, the United States Armed Forces. The 
    Philippines remained a territory of the United States for the 
    duration of the war and, accordingly, the United States maintained 
    sovereignty over Philippine foreign relations, including Philippine 
    laws enacted by the Philippine Government. Filipinos who fought in 
    the Philippines were not only defending or fighting for the 
    Philippines, but also defending, and ultimately liberating, 
    sovereign territory held by the United States Government.
        (22) The United States remains forever indebted to the bravery, 
    valor, and dedication that the Filipino Veterans of World War II 
    displayed. Their commitment and sacrifice demonstrates a highly 
    uncommon and commendable sense of patriotism and honor.
SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.
    In this Act--
     (a) the term ``Filipino Veterans of World War II'' includes any 
individual who served--
        (1) honorably at any time during the period beginning on July 
    26, 1941, and ending on December 31, 1946;
        (2) in an active-duty status under the command of the United 
    States Armed Forces in the Far East; and
        (3)(A) within the Philippine Commonwealth Army, the Philippine 
    Scouts, the Philippine Constabulary, Recognized Guerrilla units, 
    the New Philippine Scouts, the First Filipino Infantry Regiment, 
    the Second Filipino Infantry Battalion (Separate), or the First 
    Reconnaissance Battalion; or
        (B) commanding or serving in a unit described in paragraph 
    (3)(A) as a United States military officer or enlisted soldier; and
    (b) the term ``Secretary'' means the Secretary of the Treasury.
SEC. 4. CONGRESSIONAL GOLD MEDAL.
    (a) Award Authorized.--The President pro tempore of the Senate and 
the Speaker of the House of Representatives shall make appropriate 
arrangements for the award, on behalf of Congress, of a single gold 
medal of appropriate design to the Filipino Veterans of World War II in 
recognition of the dedicated service of the veterans during World War 
II.
    (b) Design and Striking.--For the purposes of the award referred to 
in subsection (a), the Secretary shall strike the Gold Medal with 
suitable emblems, devices, and inscriptions, to be determined by the 
Secretary.
    (c) Smithsonian Institution.--
        (1) In general.--Following the award of the gold medal in honor 
    of the Filipino Veterans of World War II, the gold medal shall be 
    given to the Smithsonian Institution, where it will be available 
    for display as appropriate and made available for research.
        (2) Sense of congress.--It is the sense of Congress that the 
    Smithsonian Institution should make the gold medal received under 
    paragraph (1) available for display elsewhere, particularly at 
    other appropriate locations associated with the Filipino Veterans 
    of World War II.
    (d) Duplicate Medals.--
        (1) In general.--Under regulations that the Secretary may 
    promulgate, the Secretary may strike and sell duplicates in bronze 
    of the gold medal struck under this Act, at a price sufficient to 
    cover the costs of the medals, including labor, materials, dies, 
    use of machinery, and overhead expenses.
        (2) Sale of duplicate medals.--The amounts received from the 
    sale of duplicate medals under paragraph (1) shall be deposited in 
    the United States Mint Public Enterprise Fund.
SEC. 5. STATUS OF MEDALS.
    (a) National Medals.--Medals struck under this Act are national 
medals for purposes of chapter 51 of title 31, United States Code.
    (b) Numismatic Items.--For purposes of section 5134 of title 31, 
United States Code, all medals struck under this Act shall be 
considered to be numismatic items.

                               Speaker of the House of Representatives.

                            Vice President of the United States and    
                                               President of the Senate.