Safeguarding the Constitution
By RENATO C. CORONA, Supreme Court Chief Justice
October 23, 2010, 9:59pm
PHILCONSA Governors and officers led by the Chairman of the Board of Governors, Conrado Estrella, President Manuel Lazaro, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, a pleasant good evening to you all.
I would like to thank the Philippine Constitution Association (Philconsa) for the honor and privilege of celebrating our 49th Anniversary with you. The membership of Philconsa, as everybody in this hall will agree, is a different and elite kind of crowd. Your guests of honor, for one, are limited only to those – and I quote the Philconsa creed – who make “freedom and justice prevail in our country forever.” I therefore consider it a distinct recognition to have met your standards not just once but twice this year – first, on Independence Day which celebrates our freedom and second, today, on Philconsa’s 49th Anniversary which marks almost half a century of unwavering commitment to the rule of law. I am particularly elated by the fact that these two occasions underscore the twin values so powerfully expressed in the Philconsa creed: freedom and justice.
I usually do not give much thought to coincidences but these two values happen to be my own public mission in life. I am reminded by what Holocaust survivor, Austrian neurologist Viktor Frankl, once wrote: “Every one must carry a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment.”
The Philconsa has been at the forefront of constitutionalism and, for almost 50 years today, we have assumed the sacred duty if upholding and defending the Constitution.
There is probably no document more telling of our country’s soul and more revealing of our nation’s collective sentiments than the Constitution.
Our country has had three Constitutions in its relatively short history as a democracy. Each one was a result of a common ideal for a social contract between the government and the people, reflecting not only contemporary affairs but also the concerns of the future.
The 1935 Constitution starts with the words “The Filipino people.” The 1973 and 1987 Charters, on the other hand, begin with “We. The sovereign Filipino people.” The introductory words to the preamble may have changed but one things remains: It is the Filipino people who ordained and promulgated the Constitution. It is the people who willed that ours be a representative government, one that is “of the people, by the people, and for the people.”
The Constitution serves as a continuing reminder to our country’s leaders that sovereign power belongs not to them but to the people who elected them. “Sovereignty resides in the people and all government authority emanates from them.”
Our government is a government of laws and the foundation of all laws is the Constitution. No government official, functionary, or branch is so high and mighty as to be above the Constitution and the laws.
The Constitution is meant not only to guarantee certain rights but also to protect the minority against the overzealousness of the majority. It is meant to grant equality to the marginalized, the weak, and the downtrodden, sectors whose rights are easily and all too often trampled upon.
The Bill of Right provides for safeguards against the exercise by the State of its inherent powers: Police power, the power of taxation, and the power of eminent domain. Our people can take comfort in the thought that there exists a document, this social contract, that will always provide refuge for the helpless and oppressed.
The fundamental law of the land will neither yield nor sway to the wishes of those who think they are above it. As the embodiment of the aspirations of a nation, it is single document that defines what and how our government should be in relation to the people.
Constitutionalism, the essential belief that the Constitution as the fundamental law should at all times be upheld to ensure our democracy, is therefore everyone’s business, yours and mine. It is the sacred document which I pledged to obey and defend at all times, even at the cost of my own life, when I took oath as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
But while the Constitution is a creation of popular will, its interpretation is never determined by popular choice. Its correctness is ascertained by what is right, not by what people in general think is right. Even the rule of the majority is a rule of tyranny. Rather it is the triumph of the general will as expressed by the citizenry which embraces, as its own, what is good for society as a whole.
The Constitution and the rule of law will never bend to the ever-shifting political winds and passions of the moment because it is the anchor that keeps the ship of state from being tossed aimlessly about or even tipped over by the waves of passing political and social events. Obeying the Constitution is observing the rule of law, not of men.
Leading modern accounts generally emphasize five elements that define constitutionalism and the rule of law.
* The first element is the capacity of legal rules, standards, or principles to guide people in the conduct of their affairs.
