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In an address delivered by Senior Justice Leonardo A. Quisumbing at theCommencement Exercises of the UP
1. Law cannot be divorced from the principles that undergird our concepts of economics. For instance, success in law practice owes much to the understanding of the fundamental principle of supply and demand.
2. The has come when the shortage of practicing lawyers are actually felt in some areas of our country. In my home province, there was a time when lawyers were the ones waiting for the judge to arrive so trial of cases could start. I understand the situation is now reversed: the judges in some municipal courts have to patiently wait for the counsels of parties because lawyers are so few and they come from distant places. If trial could not be held in the morning, because the lawyers are engaged elsewhere, the concerned court will set the hearing in the afternoon and wait for lawyers to come, even if already late.
3. Even more noteworthy, the judiciary has lots of vacant salas. Why? One reason is that in certain towns or districts, there are no available applicants seriously interested to be considered by the Judicial and Bar Council. Sometimes, the JBC will publish names of applicants for one sala and repeat them as available for other salas, just so the JBC can comply with the 3-applicants per sala rule when JBC submits nominees to the President for her actual appointment. So there you are—there are not enough lawyers to go around, so how can we solve the 29% vacancy problem in lower courts?
4. If there is any progressive development in the bar, it is the increase in the number of lady barristers (which is also to say female law students). In the Supreme Court, when I started there ten years ago, there was only 1 lady Justice. Now there are 5 ladies out of 15 members. The number actually reached 6, until Madam Justice Angelina Sandoval-Gutierrez retired a few months ago. When ladies will reach 7 in Court, then we will have a true numerical and gender balance of Associate Justices, leaving only the Chief’s post for contention.
5. Indeterminacy thesis. - It has been said that many American law students, even in their first year, already get a sinking feeling when they ask themselves: “Does the law actually make any difference to the way cases are decided?” In later years, they encounter the abovecited thesis, as if in reply to their doubts: “The laws have nothing to do with how cases come out. They are just window dressing that skillful lawyers and judges can manipulate to justify any decision they please.” Stated another way, the strong indeterminacy thesis claims that in every possible case, any possible outcome is legally correct. Or, in a more extended way, the strong indeterminate thesis says: “In any set of facts about actions and events that could be processed as a legal case, any possible outcome—consisting of a decision, order, and opinion—will be legally correct.” That’s why some practitioners say, knowing what the judge had for breakfast is more important than knowing precedents.
6. There are critics who say the Supreme Court is right even if in several given cases our decision is wrong. The Court’s decision, some say, is not final because it is infallible but it is infallible because it is final. Of course, nobody yet has opined here that “the law does not constrain judicial decision.” Or that, “any result in any legal dispute can be justified as the legally correct outcome.”
Atty. Manuel J. Laserna Jr.