GR L 10292; (March, 1915)

EN BANC

G.R. No. L-10292 ; March 31, 1915

EUSTAQUIO CONCHADA, petitioner,

vs.
THE DIRECTOR OF PRISONS, respondent.

Reyes and Millar and Mariano A. Albert for petitioner.
Office of the Solicitor-General Corpus for respondent.

ARAULLO, J.:

On May 19, 1914, the provincial fiscal charged Eustaquio Conchada with the crime of murder in the Court of First Instance of the Province of Tayabas, Seventh Judicial District, then presided over by the Honorable George R. Harvey, judge. The case against him having been duly prepared, he was tried on July 23, 1914, before the same Court of First Instance of Tayabas, then presided over by the Honorable Isidro Paredes and on that date included in the Fourteenth Judicial District by virtue of Act No. 2347 of the Philippine Legislature which went into effect on the 1st day of the same month of July and which provided for the reorganization of the Courts of First Instance and of the Court of Land Registration. Defendant was sentenced on September 23 of that year, 1914, by the same judge, the Honorable Isidro Paredes, to the penalty of life imprisonment and consequently confined in Bilibid Prison of this city of Manila under an order issued by said Honorable Isidro Paredes as judge of the Court of First Instance of Tayabas.

During the course of the trial, defendant filed a motion praying that said court refrain from proceeding further in the case and from sentencing him, and that it disqualify itself in favor of the competent court, on the ground that it was not legally constituted, because said Act No. 2347, which had created it, was contrary to the Organic act of the Philippines and therefore void, and said court and the judge presiding therein lacked jurisdiction to try and decide the case and sentence him, because such jurisdiction belonged to the Court of First Instance of Tayabas, Seventh Judicial District, in which the complaint had been filed and which still existed in the province. This motion was denied by the court, with exception on the part of the defendant, and the trial was carried forward in the same court presided over by the Honorable Isidro Paredes, who, as has already been said, rendered the said judgment of conviction.

Later the attorneys Reyes, Millar, and Albert, representing the said Eustaquio Conchada, prayed this Supreme Court to issue a writ of habeas corpus to the Director of Prisons to compel him to produce said defendant and, after due hearing, to order his release or grant him a trial in a competent court. After mentioning the facts already set forth, they virtually alleged that the judgment rendered by the Court of First Instance of Tayabas, fourteenth Judicial District, on September 23, 1914, against the defendant was illegal, null and void, because: (1) The Philippine Legislature had no authority to abolish or deprive of jurisdiction the Court of First of Tayabas, Seventh Judicial District, created by the constitution, nor to substitute therefor another court of its own creation; (2) the Philippine Legislature had no authority to dis miss or remove the judge of said Court of First Instance, which had exclusive jurisdiction, as established by the constitution, of the crime specified in the complaint; and (3) the judge of first instance of Tayabas, Seventh Judicial District, established by the Organic Act, having first acquired jurisdiction over the cause of action and the person of the defendant, no territorial law could validly compel the defendant-petitioner to submit to the jurisdiction of another court created by the Legislature and presided over by a judge who held office subject to the will of that Legislature.

After this court had directed that the respondent Director of Prisons show cause why the writ of habeas corpus sought should not issue, and the Solicitor General, representing ting the said Director of Prisons, had submitted such arguments as he deemed proper, the hearing was had, and counsel for the petitioner set forth in their brief that on the appeal they relied upon the following legal propositions:

1. The Philippine Legislature has no authority to limit the jurisdiction of the constitutional courts created by the Organic Act and still less to abolish, suppress, or destroy said courts.

2. The Philippine Legislature has no authority to remove the judges appointed under the Organic Act to preside over the court created thereby, without abolishing the courts in which they sit.

3. The Philippine Legislature, by Act No. 2347, has decreed the final extinction, abolition or destruction of the constitutional courts created by the Organic Act, and has replaced or supplanted them with other courts of its own creation.

4. The removal of the judges, along with all the officers and employees of the old courts, and the limitation of their jurisdiction to certain causes pending, necessarily imply the destruction or abolition of said courts.

5. The courts “organized” by Act No. 2347 are not legally constituted and the judges appointed by virtue of said Act lack jurisdiction to try and sentence the petitioner.

These five propositions rest upon the following hypotheses:

1. That the courts created by the Organic Act, or the law organizing the courts of justice of the Philippine islands to wit, Act No. 136, passed on June 11, 1901, by the United States Philippine Commission, are constitutional courts and that said courts have been replaced or supplanted by the Philippine Legislature through Act No. 2347 with other courts of its own creation.