People must be able to understand the law and comply with it.
* The second element is efficacy. The law should actually guide people.
* The third element is stability. The law should be reasonably stable in order to facilitate planning and coordinated action over time.
* The fourth element is the supremacy of legal authority. The law should rule officials, including judges, as well as ordinary citizens.
* The fifth and final element involves instrumentalities or impartial justice. Courts should be available to enforce the law and should employ fair procedures.
It is clear from the foregoing that the judiciary, meaning the Supreme Court and all inferior courts, serves as the vanguard of constitutionalism and the rule of law in our system of government.
The Constitution itself clearly identifies the agency which bears the primary responsibility for defending the Charter and the rule of law and it is no other than the Supreme Court of the Philippines.
Of the three great co-equal branches of government, the judiciary is the most benign and the least powerful. Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist No. 78, wrote that the judiciary has no access to either the sword (as wielded by the executive department) or the purse (as the controlled by the Congress.) However, legal scholars are also one in saying that, while it is true that the Supreme Court has no power of the sword nor of the purse, it wields the power of the pen or the authority to interpret the Constitution and the laws.
The 1987 Constitution expanded the powers of the Supreme Court so as to vest the Court with the power of judicial review whose one and only purpose is to check transgressions on the Constitution.
The power of judicial review has practically given a lighter complexion to the political question doctrine which was invoked with so much vigor and regularity before 1987.
When the Supreme Court invokes its power of judicial review, it does not assert its moral or constitutional ascendancy over the other two co-equal branches of government. It only, reminds all and sundry of the non-negotiable supremacy of the Constitution.
Neither is it an encroachment on the powers of its co-equal branches but a mere reiteration of the sovereign will of the people to have an effective system of checks and balances. Judicial review does not violate the principle of separation of powers and in fact reinforces, guarantees even, the maintenance of political equilibrium among the three co-equal branches of government.
The power of judicial review is not an exercise of dominance or interference in the exclusive affairs of another department.
It is in fact the means established by the Constitution itself to preserve the peace and stability of our political system so that the possibility of a constitutional crisis or a clash of powers may precisely be avoided. This is constitutionalism. This is the rule of law.
Which brings me to my next point. The rule of law is what governs modern society. Our people allow the rule of law to dictate how they go about enforcing their rights and seeking redress for their grievances only because of the trust and confidence they have in the legal system. It is this trust and confidence in the rule of law that prevents anarchy and mob-rule from holding sway.
We in the judiciary are burdened with the heavy responsibility to preserve and enhance the people’s trust and confidence in constitutionalism and the rule of law. It is thus of utmost importance that our decisions be handed down with justice and fairness, without fear or favor, and with no reward or expectation other than the honest desire to preserve and strengthen our democratic way of life.
In this light, judicial independence serves as the heart and soul of constitutionalism and the rule of law. Without it, the judiciary would be unable to impart fair and impartial justice to those who seek it and those who yearn for a redress of their grievances.
Judicial independence has been tested and attacked over and over again in many ways. Ever since I can remember, all sorts of accusations have at one time or another been heaped on it, from the truth to the downright malicious. The judiciary is easy to attack because it does not have the means to defend itself. It has no sword. It has no purse. Other than the decisions it writes and its limited power of contempt, there is really nothing much it can do to fight a propaganda war. That is not its business anyway. But right is right and wrong is wrong. Let justice be done though the heavens fall. When everything is said and done, there is no better defense than the balm of a good conscience. Beyond this, an upright and God-fearing magistrate can do no more. But the attacks and criticisms in truth matter very little, if at all, because it is the magistrate’s integrity that keeps the balance and equilibrium of the scales of justice on an even keel. And as long as that scale tilts neither to one side nor the other, that is the assurance that our democracy is alive and our system of justice deserves the people’s trust.
Thank you and a pleasant evening to you all.
see:
http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/283877/safeguarding-constitution
