Arroyo vs. de Venecia, 277 SCRA 268, August 14, 1997

268 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED
Arroyo vs. De Venecia

G.R. No. 127255. August 14, 1997. *
JOKER P. ARROYO, EDCEL C. LAGMAN, JOHN HENRY R. OSMEÑA,

WIGBERTO E. TAÑADA, AND RONALDO B. ZAMORA,
petitioners, vs. JOSE DE VENECIA, RAUL DAZA, RODOLFO ALBANO,
THE EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, THE SECRETARY OF FINANCE, AND
THE COMMISSIONER OF INTERNAL REVENUE, respondents.
Constitutional Law; Separation of Powers; Judicial Review;Legislative Rules of
Procedure; The cases, both in the Philippines and abroad, in varying forms of
expression, all deny to the courts the power to inquire into allegations that, in
enacting a law, a House of Congress failed to comply with its own rules, in the
absence of showing that there was a violation of a constitutional provision or the
rights of private individuals.—It is clear from the foregoing facts that what is
alleged to have been violated in the enactment of R.A. No. 8240 are merely internal
rules of procedure of the House rather than constitutional requirements for the
enactment of a law, i.e., Art. VI, §§26-27. Petitioners do not claim that there was no
quorum but only that, by some maneuver allegedly in violation of the rules of the
House, Rep. Arroyo was effectively prevented from questioning the presence of a
quorum. Petitioners contend that the House rules were adopted pursuant to the
constitutional provision that “each House may determine the rules of its
proceedings” and that for this reason they are judicially enforceable. To begin with,
this contention stands the principle on its head. In the decided cases, the
constitutional provision that “each House may determine the rules of its proceed-
ings” was invoked by parties, although not successfully, precisely to support claims
of autonomy of the legislative branch to conduct its business free from interference
by courts. Here petitioners cite the provision for the opposite purpose of invoking
judicial review. But the cases, both here and abroad, in varying forms of expression,
all deny to the courts the power to inquire into allegations that, in enacting a law, a
House of Congress failed to comply with its own rules, in the absence of showing
that there was a violation of a constitutional provision or the rights of private
individuals.
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Same; Same; Same; Same; The prevailing view is that Rules of Proceedings are
subject to revocation, modification or waiver at the pleasure of the body adopting
them as they are primarily procedural.—We conclude this survey with the useful
summary of the rulings by former Chief Justice Fernando, commenting on the power
of each House of Congress to determine its rules of proceedings. He wrote: Rules are
hardly permanent in character. The prevailing view is that they are subject to
revocation, modification or waiver at the pleasure of the body adopting them as they
are primarily procedural. Courts ordinarily have no concern with their observance.
They may be waived or disregarded by the legislative body. Consequently, mere
failure to conform to them does not have the effect of nullifying the act taken if the
requisite number of members have agreed to a particular measure. The above
principle is subject, however, to this qualification. Where the construction to be
given to a rule affects persons other than members of the legislative body the
question presented is necessarily judicial in character. Even its validity is open to
question in a case where private rights are involved.
Same; Same; Same; The Supreme Court has no more power to look into the
internal proceedings of a House than members of that House have to look over the
shoulders of the justices, as long as no violation of constitutional provisions is
shown.—In this case no rights of private individuals are involved but only those of a
member who, instead of seeking redress in the House, chose to transfer the dispute
to this Court. We have no more power to look into the internal proceedings of a
House than members of that House have to look over our shoulders, as long as no
violation of constitutional provisions is shown. Petitioners must realize that each of
the three departments of our government has its separate sphere which the others
may not invade without upsetting the delicate balance on which our constitutional
order rests. Due regard for the working of our system of government, more than
mere comity, compels reluctance on our part to enter upon an inquiry into an alleged
violation of the rules of the House. We must accordingly decline the invitation to
exercise our power.
Same; Same; Same; Political Questions; While Art. VIII, §1 has broadened the
scope of judicial inquiry into areas normally left to the political departments to
decide, such as those relating to national security, it has not altogether done away
with political questions such as those which arise in the field of foreign relations.—
Petitioners, quoting former Chief Justice Roberto Concepcion’s sponsorship in
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the Constitutional Commission, contend that under Art. VIII, §1, “nothing
involving abuse of discretion [by the other branches of the government] amounting
to lack or excess of jurisdiction is beyond judicial review.” Implicit in this statement
of the former Chief Justice, however, is an acknowledgment that the jurisdiction of
this Court is subject to the case and controversy requirement of Art. VIII, §5 and,
therefore, to the requirement of a justiciable controversy before courts can
adjudicate constitutional questions such as those which arise in the field of foreign
relations. For while Art. VIII, §1 has broadened the scope of judicial inquiry into
areas normally left to the political departments to decide, such as those relating to
national security, it has not altogether done away with political questions such as
those which arise in the field of foreign relations.
Same; Same; Same; Same; If, then, the established rule is that courts cannot
declare an act of the legislature void on account merely of noncompliance with rules
of procedure made by itself, it follows that such a case does not present a situation in
which a branch of the government has “gone beyond the constitutional limits of its
jurisdiction” so as to call for the exercise of the Court’s Art. VIII, §1 power.—As we
have already held, under Art. VIII, §1, this Court’s function is merely [to]
check whether or not the governmental branch or agency has gone beyond the
constitutional limits of its jurisdiction, not that it erred or has a different view. In the
absence of a showing . . . [of] grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack of
jurisdiction, there is no occasion for the Court to exercise its corrective power. . . . It
has no power to look into what it thinks is apparent error. If, then, the established
rule is that courts cannot declare an act of the legislature void on account merely of
noncompliance with rules of procedure made by itself, it follows that such a case
does not present a situation in which a branch of the government has “gone beyond
the constitutional limits of its jurisdiction” so as to call for the exercise of our Art.
VIII, §1 power.
Same; Same; Same; Legislative Rules of Procedure; Bicameral Conference
Committee Reports; No rule of the House of Representatives has been cited which
specifically requires that in cases involving the approval of a conference committee
report, the Chair must restate the motion and conduct a viva voce or nominal
voting.—Petitioners argue that, in accordance with the rules of the House, Rep.
Albano’s motion for the approval of the conference committee report should have
been stated by the Chair and later the individual votes of the Members should have
been taken. They say that the method used in
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this case is a legislator’s nightmare because it suggests unanimity when the
fact was that one or some legislators opposed the report. No rule of the House of
Representatives has been cited which specifically requires that in cases such as this
involving approval of a conference committee report, the Chair must restate the
motion and conduct a viva voce or nominal voting. On the other hand, as the
Solicitor General has pointed out, the manner in which the conference committee
report on H. No. 7198 was approved was by no means a unique one. It has basis in
legislative practice. It was the way the conference committee report on the bills
which became the Local Government Code of 1991 and the conference committee
report on the bills amending the Tariff and Customs Code were approved.
Same; Same; Same; Same; The advantages or disadvantages, the wisdom or
folly of a method do not present any matter for judicial consideration—the Court
cannot provide a second opinion on what is the best procedure.—Indeed, it is no
impeachment of the method to say that some other way would be better, more
accurate and even more just. The advantages or disadvantages, the wisdom or folly
of a method do not present any matter for judicial consideration. In the words of the
U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, “this Court cannot provide a second opinion on what
is the best procedure. Notwithstanding the deference and esteem that is properly
tendered to individual congressional actors, our deference and esteem for the
institution as a whole and for the constitutional command that the institution be
allowed to manage its own affairs precludes us from even attempting a diagnosis of
the problem.”
Same; Same; Same; Same; The Constitution does not require that the yeas and
the nays of the Members be taken every time a House has to vote, except only in the
following instances—upon the last and third readings of a bill, at the request of one-
fifth of the Members present, and in repassing a bill over the veto of the President.—
Nor does the Constitution require that the yeas and the nays of the Members be
taken every time a House has to vote, except only in the following instances: upon
the last and third readings of a bill, at the request of one-fifth of the Members
present, and in repassing a bill over the veto of the President. Indeed, considering
the fact that in the approval of the original bill the votes of the Members
by yeas and nays had already been taken, it would have been sheer tedium to repeat
the process.
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Same; Same; Same; Same; Words and Phrases; The phrase “grave abuse of
discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction” has a settled meaning in the
jurisprudence of procedure—it means such capricious and whimsical exercise of
judgment by a tribunal exercising judicial or quasi judicial power as to amount to
lack of power.—Given this fact, it is difficult to see how it can plausibly be contended
that in signing the bill which became R.A. No. 8240, respondent Speaker of the
House be acted with grave abuse of his discretion. Indeed, the phrase “grave abuse
of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction” has a settled meaning in the
jurisprudence of procedure. It means such capricious and whimsical exercise of
judgment by a tribunal exercising judicial or quasi judicial power as to amount to
lack of power. As Chief Justice Concep-cion himself said in explaining this provision,
the power granted to the courts by Art. VIII, §1 extends to cases where “a branch of
the government or any of its officials has acted without jurisdiction or in excess of
jurisdiction, or so capriciously as to constitute an abuse of discretion amounting to
excess of jurisdiction.”
Same; Same; Same; Same; Quorum; The question of quorum cannot be raised
repeatedly—especially when the quorum is obviously present—for the purpose of
delaying the business of the House; A Member of the House waives his objection to the
presence of a quorum by his continued interpellation for in so doing he in effect
acknowledges the presence of a quorum.—Here, the matter complained of concerns a
matter of internal procedure of the House with which the Court should not be
concerned. To repeat, the claim is not that there was no quorum but only that Rep.
Arroyo was effectively prevented from questioning the presence of a quorum. Rep.
Arroyo’s earlier motion to adjourn for lack of quorum had already been defeated, as
the roll call established the existence of a quorum. The question of quorum cannot be
raised repeatedly—especially when the quorum is obviously present—for the
purpose of delaying the business of the House. Rep. Arroyo waived his objection by
his continued interpellation of the sponsor for in so doing he in effect acknowledged
the presence of a quorum.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Enrolled Bill Doctrine; Presumptions; Under the
enrolled bill doctrine, the signing of a bill by the Speaker of the House and the
President of the Senate and the certification by the secretaries of both Houses of
Congress that it was passed are conclusive of its due enactment; There is no claim
either here or in the decision in the EVAT cases that the enrolled bill embodies a con-
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clusive presumption.—Under the enrolled bill doctrine, the signing of H. No.
7198 by the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate and the
certification by the secretaries of both Houses of Congress that it was passed on
November 21, 1996 are conclusive of its due enactment. Much energy and learning is
devoted in the separate opinion of Justice Puno, joined by Justice Davide, to
disputing this doctrine. To be sure, there is no claim either here or in the decision in
the EVAT cases [Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance] that the enrolled bill embodies a
conclusive presumption.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Same; Where there is no evidence to the contrary, the
Court will respect the certification of the presiding officers of both Houses that a bill
has been duly passed.—In one case we “went behind” an enrolled bill and consulted
the Journal to determine whether certain provisions of a statute had been approved
by the Senate. But, where as here there is no evidence to the contrary, this Court
will respect the certification of the presiding officers of both Houses that a bill has
been duly passed. Under this rule, this Court has refused to determine claims that
the three-fourths vote needed to pass a proposed amendment to the Constitution had
not been obtained, because “a duly authenticated bill or resolution imports absolute
verity and is binding on the courts.”
Same; Same; Same; Same; Same; The enrolled bill doctrine, as a rule of
evidence, is well established, and to overrule it now is to repudiate the massive
teaching of our cases and overthrow an established rule of evidence.—The enrolled
bill doctrine, as a rule of evidence, is well established. It is cited with approval by
text writers here and abroad. The enrolled bill rule rests on the following
considerations: . . . As the President has no authority to approve a bill not passed by
Congress, an enrolled Act in the custody of the Secretary of State, and having the
official attestations of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, of the President
of the Senate, and of the President of the United States, carries, on its face, a solemn
assurance by the legislative and executive departments of the government, charged,
respectively, with the duty of enacting and executing the laws, that it was passed by
Congress. The respect due to coequal and independent departments requires the
judicial department to act upon that assurance, and to accept, as having passed
Congress, all bills authenticated in the manner stated; leaving the court to
determine, when the question properly arises, whether the Act, so authenticated, is
in conformity with the Constitution. To overrule
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the doctrine now, as the dissent urges, is to repudiate the massive teaching of
our cases and overthrow an established rule of evidence.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Same; Legislative Journals; The Journal is regarded
as conclusive with respect to matters that are required by the Constitution to be
recorded therein, and with respect to other matters, in the absence of evidence to the
contrary, the Journal has also been accorded conclusive effect.—The Journal is
regarded as conclusive with respect to matters that are required by the Constitution
to be recorded therein. With respect to other matters, in the absence of evidence to
the contrary, the Journals have also been accorded conclusive effect. Thus, inUnited
States v. Pons, this Court spoke of the imperatives of public policy for regarding the
Journals as “public memorials of the most permanent character,” thus: “They should
be public, because all are required to conform to them; they should be permanent,
that rights acquired today upon the faith of what has been declared to be law shall
not be destroyed tomorrow, or at some remote period of time, by facts resting only in
the memory of individuals.” As already noted, the bill which became R.A. No. 8240 is
shown in the Journal. Hence its due enactment has been duly proven.
Same; Same; Same; The Supreme Court has not been invested with a roving
commission to inquire into complaints, real or imagined, of legislative skullduggery—
it would be acting in excess of its power and would itself be guilty of grave abuse of its
discretion were it to do so.—It would be an unwarranted invasion of the prerogative
of a coequal department for this Court either to set aside a legislative action as void
because the Court thinks the House has disregarded its own rules of procedure, or to
allow those defeated in the political arena to seek a rematch in the judicial forum
when petitioners can find their remedy in that department itself. The Court has not
been invested with a roving commission to inquire into complaints, real or imagined,
of legislative skullduggery. It would be acting in excess of its power and would itself
be guilty of grave abuse of its discretion were it to do so. The suggestion made in a
case may instead appropriately be made here: petitioners can seek the enactment of
a new law or the repeal or amendment of R.A. No. 8240. In the absence of anything
to the contrary, the Court must assume that Congress or any House thereof acted in
the good faith belief that its conduct was permitted by its rules, and deference rather
than disrespect is due the judgment of that body.
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PUNO, J., Concurring and Dissenting Opinion:
Constitutional Law; Judicial Review; Separation of Powers;Political Questions;

