serve to protect the inte ts f th

rigid application would res o e _larger society. It is only where their

to uphold d fi serve to obhterate the value which society seeks
departure b;;us:::!. the purpose for which they are enacted, would a

HOLMES QN LAW AND EXPERJENCE

JOEL G. MIRANDA v. ANTONIO M. ABAYA and the
COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS
(G.R. No. 1363S1, July 28, 1999)

PANGANIBAN, J., dissenting:

. . I _appreciate the scholarly disquisition of the majority led by my
d1stmgu1shed brother, Justice Jose A. R. Melo, explaining the difference
between the "disqualification" of a candidate and the "cancellation" of
his certificate of candidacy. The majority holds that, under Section 77
of the Omnibus Election Code, there are only three instances in which
a candidate may be "substituted," and these are "death, withdrawal
or disqualification" of such candidate. Inasmuch as the certificate of
candidacy of petitioner's father, Jose "Pempe" Miranda, was merely
"cancelled," he could not be legally substituted by reason of the rule on
statutory construction, expressio unius est exclusio a/terius.
I agree that there is some legal logic in this con~lusion. However, as
the eminent Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. has aptly said, "The life of
the law has not been logic; it has been experience." With due respect, may
I point out that the problem with the majority's position is that it totally
scuttles the result of the election for the position of mayor and, instead,
unceremoniously installs the elected vice mayor to the said position.
There is no doubt that the petitioner was the people's choice for
mayor. He garnered the highest number o~ votes in 1?e election for may~r
of the City of Santiago. Why should this Court, m the name of hair-
splitting logic, obliterate the popular will and impose upon the electorate
a person whom nobody voted ~or the ~s.ition of mayor? Experience and
common sense rebel against this propos1t10n.

UQLMES QNPLAIN CONSTRUCTION

CO KIM CHAM (alias CO KIM CHAM) v. EUSEBIO VALDEZ
TAN KEH and ARSENIO P. DIZON
(G.R. No. L-S, September 17, 1945)

PERFECTO, J., dissenting:

Th o tober Proclamation is written in such a way that it is
. 'ble t cm.ake a mistake as to the intention of it$ author.
1mposs1 e o

Theory ofLaw I s3
 Oliver Wendell Holmes, perhaps the wisest m~ ~ho had ever sat
in the Supreme Court of the United States, the following.
When the words in their literal sense have a plain meaning,
courts must be very cautious in allowing their imagination to give
them a different one. (Guildv. Walter, 182 Mass., 225, 226 [1902))

Upon questions of construction when arbitrary rule is

involved, it is always more important to consider the words and
the circumstances than even strong analogies decisions. The
successive neglect of a series of small distinctions, in the effort to
follow precedent, is very liable to end in perverting instruments
from their plain meaning. In no other branch of the law (trusts) is
so much discretion required in dealing with authority. x x x There
is a strong presumption in favor of giving them words their natural
meaning, and against reading them as if they said something else,
which they are not fitted to express. (Merrill v. Preston, 135 Mass.,
451, 455 [1883])
When the words of an instrument are free from ambiguity and
doubt, and express plainly, clearly and distinctly the sense of the framer,
there is no occasion to resort to other means of interpretation. It is not
allowable to interpret what needs no interpretation.
_Ve~ strong expression have been used by the courts to emphasize
~e pi:1nc1ple that they are to derive their knowledge of the legislative
10~t1on from the words or language of the statute itself which the
legislature_ has used to express it. The language of a statute is its most
natura~ guide. We are not liberty to imagine an intent and bind the letter
to the mtent.

HOLMES QNLAWYER'S QATH l Q CLIENTS

TEODORO REGALA, et al v. SANDIGANBAYAN
(G.R. No. 105938, September 20, 1996)

KAPUNAN, J.:
The utmost zeal given by Courts t th
client confidentiality privil d
1
° e protection of the lawyer-
evident in the duration of theegpe teant· awyer's loyalty to his client is
. . ro c 10n which ex· t .
re1at1onsh1p, but extends even aft th ' . . is s not only dunng the
er e tennmation of the relationship.
. Such are the unrelenting duties re ui d b
cbents because the law which th I q re Y lawyers vis-a-vis their
of Oliver Wendell Hoimes " e a"."Yers are sworn to uphold, in the words
. , X X X IS an exacti odd
her votaries in intellectual and 1
. . ng g ess, demanding of
not prepared to accept respondeni:~ra ~-scipl~e." The Court, no less, is
profession that is lawyering so t ~~Sitton without denigrating the noble
' ex O ed by JuSti ce Holmes in this wise:

841 PhiLawsophia: Philosophy and Theory o•

':I
Ph 1.11ppmelaw
. .
 . Every calling is great when
gives such scope to realize th greatly pursued. But what other
what other does one plun e spon~neous energy of one's soul? In
·t . ge so deep m th ·
I s passions its battles its d . . e stream oflife - so share
t ? ' espaIT its triu h b
ac or .. x x x But that is not all. What mp s, . oth _as_ witness and
are umted - this abstract· a subJect ts this m which we
· ton called the L h . .
mirror, we see reflected t l . aw, w erem as m a magic
' no on y m our 1· b
men at have been. When think . ive~, ut the lives of all
th If we are to speak of I
dazzle. the l on this maJe~tic theme my eyes
here know that she is a . aw as our mistress, we who are
mistress only to be .h
onely passion _ only to be wo . ~on wit sustained and
1which man is likened to God. n by strammg all the faculties by

identityWe
ofhave
theirno choice but to u. Ph ld pel!IIOners'
.. .
th:ri":
clients und nght not to reveal the
to their clients, because of :e breach of fiduciary duty owing
recognized exceptions to the rule ;at i:e •::'. case clearly fall ~ithin
information. s name 1s not pnvileged

HOLMES ON PUBLIC OVER PRIVATE INTEREST

CIPRIANO P. PRIMICIAS v. VALERIANO FUGOSO

(G.R. No. L-1800, January 27, 1948)

HILADO, J., dissenting:

In other words, when the use of public streets or places is involved
public convenience, public safety and public order take precedence ov.,;
even particular civil rights. For if the citizen asserting the civil right were
to override the right of the general public to the use of such streets or
places, just because it is guaranteed by the constitntion, it would be bard
to conceive how upon the same principle that citizen be prevented from
using the private property of his neighbor for the exercise of the asserted
right. Toe constitution, in guaranteeing the right of peaceful assembly and
petition, the right of free speech, etc., does not guarantee their exercise
upon public places, any more than upon private premises, without
government regulation in both cases, of the owners' consent in the second
In Davis v. Commonwealth, J67 U.S. 43, 42 Law. Ed., 71, 72, the
United States Supreme Court, in affirming the decision of the Supreme
Judicial Court of Massachusetts written by Justice Oliver Wendell
Holmes, then of the latter tribunal, quoted from said decision as follows:
''x x x As representatives of the public it (legislature)
may and does excercise control over the use which the public
may make of such places (public parks and streets), and it may
and does delegate more or less of such ~ontrol to the city or
town imIIlediatelY concerned. For the legislature absolutely or

Theory of law I 8S
 conditionally to forbid public speaking in a highway or public~
is no more an infringement of the rights of the member of the public
than for the owner of a private house to forbid it in his house._ When
no proprietary right interferes the legislature ma~ end the nght of
the public to enter upon the public place by putting an en~~ ~he
dedication to public uses. So it may take the lesser step of hm1tmg
the public use to certain purposes. See Dill. Mun. Corp. secs. 393,
407, 651, 656, 666; Brooklyn Park Comrs. v. Armstrong, 45 N. Y.
234, 243, 244 (6 Am. Rep. 70) xx x"

HOLMES ON THE VAGUENESS QFLAW

JOSEPH EJERCITO ESTRADA v. SANDIGANBAYAN
(G.R. No. 148560, November 19, 2001)

BELWSILLO, J.:
Where, therefore, the ambiguity is not latent and the legislative
intention is discoverable with the aid of the canons of construction. the
void for vagueness doctrine has no application.
In Connally v. General Constr. Co., the test of vagueness was
formulated as follows:
(A] statute which either forbids or requires the doing of an act in
terms so vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess
at its meaning and differ as to its application, violates the first essential of
due process of law.
Holmes's test was that of the viewpoint of the bad man. In The Path
ofthe Law, Holmes said:

If you want to know the law and nothing else, you must look
at it as a bad man, who cares only for the material consequences
which such knowledge enables him to predict, not as a good one,
who finds his reasons for conduct, whether inside the law or outside
of it, in the vaguer sanctions of conscience.

Whether from the point of view of a man of common intelligence

or from that of a bad man, there can be no mistaking the meaning of the
Anti-Plunder Law as applied to petitioner.
XXX

The application of mitigating and extenuating circumstances in the

Revised Penal Code to prosecutions under the Anti-Plunder Law indicates
quite clearly that mens rea is an element of plunder since the degree of
responsibility of the offender is detennined by his criminal intent. It is true
that §2 refers to "any person who participates with the said public officers
in the commission of an offense contributing to the crime of plunder."

86 I Phllawsophia: Philosophy and Theory ofPhilippine Law

There is no reason to believe, however, that it does not apply as well to
the public officer as principal in the crime. As Justice Holmes said: "We
agree to all the generalities about not supplying criminal laws with what
they omit, but there is no canon against using common sense in construing
laws as saying what they obviously mean."

SCALIA AND HOLMES ON THE PREDICTABU ITYOF

JURISPRUDENCE
LEAGUE OF CITIES, et aL v. COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS
(G.R. No. 176951, June 28, 2011)

Sereno, J., dissenting opinion:

The Court not only functions to adjudicate rights among the
parties, but also serves the purpose of a supreme tribunal of last resort
that establishes uniform rules of civil justice. Jurisprudence narrows the
field of uncertainty in the application of an unclear area of the law. The
certainty of judicial pronouncement lends respect for and adherence to
the rule of law the idea that all citizens and all organs of government are
bound by rules fixed in advance, which make it possible to foresee how the
coercive powers of govertnnent will be used, whether in its own interests
or in aid of citizens who call on them, in particular circumstances. The
Courts historic role of pronouncing what the law is between the parties is
the cornerstone of a government of laws, and not of men. Justice Antonin
Scalia of the United States Supreme Court expounded on the objectives of
uniformity and predictability of judicial decisions, to wit:
This last point suggests another obvious advantage of
establishing as soon as possible a clear, general principle of
decision: predictability. Even in simpler times uncertainty
bas been regarded as incompatible with the Rule of Law.
Rudimentary justice requires that those subject to the law must
have the means of knowing what it prescribes. It is said that
one of emperor Nero's nasty practices was to post his edicts high
on the columns so that they would be harder to read and easier to
transgress. As laws have become more numerous, and as people
have become increasingly ready to punish their adversaries in
the courts, we can less and less afford protracted uncertainty
regarding what the law may mean. Predictability, or as Llewellyn
put it, reckonability, is a needful characteristic of any law worthy
of the name. There are times when even a bad rule is better than no
rule at all. (Emphasis supplied)
Certainty and reckonability in the law are the major objectives of
the legal system, and judicial decisions serv~ the important purpose of
providing stability to the la"'. and !o the society governed by that law.
If we are to subscribe to Justice Ohver Wendell Holmes theory of a bad

Theory ofLaw I 87
 . nable redictability in the consequences of
man, then law provides reaso .f 1:rormed in a just and orderly SOCiety.

As judicial dec'.SJons form

public interest
pat
ones actions rel~t_ive to the law, , f~e law of the land, there is a strong
O
the orderly conduct of our affairs, an
ed b amconsistent
Sla?ihty course
an m f adiiudication. Thus, once a court has
O
end_serv y le of law, that decision should continue to govern the
decid~d
same upo~masurubsequent stages of the same case and thusf offers
issues h . to. the
people some measure of conv1c . ti·on about the legal effects o t e1r actions.
In the absence o f ex traord
inary circumstances, courts should be loath to
revisit prior decisions.

WORKING ON LEGAL PRINCIPLES..

PAULINO and LUCENA PADUA v. GREGORIO ROBLES
and BAY TAXI CAB
(G.R. No. L-40486, August 29, 1975)

FERNANDO, J., concurring:

The clarity and lucidity with which Justice Castro spelled out
the decisive issue and how to resolve it to achieve the desirable goal
of moral justice in adjudication compels concurrence. I do so. What is
more, there is to my mind a distinct advance in the juridical frontiers
in the mode in which the novel question raised was settled. If the trend
manifest in the view taken by the Court would thereafter be followed,
then the protective ramparts the law throws ground victims of vehicular
accidents, unfortunately of rather frequent occurrence here, will be further
strengthened. That dissipates whatever doubts I may have originally felt
in view of certain traditional procedural concepts about the correctness
of the decision reached. It is true this is one of those hard cases which,
if an old law is to be believed, may result in bad law. It need not be so,
of course, as pointed out with great J)ersuasiveness in the I 97 I inaugural
lecture at Oxford given by Professor Ronald Dworkin, the successor in
the chair
H.L.A. of jurisprudence to one of the most eminent men in the field
Hart.

The more accurate way of viewing the matter is that whenever there
is an "PParent gap in the law and settled principles of adjudication may not
clearly indicate the answer, then a judge may rely either on an argument
of policy or an atgument of Principle, the former having kinship with the
SOCJolog,caJ sch0ol of jurisprudence and the latter with the analytical. As
I hope I may be able to indicate in this brief concurrence, the decision
reached by ns is in consonance with either approach. With the natural law
thinking manifest in the opinion of the Court, witness its stress on moral
Justice, I am comforted by the reflection that the Ptocedura( barrier is not
IIISUrmoontable,_ the_ decision reached deriving support from the viewpoint
of law as logic, Justice, or social control.

88 I PhU-awsophk,.· Philosophy and Theory ofPh;J;ppine Law

 IQHN fINNISAND CQNTEMPQRARYNATURAL LAW
PHILOSOPHY
REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES v. SANDIGANBAYAN,
MAJOR GENERAL JOSEPHUS. RAMAS and ELIZABETH
DIMAANO
(G.R. No. 104768, July 21, 2003)

PONO, J., separate opinion:

[Aquinas' traditional natural law theory has been advocated, recast
and restated by other scholars up to the contemporary period. But clearly,
what has had a pervading and lasting impact on the Western philosophy of
law and government, particularly on that of the United States of America
which heavily influenced the Philippine system of government and
constitution, is the modem natural law theory.]
Footnote 39: An important restatement was made by John Finnis
who wrote Natural Law and Natural Rights published in 1980. He
reinterpreted Aquinas whom he says has been much misunderstood. He
argues that the normative conclusions of natural law are not derived from
observations of human or any other nature but are based on a reflective
grasp of what is self-evidently good for human beings. "The basic forms
of good grasped by practical understanding are what is good for human
beings with the nature they have." The following are basic goods: life (and
health), knowledge, play, aesthetic experience, sociability (friendship),
practical reasonableness, and religion (Bix, B., supra, pp. 228-229). He
claims that Aquinas considered that practical reasoning began "not by
understanding this nature from the outside x x x by way of psychological,
anthropological or metaphysical observations and judgments defining
human nature, but by experiencing one's nature x x x from the inside, in
the form of one's inclinations" (Freeman, MD.A . Lloyd's Introduction to
Jurisprudence [1996], p. 84, citing J. Finnis, Natural Law and Natural
Rights [1980}, p. 34).
Lon Fuller also adopted a natural law analysis of law and wrote
that there is a test that a law must pass before something could be properly
called law. Unlike traditional natural law theories, however, the test he
applies pertains to function rather than moral content. He identified eight
requirements for a law to be called law, viz. : "( 1) laws should be general;
(2) they should be promulgated, that citizens might know the standards
to which they are being held; (3) retroactive rule-making and application
should be minimized; (4) laws should be understandable; (5) they should
not be contradictory; (6) laws should not require conduct beyond the
abilities of those affected; (7) they should remain relatively constant
through time; and (8) there should be a congruence between the laws as
announced and their actual administration." He referred to his theory as
"a procedural, as distinguished from a substantive natural law" (Bix, B.,
supra, pp. 231-232).

Theory ofLaw I 89
 Ronald Dworkin also occasionally refers to his approach as a
natural Jaw theory. Dworkin postulates that along with rules, legal systerns
also contain principles. Quite different from rules, principles do not act
in an all-or-nothing way. Rather principles have "weight," favoring one
result or another. There can be principles favoring contrary results on a
single legal question. Examples of these principles are "one should not
be able to profit from one's wrong" and "one is held to intend all the
foreseeable consequences of one's actions." These legal principles are
moral propositions that are grounded (exemplified, quoted or somehow
supported by) on past official acts such as text of statutes, judicial
decisions, or constitutions. Thus, in "landmark" judicial decisions where
the outcome appears to be contrary to the relevant precedent, courts still
hold that they were following the "real meaning" or "true spirit" of the
law; or judges cite principles as the justification for modifying, creating
exceptions in, or overturning legal rules (Bix, B., supra, pp. 234-235).

90 I Phi.Lawsophia: Philosophy and Th

eory ofPhilippine Law