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G.R. No. 45685 - People v. Vera
G.R. No. 45685 - People v. Vera
SYLLABUS
DECISION
LAUREL , J : p
This is an original action instituted in this court on August 19, 1937, for the
issuance of the writs of certiorari and of prohibition to the Court of First Instance of
Manila so that this court may review the actuations of the aforesaid Court of First
Instance in criminal case No. 42649 entitled "The People of the Philippine Islands vs.
Mariano Cu Unjieng, et al.", more particularly the application of the defendant Mariano
Cu Unjieng therein for probation under the provisions of Act No. 4221, and thereafter
prohibit the said Court of First Instance from taking any further action or entertaining
further the aforementioned application for probation, to the end that the defendant
Mariano Cu Unjieng may be forthwith committed to prison in accordance with the nal
judgment of conviction rendered by this court in said case (G. R. No. 41200). 1
Petitioners herein, the People of the Philippine Islands and the Hongkong and
Shanghai Banking Corporation, are respectively the plaintiff and the offended party, and
the respondent herein Mariano Cu Unjieng is one of the defendants, in the criminal case
entitled "The People of the Philippine Islands vs. Mariano Cu Unjieng, et al.", criminal
case No. 42649 of the Court of First Instance of Manila and G. R. No. 41200 of this
court. Respondent herein, Hon. Jose O. Vera, is the Judge ad interim of the seventh
branch of the Court of First Instance of Manila, who heard the application of the
defendant Mariano Cu Unjieng for probation in the aforesaid criminal case.
It is contended, however, that a legislative act may be made to the effect as law
after it leaves the hands of the legislature. It is true that laws may be made effective on
certain contingencies, as by proclamation of the executive or the adoption by the
people of a particular community (6 R. C. L., 116. 170-172; Cooley, Constitutional
Limitations, 8th ed., Vol. I, p. 227). In Wayman vs. Southard ([1825], 10 Wheat. 1; 6 Law.
ed., 253), the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the legislature may
delegate a power not legislative which it may itself rightfully exercise. (Vide, also,
Dowling vs. Lancashire Ins. Co. [1896], 92 Wis., 63; 65 N. W., 738; 31 L. R. A., 112.) The
power to ascertain facts is such a power which may be delegated. There is nothing
essentially legislative in ascertaining the existence of facts or conditions as the basis of
the taking into effect of a law. That is a mental process common to all branches of the
government. (Dowling vs. Lancashire Ins. Co., supra; In re Village of North Milwaukee
[1896], 93 Wis., 616; 97 N. W., 1033; 33 L. R. A., 938; Nash vs. Fries [1906], 129 Wis.,
120; 108 N. W., 210; Field vs. Clark [1892], 143 U. S., 649; 12 Sup. Ct., 495; 36 Law. ed.,
294.) Notwithstanding the apparent tendency, however, to relax the rule prohibiting
delegation of legislative authority on account of the complexity arising from social and
economic forces at work in this modern industrial age (P ffner, Public Administration
[1936] ch. XX; Laski, "The Mother of Parliaments", Foreign Affairs, July, 1931, Vol. IX,
No. 4, pp. 569-579; Beard, "Squirt-Gun Politics", in Harper's Monthly Magazine, July,
1930, Vol. CLXI, pp. 147, 152), the orthodox pronouncement of Judge Cooley in his
work on Constitutional Limitations nds restatement in Prof. Willoughby's treatise on
the Constitution of the United States in the following language — speaking of
declaration of legislative power to administrative agencies: "The principle which
permits the legislature to provide that the administrative agent may determine when
the circumstances are such as require the application of a law is defended upon the
ground that at the time this authority is granted, the rule of public policy, which is the
essence of the legislative act, is determined by the legislature. In other words, the
legislature, as it is its duty to do, determines that, under given circumstances, certain
executive or administrative action is to be taken, and that, under other circumstances,
different or no action at all is to be taken. What is thus left to the administrative o cial
is not the legislative determination of what public policy demands, but simply the
ascertainment of what the facts of the case require to be done according to the terms
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of the law by which he is governed." (Willoughby on the Constitution of the United
States, 2nd ed., Vol. III, p. 1637.) In Miller vs. Mayer, etc., of New York ([1883], 109 U. S.,
385; 3 Sup. Ct. Rep., 228; 27 Law. ed., 971, 974), it was said: "The e ciency of an Act as
a declaration of legislative will must, of course, come from Congress, but the
ascertainment of the contingency upon which the Act shall take effect may be left to
such agencies as it may designate." ( See, also, 12 C. J., p. 864; State vs. Parker [1854],
26 Vt., 357; Blanding vs. Burr [1859], 13 Cal., 343, 358.) The legislature, then, may
provide that a law shall take effect upon the happening of future speci ed
contingencies leaving to some other person or body the power to determine when the
speci ed contingency has arisen. But, in the case at bar, the legislature has not made
the operation of the Probation Act contingent upon speci ed facts or conditions to be
ascertained by the provincial board. It leaves, as we have already said, the entire
operation or non-operation of the law upon the provincial boards. The discretion vested
is arbitrary because it is absolute and unlimited. A provincial board need not investigate
conditions or nd any fact, or await the happening of any speci ed contingency. It is
bound by no rule, — limited by no principle of expediency announced by the legislature.