In the Philippine setting, there is a more compelling reason for courts to categorically
reject the political question defense when its interposition will cover up abuse of
power.—In the Philippine setting, there is a more compelling reason for courts to
categorically reject the political question defense when its interposition will cover up
abuse of power. For section 1, Article VIII of our Constitution
was intentionallycobbled to empower courts “x x x to determine whether or not there
has been a grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction on
the part of any branch or instrumentality of the government.” This power is new and
was not granted to our courts in the 1935 and 1972 Constitutions. It was not also
xeroxed from the US Constitution or any foreign state constitution. The CONCOM
granted this enormous power to our courts in view of our experience under martial
law where abusive exercises of state power were shielded from judicial scrutiny by
the misuse of the political question doctrine. Led by the eminent former Chief
Justice Roberto Concepcion, the CONCOM expanded and sharpened the checking
powers of the judiciary vis-a-vis the Executive and the Legislative departments of
government. In cases involving the proclamation of martial law and suspension of
the privilege of habeas corpus, it is now beyond dubiety that the government can no
longer invoke the political question defense. Section 18 of Article VII completely
eliminated this defense.
Same; Same; Same; Same; In resolving the case at bar, the lessons of our own
history should provide us the light and not the experience of foreigners.—I urge my
brethren in the Court to give due and serious consideration to this new
constitutional provision as the case at bar once more calls us to define the
parameters of our power to review violations of the rules of the House. We will not
be true to our trust as the last bulwark against government abuses if we refuse to
exercise this new power or if we wield it with timidity. To be sure, it is this
exceeding timidity to unsheath the judicial sword that has increasingly emboldened
other branches of government to denigrate, if not defy, orders of our courts.
In Tolentino, I endorsed the view of former Senator Salonga that this novel provision
stretching the latitude of judicial power is distinctly Filipino and its interpretation
should not be depreciated by undue reliance on inapplicable foreign jurisprudence.
In resolving the case at bar, the lessons of our own history should provide us the
light and not the experience of foreigners.
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Same; Same; Same; Legislative Rules of Procedure; Enrolled Bill Doctrine; An
enrolled bill is a declaration by the two Houses, through their presiding officers, to
the President that a bill, thus attested, has received in due the sanction of the
legislative branch of the government, and that it is delivered to him in obedience to
the constitutional requirement that all bills which pass Congress shall be presented to
him.—An enrolled bill is one which has been duly introduced, finally enacted by both
Houses, signed by the proper officers of each House and approved by the President.
It is a declaration by the two Houses, through their presiding officers, to the
President that a bill, thus attested, has received in due the sanction of the legislative
branch of the government, and that it is delivered to him in obedience to the
constitutional requirement that all bills which pass Congress shall be presented to
him.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Same; Words and Phrases;“Modified Entry or
Affirmative Contradiction Rule” and “Extrinsic Evidence Rule,” Explained.—Over
the years, the enrolled bill theory has undergone important mutations. Some
jurisdictions have adopted the modified entry or affirmative contradiction rule.
Under this rule, the presumption in favor of the enrolled bill is not conclusive. The
rule concedes validity to the enrolled bill unlessthere affirmatively appears in
the journals of the legislature a statement that there has not been compliance with
one or more of the constitutional requirements. Other jurisdictions have adopted
the Extrinsic Evidence Rule which holds that an enrolled bill is only prima
facie evidence that it has been regularly enacted. The prima facie presumption,
however, can be destroyed by clear, satisfactory and convincing evidence that the
constitutional requirements in enacting a law have been violated. For this
purpose, journals and other extrinsic evidence are allowed to be received. Some limit
the use of extrinsic evidence to issues of fraud or mistakes.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Same; The principle of separation of powers is the
principal prop of the enrolled bill doctrine.—The principle of separation of powers is
thus the principal prop of the enrolled bill doctrine. The doctrine is also justified as a
rule of convenience. Supposedly, it avoids difficult questions of evidence. It is also
believed that it will prevent the filing of too many cases which will cast a cloud of
uncertainty on laws passed by the legislature. As explained in Ex Pacte Wren “if the
validity of every act published as law is to be tested by examining its history, as
shown by the journals of the two houses of the legislature, there will be an amount
of litiga-
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tion, difficulty, and painful uncertainty appalling in its contemplation, and
multiplying a hundredfold the alleged uncertainty of the law.” The conclusiveness of
the enrolled bill is also justified on the ground that journals and other extrinsic
evidence are conducive to mistake, if not fraud.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Same; It is high time we re-examine our preference
for the enrolled bill doctrine.—Clearly, the enrolled bill doctrine no longer enjoys its
once unassailable respectability in United States. Sutherland reveals that starting
in the 1940’s, “x x x the tendency seems to be toward the abandonment of the
conclusive presumption rule and the adoption of the third rule leaving only a prima
facie presumption of validity which may be attacked by any authoritative source of
information.” It is high time we re-examine our preference for the enrolled bill
doctrine. It was in the 1947 case of Mabanag v. Lopez Vito, that this Court, with
three (3) justices dissenting, first embraced the rule that a duly authenticated bill or
resolution imports absolute verity and is binding on the courts.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Same; It is time to bury the enrolled bill for its fiction
of conclusiveness shuts off truth in many litigations—giving an enrolled bill a mere
prima facie presumption of correctness will facilitate our task of dispensing justice
based on truth.—I respectfully submit that it is now time for the Court to make a
definitive pronouncement that we no longer give our unqualified support to the
enrolled bill doctrine. There are compelling reasons for this suggested change in
stance. For one, the enrolled bill is appropriate only in England where it originated
because in England there is no written Constitution and the Parliament is supreme.
For another, many of the courts in the United States have broken away from the
rigidity and unrealism of the enrolled bill in light of contemporary developments in
lawmaking. And more important, our uncritical adherence to the enrolled bill is
inconsistent with our Constitution, laws and rules. In Mabanag, we relied on section
313 of the Old Code of Civil Procedure as amended by Act No. 2210 as a principal
reason in embracing the enrolled bill. This section, however has long been repealed
by our Rules of Court. A half glance at our Rules will show that its section on
conclusive presumption does not carry the conclusive presumption we give to an
enrolled bill. But this is not all. The conclusiveness of an enrolled bill which all too
often results in the suppression of truthcannot be justified under the 1987
Constitution. The Preamble of our Constitution demands that we live not only under
a rule of law but also
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under a regime of truth. Our Constitution also adopted a national policy
requiring full public disclosure of all state transactions involving public interest.
Any rule which will defeat this policy on transparency ought to be disfavored. And to
implement these policies, this Court was given the power to pry open and to strike
down any act of any branch or instrumentality of government if it amounts to grave
abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction. It is time to bury the
enrolled bill for its fiction of conclusiveness shuts off truth in many litigations. We
cannot dispense justice based on fiction for the search for justice is the search for
truth. I submit that giving an enrolled bill a mere prima facie presumption of
correctness will facilitate our task of dispensing justice based on truth.
Same; Same; Same; Same; Quorum; The rules on how to question the existence
of a quorum are procedural in character, and their observance or non-observance is a
matter of judgment call on the part of our legislators and it is not the business of the
Court to reverse this judgment when untainted by grave abuse of discretion
amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction.—In sum, I respectfully submit that the
Court has jurisdiction over the petition at bar and that issues posed by petitioner
are justiciable. Nonetheless, I do not find any grave abuse of discretion committed by
the public respondents to justify granting said petition. As the ponencia points out,
the petition merely involves the complaint that petitioner was prevented from
raising the question of quorum. The petition does not concern violation of any rule
mandated by the Constitution. Nor does it involve the right of a non-member of the
House which requires constitutional protection. The rules on how to question the
existence of a quorum are procedural in character. They are malleable by nature for
they were drafted to help the House enact laws. As well stated, these rules are
servants, not masters of the House. Their observance or non-observance is a matter
of judgment call on the part of our legislators and it is not the business of the Court
to reverse this judgment when untainted by grave abuse of discretion amounting to
lack or excess of jurisdiction.
SPECIAL CIVIL ACTION in the Supreme Court. Certiorari and/or

Prohibition.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the Court.

Azcuna, Yorac, Sarmiento, Arroyo & Chua and Rene A.V. Saguisag for
petitioners.
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Cesar A. Sevilla & Associates for Jose de Venecia.
MENDOZA, J.:
This is a petition for certiorari and/or prohibition challenging the validity of

Republic Act No. 8240, which amends certain provisions of the National
Internal Revenue Code by imposing so-called “sin taxes” (actually specific
taxes) on the manufacture and sale of beer and cigarettes.
Petitioners are members of the House of Representatives. They brought
this suit against respondents Jose de Venecia, Speaker of the House of
Representatives, Deputy Speaker Raul Daza, Majority Leader Rodolfo
Albano, the Executive Secretary, the Secretary of Finance, and the
Commissioner of Internal Revenue, charging violation of the rules of the
House which petitioners claim are “constitutionally mandated” so that their
violation is tantamount to a violation of the Constitution.
The law originated in the House of Representatives as H. No. 7198. This
bill was approved on third reading on September 12, 1996 and transmitted on
September 16, 1996 to the Senate which approved it with certain
amendments on third reading on November 17, 1996. A bicameral conference
committee was formed to reconcile the disagreeing provisions of the House
and Senate versions of the bill.
The bicameral conference committee submitted its report to the House at 8
a.m. on November 21, 1996. At 11:48 a.m., after a recess, Rep. Exequiel
Javier, chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, proceeded to deliver
his sponsorship speech, after which he was interpellated. Rep. Rogelio
Sarmiento was first to interpellate. He was interrupted when Rep. Arroyo
moved to adjourn for lack of quorum. Rep. Antonio Cuenco objected to the
motion and asked for a head count. After a roll call, the Chair (Deputy
Speaker Raul Daza) declared the presence of a quorum. Rep. Arroyo appealed
1
the
_______________________
1 JOURNAL No. 39, pp. 66-68; Rollo, pp. 210, 212; Transcript of November 21, 1996 session,
pp. 39-52; Rollo, pp. 368-381; Petition, p. 6, par. 10; Rollo, p. 8.
280
ruling of the Chair, but his motion was defeated when put to a vote. The
interpellation of the sponsor thereafter proceeded.
Petitioner Rep. Joker Arroyo registered to interpellate. He was fourth in
the order, following Rep. Rogelio Sarmiento, Rep. Edcel C. Lagman and Rep.
Enrique Garcia. In the course of his interpellation, Rep. Arroyo announced
that he was going to raise a question on the quorum, although until the end
of his interpellation he never did. What happened thereafter is shown in the
following transcript of the session on November 21, 1996 of the House of
Representatives, as published by Congress in the newspaper issues of
December 5 and 6, 1996:
MR. ALBANO. Mr. Speaker, I move that we now approve and ratify the conference
committee report.
THE DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr. Daza). Any objection to the motion?
MR. ARROYO. What is that, Mr. Speaker?
THE DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr. Daza). There being none, approved. (Gavel)
MR. ARROYO. No, no, no, wait a minute, Mr. Speaker, I stood up. I want to know
what is the question that the Chair asked the distinguished sponsor.
THE DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr. Daza). There was a motion by the Majority
Leader for approval of the report, and the Chair called for the motion.
MR. ARROYO. Objection, I stood up, so I wanted to object.
THE DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr. Daza). The session is suspended for one minute.
(It was 3:01 p.m.)
(3:40 p.m., the session was resumed) THE DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr. Daza). The
session is resumed.
MR. ALBANO. Mr. Speaker, I move to adjourn until four o’clock, Wednesday,
next week.
THE DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr. Daza). The session is adjourned until four o’clock,
Wednesday, next week. (It was 3:40 p.m.)
On the same day, the bill was signed by the Speaker of the House of
Representatives and the President of the Senate and
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certified by the respective secretaries of both Houses of Congress as having
been finally passed by the House of Representatives and by the Senate on
November 21, 1996. The enrolled bill was signed into law by President Fidel
V. Ramos on November 22, 1996.
Petitioners claim that there are actually four different versions of the
transcript of this portion of Rep. Arroyo’s interpellation: (1) the transcript of
audio-sound recording of the proceedings in the session hall immediately
after the session adjourned at 3:40 p.m. on November 21, 1996, which
petitioner Rep. Edcel C. Lagman obtained from the operators of the sound
system; (2) the transcript of the proceedings from 3:00 p.m. to 3:40 p.m. of
November 21, 1996, as certified by the Chief of the Transcription Division on
November 21, 1996, also obtained by Rep. Lagman; (3) the transcript of the
proceedings from 3:00 p.m. to 3:40 p.m. of November 21, 1996 as certified by
the Chief of the Transcription Division on November 28, 1996, also obtained
by Rep. Lagman; and (4) the published version abovequoted. According to
petitioners, the four versions differ on three points, to wit: (1) in the audio-
sound recording the word “approved,” which appears on line 13 in the three
other versions, cannot be heard; (2) in the transcript certified on November
21, 1996 the word “no” on line 17 appears only once, while in the other
versions it is repeated three times; and (3) the published version does not
contain the sentence “(Y)ou better prepare for a quorum because I will raise
the question of the quorum,” which appears in the other versions.
Petitioners’ allegations are vehemently denied by respondents. However,
there is no need to discuss this point as petitioners have announced that, in
order to expedite the resolution of this petition, they admit, without
conceding, the correctness of the transcripts relied upon by the respondents.
Petitioners agree that for purposes of this proceeding the word “approved”
appears in the transcripts.
Only the proceedings of the House of Representatives on the conference
committee report on H. No. 7198 are in question. Petitioners’ principal
argument is that R.A. No. 8240 is
282
null and void because it was passed in violation of the rules of the House;
that these rules embody the “constitutional mandate” in Art. VI, §16(3) that
“each House may determine the rules of its proceedings” and that,
consequently, violation of the House rules is a violation of the Constitution
itself. They contend that the certification of Speaker De Venecia that the law
was properly passed is false and spurious.
More specifically, petitioners charge that (1) in violation of Rule VIII, §35
and Rule XVII, §103 of the rules of the House, the Chair, in submitting the
2
conference committee report to the House, did not call for the yeas or nays,
but simply asked for its approval by motion in order to prevent petitioner
Arroyo from questioning the presence of a quorum; (2) in violation of Rule
XIX, §112, the Chair deliberately ignored Rep. Arroyo’s question, “What is
3
that . . . Mr. Speaker?” and did not repeat Rep. Albano’s motion to approve or
ratify; (3) in violation of Rule XVI, §97, the Chair refused to recognize Rep.
4
Arroyo and instead proceeded to act on Rep. Albano’s motion and afterward
declared the report approved; and (4) in violation of Rule XX, §§121-122, Rule
XXI, §123, and Rule XVIII, §109, the Chair suspended the session without
5
first ruling on
___________________
2 Rule VIII, §35. Voting.—Every member present in the session shall vote on every question
put unless he inhibits himself on account of personal pecuniary interest therein. Rule XVII,
§103. Manner of Voting.—The Speaker shall rise to put a question saying “As many as are in
favor of (as the question may be). say Aye” and, after the affirmative vote is counted. “As many as
are opposed. Say Nay . . .”
3 Rule XIX, §112. Reading and Withdrawal of Motions.—The Speaker shall state the motion
or, if in writing, shall cause it to be read by the Secretary General before being debated. A motion
may be withdrawn any time before its approval.
4 Rule XVI, §97. Recognition of Member.—When two or more members rise at the same time,
the Speaker shall recognize the Member who is to speak first.
5 Rule XX, §121. Definition.—Questions of privilege are those affecting the duties, conduct,
rights, privileges, dignity, integrity of
283
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 283
Rep. Arroyo’s question which, it is alleged, is a point of order or a privileged
motion. It is argued that Rep. Arroyo’s query should have been resolved upon
the resumption of the session on November 28, 1996, because the
parliamentary situation at the time of the adjournment remained upon the
resumption of the session.
Petitioners also charge that the session was hastily adjourned at 3:40 p.m.
on November 21, 1996 and the bill certified by Speaker Jose De Venecia to
prevent petitioner Rep. Arroyo from formally challenging the existence of a
quorum and asking for a reconsideration.
Petitioners urge the Court not to feel bound by the certification of the
Speaker of the House that the law had been properly passed, considering the
Court’s power under Art. VIII, §1 to pass on claims of grave abuse of
discretion by the other departments of the government, and they ask for a
reexamination of Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance, which affirmed the 6
conclusiveness of an enrolled bill, in view of the changed membership of the

Court.
The Solicitor General filed a comment in behalf of all respondents. In
addition, respondent De Venecia filed a supplemental comment. Respondents’
defense is anchored on the
_____________________
reputation of the House or of its members, collectively or individually.

