Judicial independence

I wrote last Sunday that after I had retired as chief justice and after Joseph Estrada had been pardoned and released from confinement, he sought me out and asked, “I appointed six justices, yet none of them voted for me. Why?”

Primacy of independence. I could not speak for his appointees, but I explained that the Constitution required members of the judiciary to be “of proven competence, integrity, probity and independence.”

Of these four attributes, independence is the most crucial in dealing with the executive branch, which the judiciary is mandated to check under our constitutional system. Those who don the black robe, especially in the Supreme Court, undergo a transformation; they become different persons, forfeit their past activities, relatives and friends, especially the president who appointed them; and devote their full time and attention to the exclusive and reclusive world of decision-making.

I added that when Estrada vs Desierto was promulgated on March 3, 2001, the Senate and the House of Representatives had already passed separate resolutions “expressing support to the assumption into office by Vice President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo as President…”

These resolutions, per the said decision, were beyond the power of the judiciary to review or reverse, for they involved “political questions … to which full discretionary power has been delegated [by the people] to the legislative branch…” Moreover, the international community had likewise recognized the Arroyo government.

To quote the separate opinion of Justice Angelina Sandoval-Gutierrez, Estrada’s last appointee (who took office on Dec. 22, 2000, a month prior to Edsa 2), “Under the circumstances, this Court has to declare as a fact what in fact exists. Respondent Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is the de jure President of the Republic of the Philippines.”

Looking back, had the Supreme Court not affirmed the legitimacy of her ascension, Arroyo would have been tempted to set aside the Constitution and set up a revolutionary government, and in so doing, would have altered our history, given that at that point she had control of the military and the police.

Invoked by others. To be sure, Estrada is not the first or the last chief executive to lament the seeming “ingratitude” of his appointees. Even President Aquino has expressed dismay over some opinions of his appointees.

When asked by the Judicial and Bar Council how he would decide critical cases involving P-Noy (his former boss, school buddy and close friend), new Supreme Court Justice Alfredo Benjamin S. Caguioa invoked judicial independence when he replied, “My impartiality and probity as a judge would not be compromised by utang  na  loob  (debt of gratitude)…”

Arroyo herself, who named me CJ in 2005, was probably disappointed by many decisions of the Panganiban Court, like those that struck down

(1) her Executive Order No. 464 (which barred her Cabinet members from testifying in Senate investigations), (2) her “calibrated preemptive response” in dealing with rallies and demos, (3) her declaration of a state of national emergency, and (4) her people’s initiative to change our form of government from presidential to parliamentary.

The moral lesson, I think, is that presidents should expect a cutting of umbilical ties when jurists enter the hallowed doors of the Supreme Court. In fact, I think, they should be happy, or at least consoled, that their appointees lived up to their sworn duty of “Fiat  justitia  ruat  caelum” (Do justice though the heavens may fall).

Above reproach. “If they could not side with me, why did they not just inhibit like you?” So followed up Estrada. Again, I could not speak for them.

Nonetheless, I said that the Rules of Court laid down the grounds for compulsory disqualification in these words: “No judge … shall sit in any case in which he or his wife or child, is pecuniarily interested as heir, legatee, creditor or otherwise, or in which he is related to either party within the sixth degree of consanguinity or affinity, or to counsel within the fourth degree …, or in which he has been executor, administrator, guardian, trustee or counsel, or in which he has presided in any inferior court when his ruling or decision is the subject of review…”

The next paragraph of that rule sets forth the grounds for voluntary inhibition: “A judge may, in the exercise of sound discretion, disqualify himself from sitting in a case, for just or valid reasons other than those mentioned above,” like “personal bias, or prejudice” as provided under the Code of Judicial Conduct.

None of those grounds for compulsory and voluntary disqualification applied to his appointees; thus, they did not inhibit. In my case, however, I voluntarily inhibited because his counsel, former senator Rene A. V. Saguisag, filed a formal petition to disqualify me (and CJ Davide), alleging that I may have prejudged his cause and that he may no longer be able to convince me to change my mind.

In reply, I wrote the Court that “although petitioner had not proven any legal ground for his request, I was nonetheless voluntarily inhibiting for two reasons: (1) to hold myself above petitioner’s reproach and suspicion and (2) to deprive him or anyone else of any excuse to cast any doubt on the integrity of these proceedings and of the decision that this Court may render…” My “extended explanation of inhibition” is appended to the Court’s decision.

Aside from the “totality test” espoused by the decision, the justices filed separate opinions discussing Estrada’s “permanent disability” and “abandonment” to justify Arroyo’s ascent to the presidency.

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