Questions of Fact and Law
Manuel Quezon III links to two columns written by lawyer-blogger Connie Veneracion and political scientist Alex Magno about the fallout from the Supreme Court’s decision in Lambino et al. v. COMELEC. While both writers inhabit different ends of the Philippine political spectrum, Manolo was rather surprised that both expressed the same strong opinion against what the Court did in adjudicating on this matter – “delightfully congruent” was the phrase he used.
Their point? The Supreme Court should have only decided Lambino on questions of law and not questions of fact.
The money quotes, first from Connie:
“The gist of the ruling was based on something that was never really raised as an issue either by the petitioners, the respondent nor the intervenors. And this is where lawyer Raul Lambino’s media statements start to make sense. The Supreme Court was bound to make its ruling based on questions of law. It has no businesses conducting a trial of facts which was exactly what it did. The oral arguments were meant to allow the parties to elucidate on their legal positions. It was not meant to elicit testimonial evidence, the veracity of which the Supreme Court could pass upon.”
Next from Alex:
“The Carpio decision apparently forgot that the Supreme Court rules on matters of law and not on matters of fact. The facts are for the inferior courts and other bodies to establish.
“The basic flaw of the Carpio decision is that it rules on the contentious facts, thereby overriding procedures and processes that are in the jurisdiction of other authorities. It does what the Supreme Court has no means to do: to inquire into the conduct of the people’s initiative and the process of verifying the signatures.”
I was very surprised that these two persons, astute legal and political observers both, took what I think is an erroneous view of what the Supreme Court can – and can’t – do.
As the highest court in the land, the High Tribunal is both a trier of fact and law. That is clear enough from the plain text of the Constitution itself.
“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.” [Emphasis mine - Ed.].
In the ordinary course of business, the Supreme Court usually declines to review factual questions on the ground that lower courts and tribunals are better-equipped to pass on them because they received the evidence first-hand, and are thus in a superior position to say whether these facts are credible or not. After all, if the Court took it on itself to review every question of fact that it comes across, its docket will be clogged for decades.
The fact of the matter, however, is it can, and in cases where the Court’s extraordinary jurisdiction – that’s the italicized clause above – is invoked, it must.
Moreover while one can argue that a certiorari petition is supposed to answer only legal points, such an action opens the entire matter for review, and the Court is free to resolve the case in the manner it sees fit, on the basis of law, current jurisprudence, and on the evidence at hand – which the petitioner handily supplied to the Court in open session at that – like in this case where Connie observed that the Court “did not really base its decision on the focal issue of whether or not the Defensor-Santiago [v. COMELEC] ruling is binding and should continue to be a precedent.”
Oh, come on, Paul. That the Supreme Court can only review is elementary.
otherwise, a petition for certiorari would be nothing more than a veiled attempt to move for a new trial.
“the Court is free to resolve the case in the manner it sees fit, on the basis of law, current jurisprudence, and on the evidence at hand”
right. except that EVIDENCE AT HAND means evidence on the record.
Atty. Lambino’s replies to the Court’s questions in open court became part of the record Connie the minute he uttered them, something they couldn’t just ignore.
Re certiorari, I think the Court is fairly strict in granting even due course to such petitions, knowing that plenty of litigants use it as an unofficial mode of review of cases already decided on appeal by the Court of Appeals, for example.
Reading between the lines, I suspect that your beef against the Court was its overly activist stance in this case. They could have simply said that the COMELEC did not abuse its discretion because it merely applied Defensor-Santiago to Lambino’s petition and that would have been the end of that.
There is no quarrel that the Supreme Court CAN in fact rule on questions of fact, but mostly as an exception, particularly so if the lower court grossly misappreciated the facts. It is a settled doctrine that conclusions and findings of fact of the lower courts are entitled to great weight on appeal and should not be disturbed, such rule is not without strong exceptions as when the court has overlooked or worse, ignored certain facts of substance and value which, if duly appreciated, might affect the result of the case.
But such does not squarely apply in this case; it is the Comelec which rendered the decision – a decision predicated mainly on the Santiago ruling. That was why I posed the question: Why would the Court bother ruling on questions of fact when it could have easily dismissed the petition by resolving questions of law.
My point exactly, Siu, in comment # 3.
If the executive department is interested in curbing what it thinks is the Court’s growing taste for legislating from the bench, it should convince the Congress to plug those holes in the Constitution that require action from the legislature to be enforceable, like a sound law on people’s initiative referendum, for example.