§122. Precedence.—Subject to the ten-minute rule, questions of privilege shall have precedence over all other
questions, except a motion to adjourn and a point of order.
Rule XXI, §123. Definition and Precedence.—A privileged motion pertains to a subject matter which,
under the rules, takes precedence over others. The order of precedence of privileged motions is determined in
each case by the rules.
Rule XVIII, §109. Who May Vote; Procedure; Exceptions.—When a bill, report or motion is adopted or lost,
a member who voted with the majority may move for its reconsideration on the same or succeeding session
day. The motion shall take precedence over all other questions, except a motion to adjourn, a question of
privilege, and a point of order.
6 235 SCRA 630 (1994).
284
principle of separation of powers and the enrolled bill doctrine. They argue
that the Court is not the proper forum for the enforcement of the rules of the
House and that there is no justification for reconsidering the enrolled bill
doctrine. Although the Constitution provides in Art. VI, §16(3) for the
adoption by each House of its rules of proceedings, enforcement of the rules
cannot be sought in the courts except insofar as they implement
constitutional requirements such as that relating to three readings on
separate days before a bill may be passed. At all events, respondents contend
that, in passing the bill which became R.A. No. 8240, the rules of the House,
as well as parliamentary precedents for approval of conference committee
reports on mere motion, were faithfully observed.
In his supplemental comment, respondent De Venecia denies that his
certification of H. No. 7198 is false and spurious and contends that under the
journal entry rule, the judicial inquiry sought by the petitioners is barred.
Indeed, Journal No. 39 of the House of Representatives, covering the sessions
of November 20 and 21, 1996, shows that “On Motion of Mr. Albano, there
being no objection, the Body approved the Conference Committee Report on
House Bill No. 7198.” This Journal was approved on December 2, 1996 over
7
the lone objection of petitioner Rep. Lagman. 8
After considering the arguments of the parties, the Court finds no ground
for holding that Congress committed a grave abuse of discretion in enacting
R.A. No. 8240. This case is therefore dismissed.
First. It is clear from the foregoing facts that what is alleged to have been
violated in the enactment of R.A. No. 8240 are merely internal rules of
procedure of the House rather than constitutional requirements for the
enactment of a law, i.e., Art. VI, §§26-27. Petitioners do not claim that there
was no quorum but only that, by some maneuver allegedly in vio-
___________________
7 Rollo, p. 228.
8 Id., p. 229.
285
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 285
lation of the rules of the House, Rep. Arroyo was effectively prevented from
questioning the presence of a quorum.
Petitioners contend that the House rules were adopted pursuant to the
constitutional provision that “each House may determine the rules of its
proceedings” and that for this reason they are judicially enforceable. To begin
9
with, this contention stands the principle on its head. In the decided
cases, the constitutional provision that “each House may determine the rules
10
of its proceedings” was invoked by parties, although not successfully,

precisely to support claims of autonomy of the legislative branch to conduct
its business free from interference by courts. Here petitioners cite the
provision for the opposite purpose of invoking judicial review.
But the cases, both here and abroad, in varying forms of expression, all
deny to the courts the power to inquire into allegations that, in enacting a
law, a House of Congress failed to comply with its own rules, in the absence
of showing that there was a violation of a constitutional provision or the
rights of private individuals. In Osmeña v. Pendatun, it was held: “At any
11
rate, courts have declared that ‘the rules adopted by deliberative bodies are
subject to revocation, modification or waiver at the pleasure of the body
adopting them.’ And it has been said that ‘Parliamentary rules are merely
procedural, and with their observance, the courts have no concern. They may
be waived or disregarded by the legislative body.’ Consequently, ‘mere failure
to conform to parliamentary usage will not invalidate the action (taken by a
deliberative body) when the requisite number of members have agreed to a
particular measure.’ ”
__________________
9 Art. VI, §16(3).

10 E.g., United States v. Ballin, Joseph & Co., 144 U.S. 1, 36 L.Ed. 321 (1862); Exxon Corp. v.
FTC, 589 F. 2d 582 (1978); Murray v. Buchanan, 674 F.2d 14 (1982); Metzenbaum v. Federal
Energy Regulatory Com’n. 675 F.2d 1282 (1982). See also Osmeña v. Pendatun, 109 Phil.
863 (1960).
11 109 Phil. at 870-71. See also EVAT cases [Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance], 235 SCRA 630.
286
In United States v. Ballin, Joseph & Co., the rule was stated thus: “The
12
Constitution empowers each house to determine its rules of proceedings. It

may not by its rules ignore constitutional restraints or violate fundamental
rights, and there should be a reasonable relation between the mode or
method of proceeding established by the rule and the result which is sought
to be attained. But within these limitations all matters of method are open to
the determination of the House, and it is no impeachment of the rule to say
that some other way would be better, more accurate, or even more just. It is
no objection to the validity of a rule that a different one has been prescribed
and in force for a length of time. The power to make rules is not one which
once exercised is exhausted. It is a continuous power, always subject to be
exercised by the House, and within the limitations suggested, absolute and
beyond the challenge of any other body or tribunal.”
In Crawford v. Gilchrist, it was held: “The provision that each House
13
shall determine the rules of its proceedings does not restrict the power given
to a mere formulation of standing rules, or to the proceedings of the body in
ordinary legislative matters; but in the absence of constitutional restraints,
and when exercised by a majority of a constitutional quorum, such authority
extends to a determination of the propriety and effect of any action as it is
taken by the body as it proceeds in the exercise of any power, in the transaction
of any business, or in the performance of any duty conferred upon it by the
Constitution.”
In State ex rel. City Loan & Savings Co. v. Moore, the Supreme Court of
14
Ohio stated: “The provision for reconsideration is no part of the Constitution

and is therefore entirely within the control of the General Assembly. Having
made the rule, it should be regarded, but a failure to regard it is not the
subject-matter of judicial inquiry. It has been decided by the courts of last
resort of many states, and also by the United
__________________
12 144 U.S. at 5, 36 L.Ed. at 324-25 (emphasis added).

13 64 Fla. 41; 59 So. 963, 968 (1912) (emphasis added).
14 124 Ohio St. 256, 177 N.E. 910, 911 (1931) (emphasis added).
287
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 287
States Supreme Court, that a legislative act will not be declared invalid for
noncompliance with rules.”
In State v. Savings Bank, the Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut
15
declared itself as follows: “The Constitution declares that each house shall
determine the rules of its own proceedings and shall have all powers
necessary for a branch of the Legislature of a free and independent state.
Rules of proceedings are the servants of the House and subject to its
authority. This authority may be abused, but when the House has acted in a
matter clearly within its power, it would be an unwarranted invasion of the
independence of the legislative department for the court to set aside such
action as void because it may think that the House has misconstrued or
departed from its own rules of procedure.”
In McDonald v. State, the Wisconsin Supreme Court held: “When it
16
appears that an act was so passed, no inquiry will be permitted to ascertain

whether the two houses have or have not complied strictly with their own
rules in their procedure upon the bill, intermediate its introduction and final
passage. The presumption is conclusive that they have done so. We think no
court has ever declared an act of the legislature void for non-compliance with
the rules of procedure made by itself, or the respective branches thereof, and
which it or they may change or suspend at will. If there are any such
adjudications, we decline to follow them.”
Schweizer v. Territory is illustrative of the rule in these cases. The 1893
17
Statutes of Oklahoma provided for three readings on separate days before a

bill may be passed by each house of the legislature, with the proviso that in
case of an emergency the house concerned may, by two-thirds vote, suspend
the operation of the rule. Plaintiff was convicted in the district court of
violation of a law punishing gambling. He appealed contending that the
gambling statute was not properly passed by the legislature because the
suspension of the
___________________
15 79 Conn. 141, 64 Atl. 5, 9-10 (1906) (emphasis added).
16 80 Wis. 407, 50 N.W. 185, 186 (1891) (emphasis added).
17 5 Okl. 297, 47 Pac. 1094 (1897) (emphasis added).
288
rule on three readings had not been approved by the requisite two-thirds
vote. Dismissing this contention, the State Supreme Court of Oklahoma held:
We have no constitutional provision requiring that the legislature should
read a bill in any particular manner. It may, then, read or deliberate upon a
bill as it sees fit, either in accordance with its own rules, or in violation
thereof, or without making any rules. The provision of section 17 referred to
is merely a statutory provision for the direction of the legislature in its action
upon proposed measures. It receives its entire force from legislative sanction,
and it exists only at legislative pleasure. The failure of the legislature to
properly weigh and consider an act, its passage through the legislature in a
hasty manner, might be reasons for the governor withholding his signature
thereto; but this alone, even though it is shown to be a violation of a rule
which the legislature had made to govern its own proceedings, could be no
reason for the court’s refusing its enforcement after it was actually passed by
a majority of each branch of the legislature, and duly signed by the
governor. The courts cannot declare an act of the legislature void on account of
noncompliance with rules of procedure made by itself to govern its
deliberations. McDonald v. State, 80 Wis. 407, 50 N.W. 185; In re Ryan, 80
Wis. 414, 50 N.W. 187; State v. Brown, 33 S.C. 151, 11 S.E. 641; Railway Co.
v. Gill, 54 Ark. 101, 15 S.W. 18.
We conclude this survey with the useful summary of the rulings by former
Chief Justice Fernando, commenting on the power of each House of Congress
to determine its rules of proceedings. He wrote:
Rules are hardly permanent in character. The prevailing view is that they are
subject to revocation, modification or waiver at the pleasure of the body adopting
them as they are primarily procedural. Courts ordinarily have no concern with their
observance. They may be waived or disregarded by the legislative body.
Consequently, mere failure to conform to them does not have the effect of nullifying
the act taken if the requisite number of members have agreed to a particular
measure. The above principle is subject, however, to this qualification. Where the
construction to be given to a rule affects persons other than members of the
legislative body the question
289
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 289
presented is necessarily judicial in character. Even its validity is open to question in
a case where private rights are involved. 18
In this case no rights of private individuals are involved but only those of a
member who, instead of seeking redress in the House, chose to transfer the
dispute to this Court. We have no more power to look into the internal
proceedings of a House than members of that House have to look over our
shoulders, as long as no violation of constitutional provisions is shown.
Petitioners must realize that each of the three departments of our
government has its separate sphere which the others may not invade without
upsetting the delicate balance on which our constitutional order rests. Due
regard for the working of our system of government, more than mere comity,
compels reluctance on our part to enter upon an inquiry into an alleged
violation of the rules of the House. We must accordingly decline the invitation
to exercise our power.
Second. Petitioners, quoting former Chief Justice Roberto Concepcion’s
sponsorship in the Constitutional Commission, contend that under Art. VIII,
§1, “nothing involving abuse of discretion [by the other branches of the
government] amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction is beyond judicial
review.” Implicit in this statement of the former Chief Justice, however, is
19
an acknowledgment that the jurisdiction of this Court is subject to the case

and controversy requirement of Art. VIII, §5 and, therefore, to the
requirement of a justiciable controversy before courts can adjudicate
constitutional questions such as those which arise in the field of foreign
relations. For while Art. VIII, §1 has broadened the scope of
_____________________
18 ENRIQUE M. FERNANDO, CONSTITUTION OF THE PHILIPPINES ANNOTATED 188-

189 (1977); Pacete v. Secretary of the Commission on Appointments, 40 SCRA 58 (1971).
19 Petition, p. 25, quoting the sponsorship speech of former Chief Justice Roberto Concepcion,
chairman of the Committee on Judiciary of the Constitutional Commission, in 1 RECORDS OF
THE CONSTITUTIONAL COMMISSION 436 (Session of July 10,
1986).
290
judicial inquiry into areas normally left to the political departments to decide,
such as those relating to national security, it has not altogether done away
20
with political questions such as those which arise in the field of foreign
relations. As we have already held, under Art. VIII, §1, this Court’s function
is merely [to] check whether or not the governmental branch or agency has gone
beyond the constitutional limits of its jurisdiction, not that it erred or has a different
view. In the absence of a showing . . . [of] grave abuse of discretion amounting to
lack of jurisdiction, there is no occasion for the Court to exercise its corrective power.
. . . It has no power to look into what it thinks is apparent error. 21
If, then, the established rule is that courts cannot declare an act of the
legislature void on account merely of noncompliance with rules of procedure
made by itself, it follows that such a case does not present a situation in
which a branch of the government has “gone beyond the constitutional limits
of its jurisdiction” so as to call for the exercise of our Art. VIII, §1 power.
Third. Petitioners claim that the passage of the law in the House was
“railroaded.” They claim that Rep. Arroyo was still making a query to the
Chair when the latter declared Rep. Albano’s motion approved.
What happened is that, after Rep. Arroyo’s interpellation of the sponsor of
the committee report, Majority Leader Rodolfo Albano moved for the approval
and ratification of the conference committee report. The Chair called out for
objections to the motion. Then the Chair declared: “There being none,
approved.” At the same time the Chair was saying this, however,
__________________
20 Gonzales v. Macaraig, 191 SCRA 452 (1990); See Marcos v. Manglapus, 177 SCRA 668, 695
(1989); Lansang v. Garcia, 42 SCRA 448(1971).
21 Co v. Electoral Tribunal of the House of Representatives, 199 SCRA 692, 701 (1991); Llamas
v. Orbos, 202 SCRA 849, 857 (1991); Lansang v. Garcia, 42 SCRA at 480-481 (emphasis added).
291
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 291
Rep. Arroyo was asking, “What is that . . . Mr. Speaker?” The Chair and Rep.
Arroyo were talking simultaneously. Thus, although Rep. Arroyo
subsequently objected to the Majority Leader’s motion, the approval of the
conference committee report had by then already been declared by the Chair,
symbolized by its banging of the gavel.
Petitioners argue that, in accordance with the rules of the House, Rep.
Albano’s motion for the approval of the conference committee report should
have been stated by the Chair and later the individual votes of the Members
should have been taken. They say that the method used in this case is a
legislator’s nightmare because it suggests unanimity when the fact was that
one or some legislators opposed the report.
No rule of the House of Representatives has been cited which specifically
requires that in cases such as this involving approval of a conference
committee report, the Chair must restate the motion and conduct a viva
voce or nominal voting. On the other hand, as the Solicitor General has
pointed out, the manner in which the conference committee report on H. No.
7198 was approved was by no means a unique one. It has basis in legislative
practice. It was the way the conference committee report on the bills which
became the Local Government Code of 1991 and the conference committee
report on the bills amending the Tariff and Customs Code were approved.
In 1957, the practice was questioned as being contrary to the rules of the
House. The point was answered by Majority Leader Arturo M. Tolentino and
his answer became the ruling of the Chair. Mr. Tolentino said:
Mr. TOLENTINO. The fact that nobody objects means a unanimous action of the
House. Insofar as the matter of procedure is concerned, this has been a precedent
since I came here seven years ago, and it has been the procedure in this House that
if somebody objects, then a debate follows and after the debate, then the voting
comes in.
....
Mr. Speaker, a point of order was raised by the gentleman from Leyte, and I
wonder what his attitude is now on his point of
292
order. I should just like to state that I believe that we have had a substantial
compliance with the Rules. The Rule invoked is not one that refers to statutory or
constitutional requirement, and a substantial compliance, to my mind, is sufficient.
When the Chair announces the vote by saying “Is there any objection?” and nobody
objects, then the Chair announces “The bill is approved on second reading.” If there
was any doubt as to the vote, any motion to divide would have been proper. So, if
that motion is not presented, we assume that the House approves the measure. So I
believe there is substantial compliance here, and if anybody wants a division of the
House he can always ask for it, and the Chair can announce how many are in favor
and how many are against. 22
Indeed, it is no impeachment of the method to say that some other way would
be better, more accurate and even more just. The advantages or
23
disadvantages, the wisdom or folly of a method do not present any matter for
judicial consideration. In the words of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals,
24
“this Court cannot provide a second opinion on what is the best procedure.
Notwithstanding the deference and esteem that is properly tendered to
individual congressional actors, our deference and esteem for the institution
as a whole and for the constitutional command that the institution be allowed
to manage its own affairs precludes us from even attempting a diagnosis of
the problem.” 25
Nor does the Constitution require that the yeas and thenays of the
Members be taken every time a House has to vote, except only in the
following instances: upon the last and third readings of a bill, at the request
26
of one-fifth of the Members present, and in repassing a bill over the veto of
27
the Presi-
__________________
22 4 CONG. REC. 413-414 (Feb. 15, 1957).

23 United States v. Ballin, Joseph & Co., 144 U.S. at 5, 36 L.Ed. at 324-25; State v. Lewis, 186
S.E. 625, 630 (1936).
24 United States v. Smith, 286 U.S. 6, 76 L.Ed. 954 (1931).
25 Gregg v. Barrett, 771 F.2d 539, 549 (1985).
26 Art. VI, §26(2).
27 Id., §16(4).
293
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 293
dent. Indeed, considering the fact that in the approval of the original bill the
28
votes of the Members by yeas and nayshad already been taken, it would have
been sheer tedium to repeat the process.
Petitioners claim that they were prevented from seeking reconsideration
allegedly as a result of the precipitate suspension and subsequent
adjournment of the session. It would appear, however, that the session was
29
suspended to allow the parties to settle the problem, because when it

resumed at 3:40 p.m. on that day Rep. Arroyo did not say anything anymore.
While it is true that the Majority Leader moved for adjournment until 4 p.m.
of Wednesday of the following week, Rep. Arroyo could at least have objected
if there was anything he wanted to say. The fact, however, is that he did not.
The Journal of November 21, 1996 of the House shows:
ADJOURNMENT OF SESSION
On motion of Mr. Albano, there being no objection, the Chair declared the session
adjourned until four o’clock in the afternoon of Wednesday, November 27, 1996.
It was 3:40 p.m. Thursday, November 21, 1996. (emphasis added)
This Journal was approved on December 2, 1996. Again, no one objected to its
approval except Rep. Lagman.
It is thus apparent that petitioners’ predicament was largely of their own
making. Instead of submitting the proper motions for the House to act upon,
petitioners insisted on the pendency of Rep. Arroyo’s question as an obstacle
to the passage of the bill. But Rep. Arroyo’s question was not, in form or
substance, a point of order or a question of privilege entitled to
precedence. And even if Rep. Arroyo’s question were so,
30
_____________________
28 Id., §27(1).
29 Id., p. 17; id., p. 19.
30 INOCENCIO PAREJA, RULES OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES COMMENTED
AND ANNOTATED 331 (1963);
294
Rep. Albano’s motion to adjourn would have precedence and would have put
an end to any further consideration of the question. 31
Given this fact, it is difficult to see how it can plausibly be contended that
in signing the bill which became R.A. No. 8240, respondent Speaker of the
House be acted with grave abuse of his discretion. Indeed, the phrase “grave
abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction” has a settled
meaning in the jurisprudence of procedure. It means such capricious and
whimsical exercise of judgment by a tribunal exercising judicial or quasi
judicial power as to amount to lack of power. As Chief Justice Concepcion
himself said in explaining this provision, the power granted to the courts by
Art. VIII, §1 extends to cases where “a branch of the government or any of its
officials has acted without jurisdiction or in excess of jurisdiction, or so
capriciously as to constitute an abuse of discretion amounting to excess of
jurisdiction.” 32
Here, the matter complained of concerns a matter of internal procedure of

the House with which the Court should not be concerned. To repeat, the claim
is not that there was no quorum but only that Rep. Arroyo was effectively
prevented from questioning the presence of a quorum. Rep. Arroyo’s earlier
motion to adjourn for lack of quorum had already been defeated, as the roll
call established the existence of a quorum. The question of quorum cannot be
raised repeatedly—especially when the quorum is obviously present—for the
purpose of delaying the business of the House. Rep. Arroyo waived his
33
objection by his continued interpellation of the

____________________
REYNALDO FAJARDO, PRINCIPLES OF PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE 157-158, 172-

173 (1963).
31 Rule XIX, §13.
32 1 RECORDS OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL COMMISSION 436 (Session of July 10, 1986).
33 ALICE STURGIS, STANDARD CODE OF PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE, 17 (1950).
295
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 295
sponsor for in so doing he in effect acknowledged the presence of a quorum. 34
At any rate it is noteworthy that of the 111 members of the House earlier
found to be present on November 21, 1996, only the five, i.e., petitioners in
this case, are questioning the manner by which the conference committee
report on H. No. 7198 was approved on that day. No one, except Rep. Arroyo,
appears to have objected to the manner by which the report was approved.
Rep. John Henry Osmeña did not participate in the bicameral conference
committee proceedings. Rep. Lagman and Rep. Zamora objected to the
35
report but not to the manner it was approved; while it is said that, if voting
36
had been conducted, Rep. Tañada would have voted in favor of the conference
committee report. 37
Fourth. Under the enrolled bill doctrine, the signing of H. No. 7198 by the
Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate and the certification by
the secretaries of both Houses of Congress that it was passed on November
21, 1996 are conclusive of its due enactment. Much energy and learning is
devoted in the separate opinion of Justice Puno, joined by Justice Davide, to
disputing this doctrine. To be sure, there is no claim either here or in the
decision in the EVAT cases [Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance] that the
enrolled bill embodies a conclusive presumption. In one case we “went 38
behind” an enrolled bill and consulted the Journal to determine whether

certain provisions of a statute had been approved by the Senate.
But, where as here there is no evidence to the contrary, this Court will
respect the certification of the presiding officers of both Houses that a bill has
been duly passed. Under
___________________
34 PAUL MASON, MANUAL OF LEGISLATIVE PROCEDURE 335 (1953).

35 Conference Committee Report, Rollo, p. 36; Petition, p. 14; Rollo, p. 16.
36 Ibid.
37 Petition, p. 14; Rollo, p. 16.
38 Astorga v. Villegas, 56 SCRA 714 (1974).
296
this rule, this Court has refused to determine claims that the three-fourths
vote needed to pass a proposed amendment to the Constitution had not been
obtained, because “a duly authenticated bill or resolution imports absolute
verity and is binding on the courts.” This Court quoted from Wigmore on
39
Evidence the following excerpt which embodies good, if oldfashioned,

democratic theory:
The truth is that many have been carried away with the righteous desire to check at
any cost the misdoings of Legislatures. They have set such store by the Judiciary for
this purpose that they have almost made them a second and higher Legislature. But
they aim in the wrong direction. Instead of trusting a faithful Judiciary to check an
inefficient Legislature, they should turn to improve the Legislature. The sensible
solution is not to patch and mend casual errors by asking the Judiciary to violate
legal principle and to do impossibilities with the Constitution; but to represent
ourselves with competent, careful, and honest legislators, the work of whose hands
on the statute-roll may come to reflect credit upon the name of popular government. 40
This Court has refused to even look into allegations that the enrolled bill sent
to the President contained provisions which had been “surreptitiously”
inserted in the conference committee:
[W]here allegations that the constitutional procedures for the passage of bills have
not been observed have no more basis than another allegation that the Conference
Committee “surreptitiously” inserted provisions into a bill which it had prepared, we
should decline the invitation to go behind the enrolled copy of the bill. To disregard
the “enrolled bill” rule in such cases would be to disregard the respect due the other
two departments of our government. 41
__________________
39 Mabanag v. Lopez Vito, 78 Phil. 1, 12 (1947).

40 Id. at 17, quoting 4 JOHN WIGMORE, TREATISE ON THE LAW ON EVIDENCE §1350 at
702 (1940). This excerpt is preserved in the Chadbourne edition of this locus classicus. See
4 WIGMORE ON EVIDENCE §1350 at 834 (James H. Chadbourne, ed. 1972).
41 EVAT cases [Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance], 235 SCRA at 672. Cf.Morales vs. Subido, 27
SCRA 131 (1969).
297
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 297
It has refused to look into charges that an amendment was made upon the
last reading of a bill in violation of Art. VI, §26(2) of the Constitution that
“upon the last reading of a bill, no amendment shall be allowed.” 42
In other cases, this Court has denied claims that the tenor of a bill was
43
otherwise than as certified by the presiding officers of both Houses of

Congress.
The enrolled bill doctrine, as a rule of evidence, is well established. It is
cited with approval by text writers here and abroad. The enrolled bill rule
44
rests on the following considerations:

. . . As the President has no authority to approve a bill not passed by Congress, an
enrolled Act in the custody of the Secretary of State, and having the official
attestations of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, of the President of the
Senate, and of the President of the United States, carries, on its face, a solemn
judicial department to act upon that assurance, and to accept, as having passed
Congress, all bills authenticated in the manner stated; leaving the court to
in conformity with the Constitution. 45
To overrule the doctrine now, as the dissent urges, is to repudiate the

massive teaching of our cases and overthrow an established rule of evidence.
____________________________
42 Philippine Judges Ass’n v. Prado, 227 SCRA 703, 710 (1993); Morales v. Subido, 27 SCRA
131.
43 Casco Philippine Chemical Co., Inc. v. Gimenez, 7 SCRA 347 (1963);Resins, Inc. v. Auditor
General, 25 SCRA 754 (1968).
44 4 WIGMORE ON EVIDENCE §1350 (James H. Chadbourne, ed. 1972); 6 MANUEL V.
MORAN, COMMENTS ON THE RULES OF COURT 115 (1980); 7 VICENTE J. FRANCISCO,
THE REVISED RULES OF COURT (Pt. II) 454 (1973).
45 Marshall Field & Co. v. Clark, 143 U.S. 649, 672, 36 L.Ed. 294, 303 (1891).
298
Indeed, petitioners have advanced no argument to warrant a departure from
the rule, except to say that, with a change in the membership of the Court,
the three new members may be assumed to have an open mind on the
question of the enrolled bill rule. Actually, not three but four (Cruz, Feliciano,
Bidin, and Quiason, JJ.) have departed from the Court since our decision in
the EVAT cases and their places have since been taken by four new members
(Francisco, Hermosisima, Panganiban, and Torres, JJ.). Petitioners are thus
simply banking on the change in the membership of the Court.
Moreover, as already noted, the due enactment of the law in question is
confirmed by the Journal of the House of Novem-ber 21, 1996 which shows
that the conference committee report on H. No. 7198, which became R.A. No.
8240, was approved on that day. The keeping of the Journal is required by
the Constitution. Art. VI, §16(4) provides:
Each House shall keep a Journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish
the same, excepting such parts as may, in its judgment, affect national security; and
the yeas and nays on any question shall, at the request of one-fifth of the Members
present, be entered in the Journal.
Each House shall also keep a Record of its proceedings.
The Journal is regarded as conclusive with respect to matters that are
required by the Constitution to be recorded therein. With respect to other
46
matters, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, the Journals have also
been accorded conclusive effect. Thus, in United States v. Pons, this Court 47
spoke of the imperatives of public policy for regarding

____________________
46 The following are required to be entered on the Journal: (1) The yeasand nays on the third
and final reading of a bill (Art. VI, §26[2]); (2) theyeas and nays on any question, at the request of
onefifth of the members present (Id., §16 [4]); (3) the yeas and nays upon repassing a bill over the
President’s veto (Id., §27 (1); and (4) the President’s objection to a bill which he has vetoed. (Id.)
47 34 Phil. 729, 735 (1916), quoting State ex rel. Herron v. Smith, 44 Ohio 348 (1886).
299
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 299
the Journals as “public memorials of the most permanent character,” thus:
“They should be public, because all are required to conform to them; they
should be permanent, that rights acquired today upon the faith of what has
been declared to be law shall not be destroyed tomorrow, or at some remote
period of time, by facts resting only in the memory of individuals.” As already
noted, the bill which became R.A. No. 8240 is shown in the Journal. Hence its
due enactment has been duly proven.
——————————————
It would be an unwarranted invasion of the prerogative of a coequal

department for this Court either to set aside a legislative action as void
because the Court thinks the House has disregarded its own rules of
procedure, or to allow those defeated in the political arena to seek a rematch
in the judicial forum when petitioners can find their remedy in that
department itself. The Court has not been invested with a roving commission
to inquire into complaints, real or imagined, of legislative skullduggery. It
would be acting in excess of its power and would itself be guilty of grave
abuse of its discretion were it to do so. The suggestion made in a case may
48
instead appropriately be made here: petitioners can seek the enactment of a

new law or the repeal or amendment of R.A. No. 8240. In the absence of
anything to the contrary, the Court must assume that Congress or any House
thereof acted in the good faith belief that its conduct was permitted by its
rules, and deference rather than disrespect is due the judgment of that body. 49
WHEREFORE, the petition for certiorari and prohibition is DISMISSED.

