Quirino: History
=== Early history ===
Long before its formal creation as an independent province, Quirino was the forest region of the province of Nueva Vizcaya, inhabited by tribal groups known as the Negritos. They roamed the hinterlands and built their huts at the heart of the jungle. Aside from the Negritos, the area was also inhabited by Ilongot people, who were feared for their headhunting raids against enemy tribes and Spanish-controlled settlements. Throughout the period of Spanish colonization, the province was one of the few remaining unconquered areas in the Philippines due to its remoteness, having only seen a Spanish military expedition in 1848 and the brief presence of Spanish missionaries in 1891.
During the American period, the territory of Quirino was administered by the province of Isabela before Congressman Leon Cabarroguis of Nueva Vizcaya pushed for its return to Nueva Vizcaya by authoring Republic Act No. 236, which was signed into law in 1948.
On June 18, 1966, Republic Act No. 4734 was enacted, constituting the municipalities of Diffun, Saguday, Aglipay, and Maddela, all from Nueva Vizcaya province, into a new sub-province to be known as "Quirino", named after the late Philippine President Elpidio Quirino. The reasons for naming it for Elpidio Quirino are the Ilocano settlers in the area and he created the neighboring province Aurora sub-province of Quezon in 1951 through Republic Act No. 648 under his presidency.
On June 21, 1969, Republic Act No. 5554 was enacted, amending RA 4734, and creating the municipality of Cabarroguis (now the provincial capital town), which was taken from portions of Diffun, Saguday, and Aglipay.
==== Social Unrest in the early 1970s ====
The closing months of the first term of President Ferdinand Marcos marked a period of turmoil and change in the Philippines, as well as in the localities which would later become the Province of Quirino. During his bid to be the first Philippine president to be re-elected for a second term, Ferdinand Marcos launched an unprecedented number of public works projects that caused the Philippine economy to take a sudden downwards turn known as the 1969 Philippine balance of payments crisis, which led to a period of economic difficulty and social unrest.
With only a year left in his last constitutionally allowed term as president, Ferdinand Marcos placed the Philippines under martial law in September 1972 and thus retained the position for fourteen more years as a dictator. This period in Philippine history is remembered for the Marcos administration's record of human rights abuses, particularly targeting political opponents, student activists, journalists, religious workers, farmers, and others who fought against the Marcos dictatorship.
In Quirino, one of the most significant events of this period were the logging concessions in the areas of the Sierra Madre region awarded to various Marcos cronies, which marked the beginning of widespread deforestation and other environmental problems in the province.
Despite so much social unrest happening at this time, this was the period in which the efforts of Quirino's legislators finally managed to see its establishment as a separate province.
Republic Act No. 6394, authored by then-Congressman Leonardo B. Perez (Nueva Vizcaya–Lone), was passed on September 10, 1971, further amending RA 5554 and separating the sub-province of Quirino from its mother province, Nueva Vizcaya, constituting it into a regular province. …