It may take into consideration certain facts or conditions; and, again, it may not. It may
have any purpose or no purpose at all. It need not give any reason or have any reason
whatsoever for refusing or failing to appropriate any funds for the salary of a probation
o cer. This is a matter which rests entirely at its pleasure. The fact that at some future
time — we cannot say when — the provincial boards may appropriate funds for the
salaries of probation o cers and thus put the law into operation in the various
provinces will not save the statute. The time of its taking into effect, we reiterate, would
yet be based solely upon the will of the provincial boards and not upon the happening
of a certain speci ed contingency, or upon the ascertainment of certain facts or
conditions by a person or body other than the legislature itself.
The various provincial boards are, in practical effect, endowed with the power of
suspending the operation of the Probation Law in their respective provinces. In some
jurisdictions, constitutions provide that laws may be suspended only by the legislature
or by its authority. Thus, section 28, article I of the Constitution of Texas provides that
"No power of suspending laws in this state shall be exercised except by the legislature";
and section 26, article I of the Constitution of Indiana provides "That the operation of
the laws shall never be suspended, except by authority of the General Assembly." Yet,
even provisions of this sort do not confer absolute power of suspension upon the
legislature. While it may be undoubted that the legislature may suspend a law, or the
execution or operation of a law, a law may not be suspended as to certain individuals
only, leaving the law to be enjoyed by others. The suspension must be general, and
cannot be made for individual cases or for particular localities. In Holden vs. James
([1814], 11 Mass., 396; 6 Am. Dec., 174, 177, 178), it was said:
"By the twentieth article of the declaration of rights in the constitution of
this commonwealth, it is declared that the power of suspending the laws, or the
execution of the laws, ought never to be exercised but by the legislature, or by
authority derived from it, to be exercised in such particular cases only as the
legislature shall expressly provide for. Many of the articles in that declaration of
rights were adopted from the Magna Charta of England, and from the bill of rights
passed in the reign of William and Mary. The bill of rights contains an
enumeration of the oppressive acts of James II, tending to subvert and extirpate
the protestant religion, and the laws and liberties of the kingdom; and the rst of
them is the assuming and exercising a power of dispensing with and suspending
the laws, and the execution of the laws without consent of parliament. The rst
article in the claim or declaration of rights contained in the statute is, that the
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exercise of such power, by regal authority without consent of parliament, is illegal.
In the tenth section of the same statute it is further declared and enacted, that 'No
dispensation by non obstante of or to any statute, or any part thereof, should be
allowed; but the same should be held void and of no effect, except a dispensation
be allowed of in such statute.' There is an implied reservation of authority in the
parliament to exercise the power here mentioned; because, according to the theory
of the English Constitution, 'that absolute despotic power, which must in all
governments reside somewhere,' is intrusted to the parliament: 1 Bl. Com., 160.
"The principles of our government are widely different in this particular.
Here the sovereign and absolute power resides in the people; and the legislature
can only exercise what is delegated to them according to the constitution. It is
obvious that the exercise of the power in question would be equally oppressive to
the subject, and subversive of his right to protection, 'according to standing laws,'
whether exercised by one man or by a number of men. It cannot be supposed that
the people when adopting this general principle from the English bill of rights and
inserting it in our constitution, intended to bestow by implication on the general
court one of the most odious and oppressive prerogatives of the ancient kings of
England. it is manifestly contrary to the rst principles of civil liberty and natural
justice, and to the spirit of our constitution and laws, that any one citizen should
enjoy privileges and advantages which are denied to all others under like
circumstances; or that any one should be subject to losses, damages, suits, or
actions from which all others under like circumstances are exempted."
