Gonzales v.

Hechanova

Summary Cases:

● Gonzales vs. Hechanova 9 SCRA 230 or 118 Phil 1065

Subject:

Executive Agreements, Exhaustion of administrative remedies

Facts:

On September 22, 1963, Executive Secretary Rufino Hechanova authorized the importation of 67,000
tons of foreign rice ‘for military stock pile purposes’, to be purchased from private sources, and created a
rice procurement committee.

Ramon Gonzales, a rice planter and president of the Iloilo Palay and Corn Planters Association, filed this
petition averring that the importation of the said foreign rice is in violation of RA 3452 (which allegedly
repeals or amends RA 2207) explicitly prohibiting the importation of rice and corn into the Philippines by
any person or government agency.

Respondents counter that the proposed importation is not covered by the prohibition under RA 2207 and
3452 because it was authorized by the President for ‘purposes of national security and/or national
emergency’ in the exercise of his ‘commander-in-chief’ powers under Sec. 2 of Commonwealth Act No. 1
(National Defense Act).

Held:

Sufficiency of petitioner’s interest

1. RA 3452 declares that the policy of the Government is to engage in the purchase of basic foods
directly from producers and landowners in the Philippines.Petitioner, as a planter with a rice land of
substantial proportion, is entitled to a chance to sell to the Government the rice which the latter seeks to
buy abroad.

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2. The funds to be used in purchasing the said foreign rice are public funds mainly raised by taxation.
Petitioner as a taxpayer has sufficient interest to seek judicial assistance to restrain what could be an
attempt to unlawfully disburse the said funds.

Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies

3. The principle requiring the previous exhaustion of administrative remedies is not applicable where the
question in dispute is:

a. purely a legal one, or

b. where the controverted act is patently illegal or was performed without jurisdiction or in excess of
jurisdiction, or

c. where the respondent is a department secretary, whose acts as an alter-ego of the President bear the
implied or assumed approval of the latter, or

d. where there are circumstances indication the urgency of judicial intervention.

The case at bar falls under each of the foregoing exceptions to the general rule.

Merit of Petitioner’s Cause of Action

4. Regardless of whether RA 3452 has repealed RA 2207, the two Acts are applicable to the proposed
importation because the language of said laws is such as to include within the purview thereof all
importations of rice and corn into the Philippines.

5. Respondent alleges that the provisions of RA 2207 and 3452 prohibiting the importation of rice and
corn by any "government agency" do not apply to importations ‘made by the Government itself’, because
the latter is not a ‘government agency’. This theory is devoid of merit. The Department of National
Defense and the Armed Forces of the Philippines and each and every officer and employee of our
Government, are government agencies and/or agents.

6. The restrictions in RA 2207 and 3452 are merely additional to those in Commonwealth Act 138, in
which it is provided that in all purchases by the Government, including those made by and/or for the
armed forces, preference shall be given to materials produced in the Philippines. The importation of
foreign rice clearly violates this general policy of the Government.
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7. The provisions of Section 2 of Commonwealth Act No. 1, upon which respondents rely, are not
self-executory. They merely outline the general objectives of said legislation. There is still a need for
congressional legislation.

The Contracts with Vietnam and Burma

8. The status of the said contracts as Executive Agreements has not been sufficiently established. The
parties to the said contracts do not appear to have regarded the same as executive agreements.

9. Even assuming that the said contracts can be properly considered as executive agreements, the
same are unlawful, null and void, from a constitutional viewpoint, as said agreements are inconsistent
with the provisions of RAs 2207 and 3452.

10. Although the President may enter into Executive Agreements without previous legislative authority,
he may not, by executive agreement, enter into a transaction which is prohibited by statues enacted prior
thereto.

11. The American theory to the effect that, in the event of conflict between a treaty and a statute, the one
which is latest in point of time shall prevail, is not applicable to the case at bar, for the contracts adverted
to are not treaties.

12. Section 2 of Article VIII of our Constitution authorizes the nullification of a treaty or international
agreement not only when it conflicts with the Constitution, but also when it runs counter to an act of
Congress.

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