____________________
48 Gregg v. Barrett, 771 F.2d 529.

49 Metzenbaum v. Federal Energy Regulatory Com’n, 675 F.2d 1282.
300
SO ORDERED.
Narvasa (C.J.), Padilla, Melo, Kapunan, Franciscoand
Hermosisima, Jr., JJ., concur.
Regalado, J., In the result.
Davide, Jr., J., I join with Mr. Justice Puno’s concurring/dissenting.
Romero, J., Please see Separate Opinion.
Bellosillo, J., No part due to relationship to parties.
Puno, J., See Concurring & Dissenting Opinion.
Vitug, J., Please see separate opinion (concurring).
Panganiban, J., No part. Former counsel of a party.
Torres, Jr., J., No part: On leave during deliberations.
SEPARATE OPINION
ROMERO, J.:
In filing this separate opinion for the dismissal of the instant petition, I am
not backtracking from the dissent which I expressed in Tolentino v. Secretary
of Finance. I am somewhat bothered that if I do not elaborate, the vote which
1
I cast today might be wrongly construed as an implied abandonment of, and

inconsistent with, my firm stance in Tolentino.
The landmark case of Tolentino, just like the one under consideration,
involved a similar challenge to the constitutionality of a significant tax
measure namely, Republic Act No. 7716, otherwise known as the Expanded
Value-Added Tax (EVAT) Law. There, a number of issues, both substantive
and procedural, were posed by petitioners, each of which was discussed by
the majority opinion of Mr. Justice Vicente V. Mendoza who, incidentally, is
also theponente of instant decision. At any rate, it is worth noting that I did
not entirely
_________________
1 235 SCRA 630.

301
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 301
disagree with each and every argument of the opinion, most especially those
touching upon substantive issues. My main objection in Tolentino, it will be
recalled, focused instead on what I perceived was a substantial breach and
disregard by the Legislature of vital constitutional requirements ordaining
the procedures to be followed in the passage of a bill which, in my opinion,
the majority seemed to have cavalierly put to rest by hiding under the cloak
of the enrolled bill theory and the precept that the Court is not the proper
2
forum for the enforcement of internal legislative rules allegedly violated. To 3
_________________
2 Id., at p. 672: “Fourth. Whatever doubts there may be as to the formal validity of Republic
Act No. 7716 must be resolved in its favor. Our cases manifest firm adherence to the rule that an
enrolled copy of a bill is conclusive not only of its provisions but also of its due enactment. Not
even claims that a proposed constitutional amendment was invalid because the requisite votes for
its approval had not been obtained or that certain provisions of a state had been ‘smuggled’ in the
printing of the bill have moved or persuaded us to look behind the proceedings of a coequal branch
of the government.
There is no reason now to depart from this rule. No claim is here made that the ‘enrolled bill’ rule is absolute.
In fact in one case we ‘went behind’ an enrolled bill and consulted the Journal to determine whether certain
provisions of a statute had been approved by the Senate in view of the fact that the President of the Senate
himself, who had signed the enrolled bill, admitted a mistake and withdrew his signature, so that in effect
there was no longer an enrolled bill to consider.
But where allegations that the constitutional procedures for the passage of bills have not been observed
have no more basis than another allegation that the Conference Committee ‘surreptitiously’ inserted
provisions into a bill which it had prepared, we should decline the invitation to go behind the enrolled copy of
the bill. To disregard the ‘enrolled bill’ rule in such cases would be to disregard the respect due the other two
departments of our government.”
3 Id., at p. 675: “Moreover, this Court is not the proper forum for the enforcement of these
internal Rules. To the contrary, as we have already ruled, ‘parliamentary rules are merely
procedural and with their observance the courts have no concern.’ Our concern is with the
procedural requirements of the Constitution for the enact-
302
me, the position then taken by the majority exhibited blind adherence to
otherwise sound principles of law which did not, however, fit the facts as
presented before the Court. Hence, I objected, not so much because I found
these principles unwise or obsolete, but rather because they were applied, or
misapplied, to a case which I believe did not call for their application.
When I differed from the majority opinion which applied the enrolled bill
theory, I was very careful to emphasize that reliance thereon is not to be
discontinued but that its application must be limited to minor matters
relating more to form and factual issues which do not materially alter the
essence and substance of the law itself. Thus:
“As applied to the instant petition, the issue posed is whether or not the procedural
irregularities that attended the passage of House Bill No. 11197 and Senate Bill No.
1630, outside of the reading and printing requirements which were exempted by the
Presidential certification, may no longer be impugned, having been ‘saved’ by the
conclusiveness on us of the enrolled bill. I see no cogent reason why we cannot
continue to place reliance on the enrolled bill, but only with respect to matters
pertaining to the procedure followed in the enactment of bills in Congress and their
subsequent engrossment, printing errors, omission of words and phrases and similar
relatively minor matters relating more to form and factual issues which do not
materially alter the essence and substance of the law itself.
Certainly, courts cannot claim greater ability to judge procedural legitimacy,
since constitutional rules on legislative procedure are easily mastered. Procedural
disputes are over facts—whether or not the bill had enough votes, or three readings,
or whatever—not over the meaning of the constitution. Legislators, as eyewitnesses,
are in a better position than a court to rule on the facts. The argument is also made
that legislatures would be offended if courts examined legislative procedure.
Such a rationale, however, cannot conceivably apply to substantive changes in a
bill introduced towards the end of its tortuous trip
____________________
ment of laws. As far as these requirements are concerned, we are satisfied that they have been
faithfully observed in these cases.”
303
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 303
through Congress, catching both legislators and the public unawares and altering the
same beyond recognition even by its sponsors.
This issue I wish to address forthwith.” 4
As regards the principle that the Court is not the proper forum for the
enforcement of internal legislative rules, both the majority and I were
actually of one mind such that I was quick to qualify the extent of the Court’s
review power in respect of internal procedures in this wise:
“I wish to consider this issue in light of Article VIII, Sec. 1 of the Constitution which
provides that ‘(j)udicial power includes the duty of the courts of justice x x x to
determine whether or not there has been a grave abuse of discretion amounting to
lack or excess of jurisdiction on the part of any branch or instrumentality of the
Government.’ We are also guided by the principle that a court may interfere with the
internal procedures of its coordinate branch only to uphold the Constitution.” 5
I differed, however, from the majority insofar as that principle was applied.
In this respect, I showed that the introduction of several provisions in the
Bicameral Conference Committee Report did not only violate the pertinent
House and Senate Rules defining the limited power of the conference
committee but that the Constitutional proscription against any amendment
upon the last reading of a bill was likewise breached. Hence, in view of these
lapses, I thought that judicial review would have been proper in order to
uphold the Constitution. This the majority, however, disregarded invoking
the same principle which should have justified the Court in questioning the
actuations of the legislative branch.
At this juncture, I wish to reiterate my continuing adherence to the
aforesaid reasons I cited in the Tolentinodissent. At the same time, I realize
that the arguments I raised in my dissent would not hold true in the instant
petition.
___________________
4 Id., pp. 778-779; emphasis supplied.

5 Id., p. 780; emphasis supplied; compare to note 3, supra.
304
For one thing, unlike in Tolentino, the rules of the House of Representatives
allegedly violated by respondents in the instant petition are purely internal
rules designed for the orderly conduct of the House’s business. They have no
direct or reasonable nexus to the requirements and proscriptions of the
Constitution in the passage of a bill which would otherwise warrant the
Court’s intervention. Likewise, the petitioners are not in any way
complaining that substantial alterations have been introduced in Republic
Act No. 8240. The thrust of petitioners’ arguments in attacking the validity of
the law is merely with respect to the fact that Rep. Joker Arroyo was
effectively prevented from invoking the question of quorum and not that the
substance thereof offends constitutional standards. This being the case, I do
not now feel called upon to invoke my previous argument that the enrolled
bill theory should not be conclusive as regards “substantive changes in a bill
introduced towards the end of its tortuous trip through Congress,” when it is
palpably unwarranted under the circumstances of instant petition.
CONCURRING AND DISSENTING OPINION
PUNO, J.:
I concur in the result. I do appreciate the fine legal disquisition of Mr. Justice
Mendoza to justify the dismissal of the case at bar. Nevertheless, I have to
express my views on the alleged non-justiciability of the issue posed by the
petitioner as well as the applicability of the archaic enrolled bill doctrine in
light of what I perceive as new wrinkles in our law brought about by the 1987
Constitution and the winds of changing time.
I
With due respect, I do not agree that the issues posed by the petitioner are
non-justiciable. Nor do I agree that we will trivialize the principle of
separation of power if we assume jurisdiction over the case at bar. Even in
the United States, the principle of separation of power is no longer an
impregna-
305
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 305
ble impediment against the interposition of judicial power on cases involving
breach of rules of procedure by legislators.
Rightly, the ponencia uses the 1891 case of US v. Ballin, as a window to
1
view the issues before the Court. It is in Ballin where the US Supreme Court
first defined the boundaries of the power of the judiciary to review
congressional rules. It held:
2
“x x x
“The Constitution, in the same section, provides, that each house may determine
the rules of its proceedings.” It appears that in pursuance of this authority the
House had, prior to that day, passed this as one of its rules:
Rule XV
3. On the demand of any member, or at the suggestion of the Speaker, the names of
members sufficient to make a quorum in the hall of the House who do not vote shall
be noted by the clerk and recorded in the journal, and reported to the Speaker with
the names of the members voting, and be counted and announced in determining the
presence of a quorum to do business. (House Journal, 230, Feb. 14, 1890)
The action taken was in direct compliance with this rule. The question, therefore,
is as to the validity of this rule, and not what methods the Speaker may of his own
motion resort to for determining the presence of a quorum, nor what matters the
Speaker or clerk may of their own volition place upon the journal. Neither do the
advantages or disadvantages, the wisdom or folly, of such a rule present any matters
for judicial consideration. With the courts the question is only one of power. The
Constitution empowers each house to determine its rules of proceedings. It may not by
its rules ignore constitutional restraints or violate fundamental rights, and there
should be a reasonable relation between the mode or method of proceedings
established by the rule and the result which is sought to be
________________
1 144 US 1 (1891).
2 The case involved the validity of a law which allegedly was passed in violation of House Rule XV
which provided that members present in the chamber but not voting would be “counted and announced
in determining the presence of a quorum to do business.”
306
attained. But within these limitations all matters of method are open to the
determination of the House, and it is no impeachment of the rule to say that some
other way would be better, more accurate, or even more just. It is no objection to the
validity of a rule that a different one has been prescribed and in force for a length of
time. The power to make rules is not one which once exercised is exhausted. It is a
continuous power, always subject to be exercised by the House, and within the
limitations suggested, absolute and beyond the challenge of any other body or
tribunal.”
Ballin, clearly confirmed the jurisdiction of courts to pass upon the validity of
congressional rules, i.e., whether they are constitutional. Rule XV was
examined by the Court and it was found to satisfy the test: (1) that it did not
ignore any constitutional restraint; (2) it did not violate any fundamental
right; and (3) its method has a reasonable relationship with the result sought
to be attained. By examining Rule XV, the Court did not allow its jurisdiction
to be defeated by the mere invocation of the principle of separation of powers.
Ballin was followed in 1932 by the case of US v. Smith. In Smith, 3
the meaning of sections 3 and 4 of Rule XXXVIII of the US Senate was in

issue, viz.:
“x x x
“3. When a nomination is confirmed or rejected, any Senator voting in the
majority may move for a reconsideration on the same day on which the vote was
taken, or on either of the next two days of actual executive session of the Senate; but
if a notification of the confirmation or rejection of a nomination shall have been sent
to the President before the expiration of the time within which a motion to
reconsider may be made, the motion to reconsider shall be accompanied by a motion
to request the President to return such notification to the Senate. Any motion to
reconsider the vote on a nomination may be laid on the table without prejudice to
the nomination, and shall be a final disposition of such motion.
4. Nominations confirmed or rejected by the Senate shall not be returned by the
Secretary to the President until the expiration of the time limited for making a
motion to reconsider the same, or
____________________
3 286 US 6 (1932).
307
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 307
while a motion to reconsider is pending, unless otherwise ordered by the Senate.”
It appears that the nomination of Mr. Smith as member of the Federal Power
Commission has been confirmed by the US Senate. The resolution of
confirmation was sent to the US President who then signed the appointment
of Mr. Smith. The Senate, however, reconsidered the confirmation of Mr.
Smith and requested the President to return its resolution of confirmation.
The President refused. A petition for quo warranto was filed against Mr.
Smith. The Court, speaking thru Mr. Justice Brandeis, assumed
jurisdiction over the dispute relying on Ballin. It exercised jurisdiction
although “the question primarily at issue relates to the construction of the
applicable rules, not to their constitutionality.” Significantly, the Court
rejected the Senate interpretation of its own rules even while it held that it
must be accorded the most sympathetic consideration.
“x x x
“Sixth. To place upon the standing rules of the Senate a construction different
from that adopted by the Senate itself when the present case was under debate is a
serious and delicate exercise of judicial power. The Constitution commits to the
Senate the power to make its own rules; and it is not the function of the Court to say
that another rule would be better. A rule designed to ensure due deliberation in the
performance of the vital function of advising and consenting to nominations for
public office, moreover, should receive from the Court the most sympathetic
consideration. But the reasons, above stated, against the Senate’s construction seem
to us compelling. We are confirmed in the view we have taken by the fact, since the
attempted reconsideration of Smith’s confirmation, the Senate itself seems
uniformly to have treated the ordering of immediate notification to the President as
tantamount to authorizing him to proceed to perfect the appointment.
Smith, of course, involves the right of a third person and its ruling falls
within the test spelled out in Ballin.
308
Smith was followed by the 1948 case of Christoffel v. United
States. Christoffel testified before the Committee on Education and Labor of
4
the House of Representatives. He denied he was a communist and was

charged with perjury in the regular court. He adduced evidence during the
trial that the committee had no quorum when the perjurious statement was
given. Nonetheless, he was convicted in view of the judge’s charge to the
members of the jury that to find Christoffel guilty, they had to find beyond a
reasonable doubt that—
“x x x
“x x x the defendant Christoffel appeared before a quorum of at least thirteen
members of the said Committee, and that ‘at least that number must have been
actually and physically present . . . If such a Committee so met, that is, if thirteen
members did meet at the beginning of the afternoon session of March 1, 1947, and
thereafter during the progress of the hearing some of them left temporarily or
otherwise and no question was raised as to the lack of a quorum, then the fact that
the majority did not remain there would not affect, for the purposes of this case, the
existence of that Committee as a competent tribunal provided that before the oath
was administered and before the testimony of the defendant was given there were
present as many as 13 members of that Committee at the beginning of the afternoon
session . . . .”
Christoffel objected to the charge on the ground that it allowed the jury to
assume there was a continuous quorum simply because it was present at the
start of the meeting of the Committee. Under the House rules, a quorum once
established is presumed to continue until the lack of quorum is raised. Again,
the court assumed jurisdiction over the case. A majority of the Court, with Mr.
Justice Murphy, as ponente, defined the issue as “what rules the House had
established and whether they have been followed.” It held:
_________________
4 338 US 89 (1948).
309
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 309
“x x x
“Congressional practice in the transaction of ordinary legislative business is of
course none of our concern, and by the same token the considerations which may
lead Congress as a matter of legislative practice to treat as valid the conduct of its
committees do not control the issue before us. The question is neither what rules
Congress may establish for its own governance, nor whether presumptions of
continuity may protect the validity of its legislative conduct. The question is rather
what rules the House has established and whether they have been followed. It of
course has the power to define what tribunal is competent to exact testimony and
the conditions that establish its competency to do so. The heart of this case is that by
the charge that was given it the jury was allowed to assume that the conditions of
competency were satisfied even though the basis in fact was not established and in
face of a possible finding that the facts contradicted the assumption.
We are measuring a conviction of crime by the statute which defined it. As a
consequence of this conviction, petitioner was sentenced to imprisonment for a term
of from two to six years. An essential part of a procedure which can be said fairly to
inflict such a punishment is that all the elements of the crime charged shall be
proved beyond a reasonable doubt. An element of the crime charged in the instant
indictment is the presence of a competent tribunal, and the trial court properly so
instructed the jury. The House insists that to be such a tribunal a committee must
consist of a quorum, and we agree with the trial court’s charge that to convict, the
jury had to be satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that there were ‘actually and
physically present’ a majority of the committee.
Then to charge, however, that such requirement is satisfied by a finding that
there was a majority present two or three hours before the defendant offered his
testimony, in the face of evidence indicating the contrary, is to rule as a matter of law
that a quorum need not be present when the offense is committed. This not only
seems to us contrary to the rules and practice of the Congress but denies petitioner a
fundamental right. That right is that he be convicted of crime only on proof of all the
elements of the crime charged against him. A tribunal that is not competent is no
tribunal, and it is unthinkable that such a body can be the instrument of criminal
conviction.”
The minority complained that the “House has adopted the rule and practice
that a quorum once established is presumed
310
to continue unless and until a point of no quorum is raised.By this decision,
the Court, in effect, invalidates that rule x x x.” The minority view
commanded only the vote of three (3) justices.
The US Supreme Court pursued the same line in 1963 in deciding the case
of Yellin v. United States. Yellin was indicted on five counts of willfully
5
refusing to answer questions put to him by a sub-committee of the House

Committee on UnAmerican Activities. He was convicted by the District Court
of contempt of Congress on four counts. The conviction was affirmed by the
Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit. On certiorari, he assailed his conviction
on the ground that the Committee illegally denied his request to be heard in
executive session. He alleged there was a violation of Committee Rule IV which
provides that “if a majority of the Committee or subcommittee, duly
appointed as provided by the rules of the House of Representatives, believes
that the interrogation of a witness in a public hearing might endanger
national security or unjustly injure his reputation, or the reputation of other
individuals, the Committee shall interrogate such witness in an executive
session for the purpose of determining the necessity or admissibility of
conducting such interrogation thereafter in a public hearing.” In a 5-4
decision, the Court, speaking thru Mr. Chief Justice Warren, held:
“x x x
“Yellin should be permitted the same opportunity for judicial review when he
discovers at trial that his rights have been violated. This is especially so when the
Committee’s practice leads witnesses to misplaced reliance upon its rules. When
reading a copy of the Committee’s rules, which must be distributed to every witness
under Rule XVII, the witness’ reasonable expectation is that the Committee actually
does what it purports to do, adhere to its own rules. To foreclose a defense based
upon those rules, simply because the witness was deceived by the Committee’s
appearance of regularity, is not fair. The Committee prepared the groundwork for
prosecution in
________________
5 374 US 109 (1963).

311
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 311
Yellin’s case meticulously. It is not too exacting to require that the Committee be
equally meticulous in obeying its own rules.”
It additionally bears stressing that in the United States, the judiciary has
pruned the “political thicket.” In the benchmark case of Baker v. Carr, the 6
US Supreme Court assumed jurisdiction to hear a petition for re-

apportionment of the Tennes-see legislature ruling that “the political
question doctrine, a tool for maintenance of government order, will not be so
applied as to promote only disorder” and that “the courts cannot reject as ‘no
law suit,’ a bona fide controversy as to whether some action denominated
‘political’ exceeds constitutional authority.”
In the Philippine setting, there is a more compelling reason for courts to
categorically reject the political question defense when its interposition will
cover up abuse of power. For section 1, Article VIII of our Constitution
wasintentionally cob-bled to empower courts “x x x to determine whether or
not there has been a grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of
jurisdiction on the part of any branch or instrumentality of the government.”
This power is new and was not granted to our courts in the 1935 and 1972
Constitutions. It was not also xeroxed from the US Constitution or any
foreign state constitution. The CONCOM granted this enormous power to our
courts in view of our experience under martial law where abusive exercises of
state power were shielded from judicial scrutiny by the misuse of the political
question doctrine. Led by the eminent former Chief Justice Roberto
Concepcion, the CONCOM expanded and sharpened the checking powers of
the judiciary vis-a-vis the Executive and the Legislative departments of
government. In cases involving the proclamation of martial law and
suspension of the privilege of habeas corpus, it is now beyond dubiety that
the government can no longer invoke the political question defense.
__________________
6 369 US 186 (1962); see also Bond vs. Floyd, 385 US 116 (1966).
312
Section 18 of Article VII completely eliminated this defense when it provided:
“x x x
“The Supreme Court may review, in an appropriate proceeding filed by any
citizen, the sufficiency of the factual basis of the proclamation of martial law or the
suspension of the privilege of the writ or the extension thereof, and must promulgate
its decision thereon within thirty days from its filing.
A state of martial law does not suspend the operation of the Constitution, nor
supplant the functioning of the civil courts or legislative assemblies, nor authorize
the conferment of jurisdiction on military courts and agencies over civilians where
civil courts are able to function, nor automatically suspend the privilege of the writ.”
The CONCOM did not only outlaw the use of the political question defense in
national security cases. To a great degree, it diminished its use as a shield to
protect other abuses of government by allowing courts to penetrate the shield
with the new power to review acts of any branch or instrumentality of the
government “x x x to determine whether or not there has been a grave abuse
of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction.” In Tolentino v.
Secretary of Finance, I posited the following postulates:
7
“x x x
“Section 1. The judicial power shall be vested in one Supreme Court and in such
lower courts as may be established by law. Judicial power includes the duty of the
courts of justice to settle actual controversies involving rights which are legally
demandable and enforceable, and to determine whether or not there has been a
grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction on the part of
any branch or instrumentality of the Government.”
Former Chief Justice Roberto R. Concepcion, the sponsor of this provision in the
Constitutional Commission explained the sense and the reach of judicial power as
follows:
____________________
7 235 SCRA 630.
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VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 313
‘x x x
‘x x x In other words, the judiciary is the final arbiter on the question of whether or
not a branch of government or any of its officials has acted without jurisdiction or in
excess of jurisdiction, or so capriciously as to constitute an abuse of discretion
amounting to excess of jurisdiction. This is not only a judicial power but a duty to
pass judgment on matters of this nature.
This is the background of paragraph 2 of Section 1, which means that the courts cannot
hereafter evade the duty to settle matters of this nature, by claiming that such matters
constitute political question.’
The Constitution cannot be any clearer. What it granted to this Court is not a mere
power which it can decline to exercise. Precisely to deter this disinclination, the
Constitution imposed it as a duty of this Court to strike down any act of a branch or
instrumentality of government or any of its officials done with grave abuse of
discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction. Rightly or wrongly, the
Constitution has elongated the checking powers of this Court against the other
branches of government despite their more democratic character, the President and
the legislators being elected by the people.
It is, however, theorized that this provision is nothing new. I beg to disagree for
the view misses the significant changes made in our constitutional canvass to cure
the legal deficiencies we discovered during martial law. One of the areas radically
changed by the framers of the 1987 Constitution is the imbalance of power between
and among the three great branches of our government—the Executive, the
Legislative and the Judiciary. To upgrade the powers of the Judiciary, the
Constitutional Commission strengthened some more the independence of courts.
Thus, it further protected the security of tenure of the members of the Judiciary by
providing ‘No law shall be passed reorganizing the Judiciary when it undermines
the security of tenure of its Members.’ It also guaranteed fiscal autonomy to the
Judiciary.
More, it depoliticalized appointments in the judiciary by creating the Judicial and
Bar Council which was tasked with screening the list of prospective appointees to
the judiciary. The power of confirming appointments to the judiciary was also taken
away from Congress. The President was likewise given a specific time to fill up
vacancies in the judiciary—ninety (90) days from the occurrence of the vacancy in
case of the Supreme Court and ninety (90) days from the submission of the list of
recommendees by the Judicial and Bar
314
Council in case of vacancies in the lower courts. To further insulate appointments in
the judiciary from the virus of politics, the Supreme Court was given the power to
‘appoint all officials and employees of the Judiciary in accordance with the Civil
Service Law.’ And to make the separation of the judiciary from the other branches of
government more watertight, it prohibited members of the judiciary to be ‘x x x
designated to any agency performing quasi judicial or administrative functions.’
While the Constitution strengthened the sinews of the Supreme Court, it reduced
the powers of the two other branches of government, especially the Executive.
Notable of the powers of the President clipped by the Constitution is his power to
suspend the writ of habeas corpus and to proclaim martial law. The exercise of this
power is now subject to revocation by Congress. Likewise, the sufficiency of the
factual basis for the exercise of said power may be reviewed by this Court in an
appropriate proceeding filed by any citizen.
The provision defining judicial power as including the ‘duty of the courts of justice . .
. to determine whether or not there has been a grave abuse of discretion amounting
to lack or excess of jurisdiction on the part of any branch or instrumentality of the
Government’ constitutes the capstone of the efforts of the Constitutional
Commission to upgrade the powers of this court vis-a-vis the other branches of
government. This provision was dictated by our experience under martial law which
taught us that a stronger and more independent judiciary is needed to abort abuses
in government. x x x.
xxx
In sum, I submit that in imposing to this Court the duty to annul acts of
government committed with grave abuse of discretion, the new Constitution
transformed this Court from passivity to activism. This transformation, dictated by
our distinct experience as a nation, is not merely evolutionary but
revolutionary. Under the 1935 and 1973 Constitutions, this Court approached
constitutional violations by initially determining what it cannot do; under the 1987
Constitution, there is a shift in stress—this Court is mandated to approach
constitutional violations not by finding out what it should not do but what it must do.
The Court must discharge this solemn duty by not resuscitating a past that petrifies
the present.
I urge my brethren in the Court to give due and serious consideration to this
new constitutional provision as the case at bar once more calls us to define
the parameters of our power to review violations of the rules of the House.
We will not be
315
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 315
true to our trust as the last bulwark against government abuses if we refuse
to exercise this new power or if we wield it with timidity. To be sure, it is this
exceeding timidity to unsheath the judicial sword that has increasingly
emboldened other branches of government to denigrate, if not defy, orders of
our courts. In Tolentino, I endorsed the view of former Senator Salonga that
8
this novel provision stretching the latitude of judicial power is distinctly

Filipino and its interpretation should not be depreciated by undue reliance on
inapplicable foreign jurisprudence. In resolving the case at bar, the lessons of
our own history should provide us the light and not the experience of
foreigners.
II
Again with due respect, I dissent from the majority insofar as it relied on the
enrolled bill doctrine to justify the dismissal of the petition at bar.
An enrolled bill is one which has been duly introduced, finally enacted by
both Houses, signed by the proper officers of each House and approved by the
President. It is a declaration by the two Houses, through their presiding
9
officers, to the President that a bill, thus attested, has received in due the
sanction of the legislative branch of the government, and that it is delivered
to him in obedience to the constitutional requirement that all bills which pass
Congress shall be presented to him.
The enrolled bill originated in England where there is no written
Constitution controlling the legislative branch of the government, and the
acts of Parliament, being regarded in their nature as judicial—as emanating
from the highest tribunal in the land—are placed on the same footing and
regarded with the same veneration as the judgment of the
__________________
8 Supra.
9 Black’s Law Dictionary, 4th Rev. ed., p. 624.
316
courts which cannot be collaterally attacked. In
10 England,
the conclusiveness of the bill was premised on the rationale that “an act of
parliament thus made is the exercise of the highest authority that this
kingdom acknowledges upon earth. And it cannot be altered, amended,
dispensed with, suspended or repealed, but in the same forms and by the
same authority of parliament; for it is a maxim in law that it requires the
same strength to dissolve as to create an obligation. 11
Over the years, the enrolled bill theory has undergone important
mutations. Some jurisdictions have adopted themodified entry or affirmative
contradiction rule. Under this rule, the presumption in favor of the enrolled
bill is not conclusive. The rule concedes validity to the enrolled
billunless there affirmatively appears in the journals of the legislature a
statement that there has not been compliance with one or more of
the constitutional requirements. Other jurisdictions
12 have adopted
the Extrinsic Evidence Rule which holds that an enrolled bill is only prima
facieevidence that it has been regularly enacted. The prima facie
presumption, however, can be destroyed by clear, satisfactory and convincing
evidence that the constitutional requirements in enacting a law have been
violated. For this purpose, journals and other extrinsic evidence are allowed
to be received. Some limit the use of extrinsic evidence to issues of fraud or
13
mistakes. 14
___________________
10 Price v. Moundsville, 64 Am. St. Rep. 878, 879; 43 W. Vir-ginia 523 [1897].
11 Carr v. Coke, 47 Am. St. Rep. 801, 803 [1895]; see also Note on ex rel. Reed v. Jones, 23
L.R.A. 211 [1893]. The rule of conclusiveness is similar to the common law rule of the inviolability
of the Sheriff’s return. The Sheriff is considered as an officer of the King just as a parliamentary
act is deemed as a regal act and no official can dispute the King’s word. Dallas, Sutherland
Statutes and Statutory Construction, Vol. 1, 4th ed., pp. 408-418 (1972).
12 Sutherland, op. cit., p. 410.
13 Sutherland, Vol. I, Section 1405 (3rd ed., 1943).
14 See e.g., Mogilner v. Metropolitan Plan Communication, 236 Ind. 298, 140 N.E. 2d 220
[1957].
317
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 317
These variants developed after a re-examination of the rationale of the
enrolled bill. The modern rationale for the enrolled bill theory was spelled out
in Field v. Clark, viz.: 15
xxx
“The signing by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and, by the
President of the Senate, in open session, of an enrolled bill, is an official attestation
by the two houses of such bill as one that has passed Congress. It is a declaration by
the two Houses, through their presiding officers, to the President, that a bill, thus
attested, has received, in due form, the sanction of the legislative branch of the
government, and that it is delivered to him in obedience to the constitutional
requirement that all bills which pass Congress shall be presented to him. And when
a bill, thus attested, receives his approval, and is deposited in the public archives, its
authentication as a bill that has passed Congress should be deemed complete and
unimpeachable. As the President has no authority to approve a bill not passed by
Congress, an enrolled Act in the custody of the Secretary of State, and having the
official attestations of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, of the President
of the Senate, and of the President of the United States, carries, on its face, a solemn
judicial department to act upon the assurance, and to accept, as having passed
Congress, all bills authenticated in the manner stated; leaving the courts to
in conformity with the Constitution.
The principle of separation of powers is thus the principal prop of the enrolled
bill doctrine. The doctrine is also justified as a rule of convenience.
Supposedly, it avoids difficult questions of evidence. It is also believed that it
16
will prevent the filing of too many cases which will cast a cloud of uncertainty
on laws passed by the legislature. As explained in Ex Pacte
_________________
15 Op. cit., footnote No. 2.

16 50 Am. Jur. Statutes, S. 150 (1938) 4 J. Wigmore Evidence, S. 1350 (3rd ed. 1940).
318
Wren “if the validity of every act published as law is to be tested by
17
examining its history, as shown by the journals of the two houses of the
legislature, there will be an amount of litigation, difficulty, and painful
uncertainty appalling in its contemplation, and multiplying a hundredfold
the alleged uncertainty of the law.” The conclusiveness of the enrolled bill is
also justified on the ground that journals and other extrinsic evidence are
conducive to mistake, if not fraud. These justifications for the enrolled bill
theory have been rejected in various jurisdictions in the United States. In his
Dissenting Opinion in Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance, and its companion
cases, Mr. Justice Regalado cited some of the leading American cases which
18
discussed the reasons for the withering, if not demise of the enrolled bill
theory, viz.:
“x x x
“Even in the land of its source, the so-called conclusive presumption of validity
originally attributed to that doctrine has long been revisited and qualified, if not
altogether rejected. On the competency of judicial inquiry, it has been held that
“(u)nder the ‘enrolled bill rule’ by which an enrolled bill is sole expository of its
contents and conclusive evidence of its existence and valid enactment, it is
nevertheless competent for courts to inquire as to what prerequisites are fixed by
the Constitution of which journals of respective houses of Legislature are required to
furnish the evidence.
In fact, in Gwynn vs. Hardee, etc., et al., the Supreme Court of Florida declared:
(1) While the presumption is that the enrolled bill, as signed by the legislative
offices and filed with the secretary of state, is the bill as it passed, yet this
presumption is not conclusive, and when it is shown from the legislative journals that
a bill though engrossed and enrolled, and signed by the legislative officers, contains
provisions that have not passed both houses, such provisions will be held spurious
and not a part of the law. As was said by Mr. Justice Cockrell in the case of Wade vs.
Atlantic Lumber Co., 51 Fla. 628, text 633, 41 So. 72, 73:
___________________
17 63 Miss 512 (1886).

18 Op. cit., pp. 729-732 (1994).
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VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 319
‘This Court is firmly committed to the holding that when the journals speak they control, and
against such proof the enrolled bill is not conclusive.’
More enlightening and apropos to the present controversy is the decision
promulgated on May 13, 1980 by the Supreme Court of Kentucky in D & W Auto
Supply, et al. vs. Department of Revenue, et al., pertinent excerpts wherefrom are
extensively reproduced here-under.
x x x In arriving at our decision we must, perforce, reconsider the validity of a
long line of decisions of this court which created and nurtured the so-called ‘enrolled
bill’ doctrine.
xxx
[1] Section 46 of the Kentucky Constitution sets out certain procedures that the
legislature must follow before a bill can be considered for final passage. x x x.
xxx
x x x Under the enrolled bill doctrine as it now exists in Kentucky, a court may
not look behind such a bill, enrolled and certified by the appropriate officers, to
determine if there are any defects.
xxx
x x x In Lafferty, passage of the law in question violated this provision, yet the
bill was properly enrolled and approved by the governor. In declining to look behind
the law to determine the propriety of its enactment, the court enunciated three
reasons for adopting the enrolled bill rule. First, the court was reluctant to scrutinize
the processes of the legislature, an equal branch of government. Second, reasons of
convenience prevailed, which discouraged requiring the legislature to preserve its
records and anticipated considerable complex litigation if the court ruled
otherwise. Third, the court acknowledged the poor record-keeping abilities of the
General Assembly and expressed a preference for accepting the final bill as enrolled,
rather than opening up the records of the legislature. x x x.
xxx
Nowhere has the rule been adopted without reason, or as a result of judicial
whim. There are four historical bases for the doctrine. (1) An enrolled bill was a
‘record’ and, as such, was not subject to attack at common law. (2) Since the
legislature is one of the three branches of government, the courts, being coequal,
must indulge in every presumption that legislative acts are valid. (3) When the rule
320
was originally formulated, record-keeping of the legislatures was so inadequate that
a balancing of equities required that the final act, the enrolled bill, be given efficacy.
(4) There were theories of convenience as expressed by the Kentucky court in
Lafferty.
The rule is not unanimous in the several states, however and it has not been without
its critics. From an examination of cases and treaties, we can summarize the criticism
as follows: (1) Artificial presumptions, especially conclusive ones, are not favored. (2)
Such a rule frequently (as in the present case) produces results which do not accord
with facts or constitutional provisions. (3) The rule is conducive to fraud, forgery,
corruption and other wrongdoings. (4) Modern automatic and electronic record-
keeping devices now used by legislatures remove one of the original reasons for the
rule. (5) The rule disregards the primary obligation of the courts to seek the truth and
to provide a remedy for a wrong committed by any branch of government. In light of
these considerations, we are convinced that the time has come to re-examine the
enrolled bill doctrine.
[2] This court is not unmindful of the admonition of the doctrine of stare decisis.
The maxim is “Stare decisis et non quieta movere,” which simply suggests that we
stand by precedents and to disturb settled points of law. Yet, this rule is not
inflexible, nor is it of such a nature as to require perpetuation of error or logic. As we
stated in Daniel’s Adm’r v. Hoofnel, 287 Ky 834, 155 S.W. 2d 469, 471-72 (1941).”
The force of the rule depends upon the nature of the question to be decided and the extent of
the disturbance of rights and practices which a change in the interpretation of the law or the
course of judicial opinions may create. Cogent considerations are whether there is clear error
and urgent reasons ‘for neither justice nor wisdom requires a court to go from one doubtful
rule to another,’ and whether or not the evils of the principle that has been followed will be
more injurious than can possibly result from a change.’
Certainly, when a theory supporting a rule of law is not grounded on facts, or
upon sound logic, or is unjust, or has been discredited by actual experience, it should
be discarded, and with it the rule it supports.
[3] It is clear to us that the major premise of the Lafferty decision, the poor
record-keeping of the legislature, has disappeared. Modern equipment and
technology are the rule in record-keeping by our General Assembly. Tape recorders,
electric typewriters, dupli-
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VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 321
cating machines, recording equipment, printing presses, computers, electronic voting
machines, and the like remove all doubts and fears as to the ability of the General
Assembly to keep accurate and readily accessible records.
It is also apparent that the ‘convenience’ rule is not appropriate in today’s modern
and developing judicial philosophy. The fact that the number and complexity of
lawsuits may increase is not persuasive if one is mindful that the overriding purpose
of our judicial system is to discover the truth and see that justice is done. The
existence of difficulties and complexities should not deter this pursuit and we reject
any doctrine or presumption that so provides.
Lastly, we address the premise that the equality of the various branches of
government requires that we shut our eyes to constitutional failing and other errors of
our copartners in government. We simply do not agree. Section 26 of the Kentucky
Constitution provides that any law contrary to the constitution is ‘void.’ The proper
exercise of judicial authority requires us to recognize any law which is
unconstitutional and to declare it void. Without elaborating the point, we believe
that under section 228 of the Kentucky Constitution it is our obligation to ‘support . .
. the Constitution of the commonwealth.’ We are sworn to see that violations of the
constitution—by any person, corporation, state agency or branch or government—
are brought to light and corrected. To countenance an artificial rule of law that
silences our voices when confronted with violations of our constitution is not
acceptable to this court.
We believe that a more reasonable rule is the one which Professor Sutherland
describes as the ‘extrinsic evidence.’ x x x. Under this approach there is a prima facie
presumption that an enrolled bill is valid, but such presumption may be overcome by
clear, satisfactory and convincing evidence establishing that constitutional
requirements have not been met.
We therefore overrule Lafferty v. Huffman and all other cases following the so-
called enrolled bill doctrine, to the extent that there is no longer a conclusive
presumption that an enrolled bill is valid. x x x.”
Clearly, the enrolled bill doctrine no longer enjoys its once unassailable
respectability in United States. Sutherland reveals that starting in the
1940’s, “x x x the tendency seems to be toward the abandonment of the
conclusive presumption rule and the adoption of the third rule leaving only
a prima
322
facie presumption of validity which may be attacked by any authoritative
source of information.” 19
It is high time we re-examine our preference for the enrolled bill doctrine.
It was in the 1947 case of Mabanag v. Lopez Vito, that this Court, with three
20
(3) justices dissenting, first embraced the rule that a duly authenticated bill
or resolution imports absolute verity and is binding on the courts. In 1963, we
firmed up this ruling in Casco Philippine Chemical Co. v. Gimenez, thus: 21
“x x x
“Hence, ‘urea formaldehyde’ is clearly a finished product which is patently
distinct and different from ‘urea’ and ‘formaldehyde,’ as separate articles used in the
manufacture of the synthetic resin known as ‘urea formaldehyde.’ Petitioner
contends, however, that the bill approved in Congress contained the copulative
conjunction ‘and’ between the term ‘urea’ and ‘formaldehyde,’ and that the members
of Congress intended to exempt ‘urea’ and ‘formaldehyde’ separately as essential
elements in the manufacture of the synthetic resin glue called ‘urea formaldehyde,’
not the latter as a finished product, citing in support of this view the statements
made on the floor of the Senate, during the consideration of the bill before said
House, by members thereof. But said individual statements do not necessarily
reflect the view of the Senate. Much less do they indicate the intent of the House of
Representatives (see Song Kiat Chocolate Factory vs. Central Bank, 54 Off. Gaz.
615; Mayor Motors, Inc. vs. Acting Commissioner of Internal Revenue, L-15000
[March 29, 1961]; Manila Jockey Club, Inc. vs. Games and Amusement Board, L-
12727 [February 19, 1960]). Furthermore, it is well settled that enrolled bill—which
uses the term ‘urea formaldehyde’ instead of ‘urea and formaldehyde’—conclusive
upon the courts as regards the tenor of the measure passed by Congress and approved
by the President (Primicias vs. Paredes, 61 Phil. 118, 120; Mabanag vs. Lopez
Vito, 78 Phil. 1; Macias vs. Comm. on Elections, L-18684, Sept. 14, 1961). If there
has been any mistake in the printing of the bill before it was certified by the officers of
Congress and approved by the Execu-
______________________
19 Sutherland, op. cit., pp. 224-225.

20 78 Phil. 1 (1947).
21 7 SCRA 374.
323
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 323
tive—on which we cannot speculate without jeopardizing the principle of separation
of powers and undermining one of the cornerstones of our democratic system—the
remedy is by amendment or curative legislation, not by judicial decree.”
In the 1969 case of Morales v. Subido, we reiterated our fidelity to the
22
enrolled bill doctrine, viz.:

“x x x. We cannot go behind the enrolled Act to discover what really happened. The
respect due to the other branches of the Government demands that we act upon the
faith and credit of what the officers of the said branches attest to as the official acts of
their respective departments. Otherwise we would be cast in the unenviable and
unwanted role of a sleuth trying to determine what actually did happen in the
labyrinth of law-making, with consequent impairment of the integrity of the
legislative process. The investigation which the petitioner would like this Court to
make can be better done in Congress. After all, House cleaning—the immediate and
imperative need for which seems to be suggested by the petitioner—can best be
effected by the occupants thereof. Expressed elsewise, this is a matter worthy of the
attention not of an Oliver Wendell Holmes but of a Sherlock Holmes.”
Significantly, however, Morales diluted the conclusiveness rule of the enrolled
bill doctrine. The ponencia stressed:
“By what we have essayed above we are not of course to be understood as holding
that in all cases the journals must yield to the enrolled bill. To be sure there are
certain matters which the Constitution expressly requires must be entered on the
journal of each house. To what extent the validity of a legislative act may be affected
by a failure to have such matters entered on the journal, is a question which we do
not now decide. All we hold is that with respect to matters not expressly required to be
entered on the journal, the enrolled bill prevails in the event of any discrepancy.”
In the 1974 case of Astorga v. Villegas, we further dilutedthe enrolled bill
23
doctrine when we refused to apply it after the

_____________________
22 27 SCRA 131, 134-135.

23 56 SCRA 714.
324
Senate President declared his signature on the bill as invalid. We ruled:
“x x x
“Petitioner’s argument that the attestation of the presiding offices of Congress is
conclusive proof of a bill’s due enactment, required, it is said, by the respect due to a
co-equal department of the government, is neutralized in this case by the fact that
the Senate President declared his signature on the bill to be invalid and issued a
subsequent clarification that the invalidation for his signature meant that the bill he
had signed had never been approved by the Senate. Obviously this declaration
should be accorded even greater respect than the attestation it invalidated, which it
did for a reason that is undisputed in fact and indisputable in logic.
As far as Congress itself is concerned, there is nothing sacrosanct in the
certification made by the presiding officers. It is merely a mode of authentication. The
law-making process in Congress ends when the bill is approved by both Houses, and
the certification does not add to the validity of the bill or cure any defect already
present upon its passage. In other words it is the approval by Congress and not the
signatures of the presiding officers that is essential. Thus the (1935) Constitution
says that “[e]very bill passed by the Congress shall, before it becomes law, be
presented to the President.” In Brown vs. Morris, supra, the Supreme Court of
Missouri, interpreting a similar provision in the State Constitution, said that the
same “makes it clear that the indispensable step is the final passage and it follows
that if a bill, otherwise fully enacted as a law, is not attested by the presiding officer,
the proof that it has ‘passed both houses’ will satisfy the constitutional requirement.”
Petitioner agrees that the attestation in the bill is not mandatory but argues that
the disclaimer thereof by the Senate President, granting it to have been validly
made, would only mean that there was no attestation at all, but would not affect the
validity of the statute. Hence, it is pointed out, Republic Act No. 4065 would remain
valid and binding. This argument begs the issue. It would limit the court’s inquiry to
the presence or absence of the attestation and to the effect of its absence upon the
validity of the statute. The inquiry, however, goes farther. Absent such attestation
as a result of the disclaimer, and consequently there being no enrolled bill to speak
of, what evidence is there to determine whether or not the bill had been duly
enacted. In such a case the entries in the journal should be consulted.
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VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 325
The journal of the proceedings of each House of Congress is no ordinary record. The
Constitution requires it. While it is true that the journal is not authenticated and is
subject to the risk of misprinting and other errors, the point is irrelevant in this
case. This Court is merely asked to inquire whether the text of House Bill No. 9266
signed by the Chief Executive was the same text passed by both Houses of Congress.
Under the specific facts and circumstances of this case, this Court can do this and
resort to the Senate journal for the purpose. The journal discloses that substantial
and lengthy amendments were introduced on the floor and approved by the Senate
but were not incorporated in the printed text sent to the President and signed by him.
This Court is not asked to incorporate such amendments into the alleged law, which
admittedly is a risky undertaking, but to declare that the bill was not duly enacted
and therefore did not become law. This We do, as indeed both the President of the
Senate and the Chief Executive did, when they withdrew their signatures therein. In
the face of the manifest error committed and subsequently rectified by the President
of the Senate and by the Chief Executive, for this Court to perpetuate that error by
disregarding such rectification and holding that the erroneous bill has become law
would be to sacrifice truth to fiction and bring about mischievous consequences not
intended by the law-making body.”
In 1993, the enrolled bill doctrine was again used as asecondary rationale in
the case of Philippine Judges Association v. Prado. In this case, the judges
24
claimed that the pertinent part of section 35 of R.A. No. 7354 repealing the
franking privilege of the judiciary appeared only in the Conference
Committee Report. In rejecting this contention, this Court ruled:
“While it is true that a conference committee is the mechanism for compromising
differences between the Senate and the House, it is not limited in its jurisdiction to
this question. Its broader function is described thus:
‘A conference committee may deal generally with the subject matter or it may be
limited to resolving the precise differences between the two houses. Even where the
conference committee is not by rule limited in its jurisdiction, legislative
___________________
24 227 SCRA 703.

326
custom severely limits the freedom with which new subject matter can be inserted
into the conference bill. But occasionally a conference committee produces
unexpected results, results beyond its mandate. These excursions occur even where
the rules impose strict limitations on conference committee jurisdiction. This is
symptomatic of the authoritarian power of conference committee (Davies, Legislative
Law and Process: In a Nutshell, 1986 Ed., p. 81).’
It is a matter of record that the Conference Committee Report on the bill in question
was returned to and duly approved by both the Senate and the House of
Representatives. Thereafter, the bill was enrolled with its certification by Senate
President Neptali A. Gonzales and Speaker Ramon V. Mitra of the House of
Representatives as having been duly passed by both Houses of Congress. It was then
presented to and approved by President Corazon C. Aquino on April 3, 1992.
Under the doctrine of separation of powers, the Court may not inquire beyond the
certification of the approval of a bill from the presiding officers of Congress. Casco
Philippine Chemical Co. v. Gimenez laid down the rule that the enrolled bill is
conclusive upon the Judiciary (except in matters that have to be entered in the
journals like the yeas and nays on the final reading of the bill). The journals are
themselves also binding on the Supreme Court, as we held in the old (but still valid)
case of U.S. vs. Pons, where we explained the reason thus:
‘To inquire into the veracity of the journals of the Philippine legislature when they are, as we
have said, clear and explicit, would be to violate both the letter and spirit of the organic laws
by which the Philippine Government was brought into existence, to invade a coordinate and
independent department of the Government, and to interfere with the legitimate powers and
functions of the Legislature.’
Applying these principles, we shall decline to look into the petitioners’ charges
that an amendment was made upon the last reading of the bill that eventually
became R.A. No. 7354 and that copies thereof in its final form were not distributed
among the members of each House. Both the enrolled bill and the legislative
journals certify that the measure was duly enacted i.e., in accordance with the
Article VI, Sec. 26(2) of the Constitution. We are bound by such official assurances
from a coordinate department of the government, to which we owe, at the very least,
a becoming courtesy.”
327
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 327
Finally in 1994 came the case of Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance, et al. and
its companion cases. Involved in the case was the constitutionality of R.A.
25
No. 7716, otherwise known as the Expanded Value Added Tax Law. The
majority partly relied on the enrolled bill doctrine in dismissing challenges
26
to the constitutionality of R.A. No. 7716. It held:

“x x x
“Fourth. Whatever doubts there may be as to the formal validity of Republic Act
No. 7716 must be resolved in its favor.Our cases manifest firm adherence to the rule
that an enrolled copy of a bill is conclusive not only of its provisions but also of its
due enactment. Not even claims that a proposed constitutional amendment was
invalid because the requisite votes for its approval had not been obtained or that
certain provisions of a statute had been ‘smuggled’ in the printing of the bill have
moved or persuaded us to look behind the proceedings of a coequal branch of the
government. There is no reason now to depart from this rule.
No claim is here made that the ‘enrolled bill’ rule is absolute. In fact in one case
we ‘went behind’ an enrolled bill and consulted the Journal to determine whether
certain provisions of a statute had been approved by the Senate in view of the fact
that the President of the Senate himself, who had signed the enrolled bill, admitted
a mistake and withdrew his signature, so that in effect there was no longer an
enrolled bill to consider.
But where allegations that the constitutional procedures for the passage of bills
have not been observed have no more basis than another allegation that the
Conference Committee ‘surreptitiously’ inserted provisions into a bill which it had
prepared, we should decline the invitation to go behind the enrolled copy of the bill.
To disregard the ‘enrolled bill’ rule in such cases would be to disregard the respect
due the other two departments of our government.”
These cases show that we have not blindly accepted the conclusiveness of the
enrolled bill. Even in Tolentino, Mr. Justice Mendoza was cautious enough to
hold that “no claim
____________________
25 Supra.
26 Justices Cruz, Regalado, Davide, Jr., Romero, Bellosillo and Puno dissented.
328
is here made that the enrolled bill is absolute.” I respectfully submit that it is
now time for the Court to make a definitive pronouncement that we no longer
give our unqualified support to the enrolled bill doctrine. There are
compelling reasons for this suggested change in stance. For one, the enrolled
bill is appropriate only in England where it originated because in England
there is no written Constitution and the Parliament is supreme. For another,
many of the courts in the United States have broken away from the rigidity
and un-realism of the enrolled bill in light of contemporary developments in
lawmaking. And more important, our uncritical adherence to the enrolled
27
bill is inconsistent with our Constitution, laws and rules. InMabanag, we 28
relied on section 313 of the Old Code of Civil Procedure as amended by Act
No. 2210 as a principal reason in embracing the enrolled bill. This section,
however has long been repealed by our Rules of Court. A half glance at our
Rules will show that its section on conclusive presumption does not carry the
conclusive presumption we give to an enrolled bill. But this is not all. The
conclusiveness of an enrolled bill which all too often results in the suppression
of truth cannot be justified under the 1987 Constitution. The Preamble of our
Constitution demands that we live not only under a rule of law but also
under a regime of truth. Our Constitution also adopted a national
policy requiring full public disclosure of all state transactions involving
29
public interest. Any rule which will defeat this policy on transparency ought
to be disfavored. And to implement these policies, this Court was given the
power to pry open and to strike down any act of any branch or
instrumentality of government if it amounts to grave abuse of discretion
amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction. It is time to bury the enrolled bill
for its fiction of conclusiveness shuts off truth in many litigations. We cannot
dispense justice based on fiction for the search for justice is the search for
truth. I submit that giving
___________________
27 See writer’s dissenting opinion in Tolentino, supra, p. 818.

28 Op. cit.
29 Section 28 of Article II of the Constitution.
329
VOL. 277, AUGUST 14, 1997 329
an enrolled bill a mere prima facie presumption of correctness will facilitate
our task of dispensing justice based on truth.
III
In sum, I respectfully submit that the Court has jurisdiction over the petition
at bar and that issues posed by petitioner are justiciable. Nonetheless, I do
not find any grave abuse of discretion committed by the public respondents to
justify granting said petition. As the ponencia points out, the petition merely
involves the complaint that petitioner was prevented from raising the
question of quorum. The petition does not concern violation of any rule
mandated by the Constitution. Nor does it involve the right of a non-member
of the House which requires constitutional protection. The rules on how to
question the existence of a quorum are procedural in character. They are
malleable by nature for they were drafted to help the House enact laws. As
well stated, these rules are servants, not masters of the House. Their
observance or nonobservance is a matter of judgment call on the part of our
legislators and it is not the business of the Court to reverse this judgment
when untainted by grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of
jurisdiction.
CONCURRING OPINION
VITUG, J.:
When the 1987 Constitution has embodied, in its circumscription of judicial
power under Section 1, Article VIII, of the Constitution, the determination of
whether or not there is grave abuse of discretion on the part of any branch or
instrumentality of government, the Supreme Court, upon which that great
burden has been imposed, could not have been thought of as likewise being
thereby tasked with the awesome responsibility of overseeing the entire
bureaucracy. The term grave abuse of discretion has long been understood in
our jurisprudence as, and confined to, a capricious and whimsical or despotic
exercise of judgment as amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction.
330
I see nothing of that sort in the case at bar. Absent a clear case of grave
abuse of discretion, like the patent disregard of a Constitutional proscription,
I would respect the judgment of Congress under whose province the specific
responsibility falls and the authority to act is vested. To do otherwise would
be an unwarranted intrusion into the internal affairs of a co-equal,
independent and coordinate branch of government. At no time, it would seem
to me, has it been intended by the framers of the fundamental law to cause a
substantial deviation, let alone departure, from the time-honored and
accepted principle of separation, but balanced, powers of the three branches
of government. There is, of course, a basic variant between the old rule and
the new Charter on the understanding of the term “judicial power.” Now, the
Court is under mandate to assume jurisdiction over, and to undertake
judicial inquiry into, what may even be deemed to be political questions
provided, however, that grave abuse of discretion—the sole test of
justiciability on purely political issues—is shown to have attended the
contested act.
All taken, I most humbly reiterate my separate opinion in Tolentino vs.
Secretary of Finance and companion cases (G.R. No. 115455, etc., 235 SCRA
630) and vote to deny the instant petition.
Petition for certiorari and prohibition dismissed.
Notes.—The House without the Senate which had adjourned sine die, is
not “Congress”—neither the House nor the Senate can hold session
independently of the other in the same manner as neither can transact any
legislative business after the adjournment of the other. (Guevara vs.
Inocentes, 16 SCRA 379 [1966])
It is a recognized principle of international law and under our system of
separation of powers that diplomatic immunity is essentially a political
question and courts should refuse to look beyond a determination by the
executive branch of the government, and where the plea of diplomatic
immunity is recognized and affirmed by the executive branch of the
government as in the case at bar, it is then the duty of the courts
331
VOL. 277, AUGUST 15, 1997 331
Court of Appeals vs. Escalante
to accept the claim of immunity upon appropriate suggestion by the principal
law officer of the government, the Solicitor General or other officer acting
under his direction. (Lasco vs. United Nations Revolving Fund for Natural
Resources Exploration, 241 SCRA 681 [1995])
——o0o——
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Arroyo vs. de Venecia, 277 SCRA 268, August 14, 1997

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Arroyo vs. de Venecia, 277 SCRA 268, August 14, 1997

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268 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Arroyo vs. De Venecia

JOKER P. ARROYO, EDCEL C. LAGMAN, JOHN HENRY R. OSMEÑA,

PUNO, J., Concurring and Dissenting Opinion:

Constitutional Law; Judicial Review; Separation of Powers;Political Questions;

SPECIAL CIVIL ACTION in the Supreme Court. Certiorari and/or

The facts are stated in the opinion of the Court.

This is a petition for certiorari and/or prohibition challenging the validity of

conclusiveness of an enrolled bill, in view of the changed membership of the

reputation of the House or of its members, collectively or individually.

the lone objection of petitioner Rep. Lagman. 8

of its proceedings” was invoked by parties, although not successfully,

9 Art. VI, §16(3).

Constitution empowers each house to determine its rules of proceedings. It

Ohio stated: “The provision for reconsideration is no part of the Constitution

12 144 U.S. at 5, 36 L.Ed. at 324-25 (emphasis added).

appears that an act was so passed, no inquiry will be permitted to ascertain

Statutes of Oklahoma provided for three readings on separate days before a

an acknowledgment that the jurisdiction of this Court is subject to the case

18 ENRIQUE M. FERNANDO, CONSTITUTION OF THE PHILIPPINES ANNOTATED 188-

22 4 CONG. REC. 413-414 (Feb. 15, 1957).

suspended to allow the parties to settle the problem, because when it

Here, the matter complained of concerns a matter of internal procedure of

objection by his continued interpellation of the

REYNALDO FAJARDO, PRINCIPLES OF PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE 157-158, 172-

behind” an enrolled bill and consulted the Journal to determine whether

34 PAUL MASON, MANUAL OF LEGISLATIVE PROCEDURE 335 (1953).

Evidence the following excerpt which embodies good, if oldfashioned,

39 Mabanag v. Lopez Vito, 78 Phil. 1, 12 (1947).

otherwise than as certified by the presiding officers of both Houses of

rests on the following considerations:

To overrule the doctrine now, as the dissent urges, is to repudiate the

spoke of the imperatives of public policy for regarding

It would be an unwarranted invasion of the prerogative of a coequal

instead appropriately be made here: petitioners can seek the enactment of a

WHEREFORE, the petition for certiorari and prohibition is DISMISSED.

48 Gregg v. Barrett, 771 F.2d 529.

I cast today might be wrongly construed as an implied abandonment of, and

1 235 SCRA 630.

forum for the enforcement of internal legislative rules allegedly violated. To 3

4 Id., pp. 778-779; emphasis supplied.

the meaning of sections 3 and 4 of Rule XXXVIII of the US Senate was in

the House of Representatives. He denied he was a communist and was

refusing to answer questions put to him by a sub-committee of the House

5 374 US 109 (1963).

US Supreme Court assumed jurisdiction to hear a petition for re-

this novel provision stretching the latitude of judicial power is distinctly

15 Op. cit., footnote No. 2.

17 63 Miss 512 (1886).

19 Sutherland, op. cit., pp. 224-225.

enrolled bill doctrine, viz.:

doctrine when we refused to apply it after the

22 27 SCRA 131, 134-135.

24 227 SCRA 703.

to the constitutionality of R.A. No. 7716. It held:

bill is inconsistent with our Constitution, laws and rules. InMabanag, we 28

27 See writer’s dissenting opinion in Tolentino, supra, p. 818.

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