To illustrate the principle: A section of a statute relative to dogs made the owner
of any dog liable to the owner of domestic animals wounded by it for the damages
without proving a knowledge of its vicious disposition. By a provision of the act, power
was given to the board of supervisors to determine whether or not during the current
year their county should be governed by the provisions of the act of which that section
constituted a part. It was held that the legislature could not confer that power. The
court observed that it could no more confer such a power than to authorize the board
of supervisors of a county to abolish in such county the days of grace on commercial
paper, or to suspend the statute of limitations. (Slinger vs. Henneman [1875], 38 Wis.,
504.) A similar statute in Missouri was held void for the same reason in State vs. Field
([1853], 17 Mo., 529; 59 Am. Dec., 275.) In that case a general statute formulating a
road system contained a provision that "if the county court of any county should be of
opinion that the provisions of the act should not be enforced, they might, in their
discretion, suspend the operation of the same for any speci ed length of time, and
thereupon the act should become inoperative in such county for the period speci ed in
such order; and thereupon order the roads to be opened and kept in good repair, under
the laws theretofore in force." Said the court: ". . . this act, by its own provisions, repeals
the inconsistent provisions of a former act, and yet it is left to the county court to say
which act shall be in force in their county. The act does not submit the question to the
county court as an original question, to be decided by that tribunal, whether the act shall
commence its operation within the county; but it became by its own terms a law in
every county not excepted by name in the act. It did not, then, require the county court
to do any act in order to give it effect. But being the law in the county, and having by its
provisions superseded and abrogated the inconsistent provisions of previous laws, the
county court is . . . empowered, to suspend this act and revive the repealed provisions
of the former act.' When the question is before the county court for that tribunal to
determine which law shall be in force, it is urged before us that the power then to be
exercised by the court is strictly legislative power, which under our constitution, cannot
be delegated to that tribunal or to any other body of men in the state. In the present
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case, the question is not presented in the abstract; for the county court of Saline
county, after the act had been for several months in force in that county, did by order
suspend its operation; and during that suspension the offense was committed which is
the subject of the present indictment . . .." ( See Mitchell vs. State [1901], 134 Ala., 392;
32 S., 687.)
True, the legislature may enact laws for a particular locality different from those
applicable to other localities and, while recognizing the force of the principle
hereinabove expressed, courts in many jurisdictions have sustained the
constitutionality of the submission of option laws to the vote of the people. (6 R. C. L.,
p. 171.) But option laws thus sustained treat of subjects purely local in character which
should receive different treatment in different localities placed under different
circumstances. "They relate to subjects which, like the retailing of intoxicating drinks, or
the running at large of cattle in the highways, may be differently regarded in different
localities, and they are sustained on what seems to us the impregnable ground, that the
subject, though not embraced within the ordinary powers of municipalities to make by-
laws and ordinances, is nevertheless within the class of public regulations, in respect to
which it is proper that the local judgment should control." (Cooley on Constitutional
Limitations, 5th ed., p. 148.) So that, while we do not deny the right of local self-
government and the propriety of leaving matters of purely local concern in the hands of
local authorities or for the people of small communities to pass upon, we believe that in
matters of general legislation like that which treats of criminals in general, and as
regards the general subject of probation, discretion may not be vested in a manner so
unquali ed and absolute as provided in Act No. 4221. True, the statute does not
expressly state that the provincial boards may suspend the operation of the Probation
Act in particular provinces but, considering that, in being vested with the authority to
appropriate or not the necessary funds for the salaries of probation o cers, they
thereby are given absolute discretion to determine whether or not the law should take
effect or operate in their respective provinces, the provincial boards are in reality
empowered by the legislature to suspend the operation of the Probation Act in
particular provinces, the Act to be held in abeyance until the provincial boards should
decide otherwise by appropriating the necessary funds. The validity of a law is not
tested by what has been done but by what may be done under its provisions. (Walter E.
Olsen & Co. vs. Aldanese and Trinidad [1922], 43 Phil., 259; 12 C. J., p. 786.)
It is conceded that a great deal of latitude should be granted to the legislature
not only in the expression of what may be termed legislative policy but in the
elaboration and execution thereof. "Without this power, legislation would become
oppressive and yet imbecile." (People vs. Reynolds, 5 Gilman, 1.) It has been said that
popular government lives because of the inexhaustible reservoir of power behind it. It is
unquestionable that the mass of powers of government is vested in the representatives
of the people and that these representatives are no further restrained under our system
than by the express language of the instrument imposing the restraint, or by particular
provisions which by clear intendment, have that effect. (Angara vs. Electoral
Commission [1936], 35 Off. Gaz., 23; Schneckenburger vs. Moran [1936], 35 Off. Gaz.,
1317.) But, it should be borne in mind that a constitution is both a grant and a limitation
of power and one of these time-honored limitations is that, subject to certain
exceptions, legislative power shall not be delegated.
We conclude that section 11 of Act No. 4221 constitutes an improper and
unlawful delegation of legislative authority to the provincial boards and is, for this
reason, unconstitutional and void.
Separate Opinions
VILLA-REAL and ABAD SANTOS , J., concurring: