On June 21, 1901, Root's War Department informed MacArthur that Chaffee was to replace him as military head in the Philippines with the change to take place on July 4, 1901. Taft decided, "four, possibly five and two small parts of others", of the 27 organized provinces across the Philippines (16 additional provinces remained unorganized at the end of 1900), "in which armed insurrection continues, will remain under the executive jurisdiction of the military governor and commanding general". The contentiousness between Taft and MacArthur seemed all too apparent as Taft stated publicly that neither his approach of municipal code nor the provincial government act under both Otis and MacArthur would form a perfect government, "though it was possible to make the former much more complete than the latter". Taft further distanced himself and work by characterizing prior military efforts as "two experiments in municipal government under the administrations of General Otis and General MacArthur before the Commission began its legislative work".