2. That the same Philippine Legislature, through Act No. 2347, without authority therefor, has limited the jurisdiction of the courts, characterized by petitioner’s counsel as constitutional, created by the Organic Act, and has abolished, suppressed, or destroyed said courts.

3. That the Philippine Legislature has removed, likewise without authority therefor, the judges appointed under the Organic Act to preside over the courts created thereby.

From these hypotheses said counsel for the petitioner, after arguing at length in support of the propositions laid down by them, deduce that the courts “organized” by Act No. 2347 are not legally constituted and that Judge Paredes, appointed under said Act, lacked jurisdiction to try and sentence Eustaquio Conchada, the petitioner.

When the United States Philippine Commission on June 11, 1901, passed Act No. 136, the law organizing the courts of justice of the Philippine Islands, the law known as “The Philippine Bill” — that is, the Act of July 1, 1902 had not yet been passed by the Congress of the United States. The organization of the courts of justice in the Philippine Islands and the definition of their jurisdiction by means of act No. 136 were effected, as petitioner’s counsel say, by virtue of or under the instructions of the President of the United States. What was the organization of those courts of justice? How was the jurisdiction thereof defined? The very Act, No. 136, categorically answers these queries.

Section 1 of said Act says:

Courts of justice shall be maintained in every province of the Philippine Islands in which civil government shall be established; which courts shall be open for the trial of all causes proper for their cognizance, and justice shall be therein impartially administered without corruption or unnecessary delay.

Section 2 of the same Act says:

The judicial power of the Government of the Philippine Islands shall be vested in a Supreme Court, Courts of First Instance, and courts of justices of the peace, together with such special jurisdictions of municipal courts, and other special tribunals as now are or hereafter may be authorized by law.

With reference to the Courts of First Instance, section 48 of the same Act says:

There shall be in each province in which civil government has been or shall be organized under the sovereignty of the United States, a Court of First Instance, in each of which a judge shall preside, to be appointed by the Philippine Commission, to hold office during its pleasure. Each judge so appointed shall preside in all Courts of First Instance in his judicial district, which shall consist of such provinces as shall be hereafter by law designated to constitute such judicial district.

Said section makes an exception with reference to the city of Manila, which is dealt with in the next succeeding section, 49, in a way not pertinent here.

In treating of the jurisdiction of the Courts of First Instance, section 55 of said Act says that it shall be of two kinds, original and appellate, the next succeeding section, 56, mentioning among the first kind that of trying and deciding all criminal cases in which a penalty of more than six months’ imprisonment or a fine exceeding $100 may be imposed.

A simple reading of the provisions of the Act No. 136 is sufficient for understanding that its object was to organize, or, rather, to create, the judiciary in this Philippine Islands under the system of government established thereinby the United States of America in substitution for that which existed when, by virtue of the treaty of Paris, sovereignty over said Islands was transferred by the Spanish Government to the United States of America.

After the judiciary was organized, the jurisdiction corresponding to each of the divisions of that power was assigned, and after the courts established by virtue of said Act No. 136 were already in operation, the Congress of the United States passed the Act of July 1, 1902, known as “The Philippine Bill,” which, among other matters relating to the administration of the affairs of civil government in the Philippine Islands set forth in section 9 thereof:

That the Supreme Court and the Courts of First Instance of the Philippine Islands shall possess and exercise jurisdiction as heretofore provided and such additional jurisdiction as shall hereafter be prescribed by the Government of said Islands, subject to the power of said Government to change the practice and method of procedure. The municipal courts of said Islands shall possess and exercise jurisdiction as heretofore provided by the Philippine Commission, subject in all matters to such alteration and amendment as may be hereafter enacted by law; and the Chief Justice and Associate Justices of the Supreme Court shall hereafter be appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and shall receive the compensation heretofore prescribed by the commission until otherwise provided by congress. The judges of the Court of First Instance shall be appointed by the Civil Governor, by and with the advice and consent of the Philippine Commission: Provided, That the admiralty jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and the Courts of First Instance shall not be changed except by Act of Congress.

It is therefore unquestionable that the Congress of the United States through the Philippine Bill placed, as petitioner’s counsel say, its high sanction upon the institutions already existing in said Islands and definitely confirmed their existence, and it is also unquestionable that, with reference to the organization of the judiciary — that is, to the institution for the administration of justice — said Act approved and confirmed it, leaving it as it had been established by Act No. 136, while it sets forth what appears in the section 9 above quoted with reference to the different divisions of that same judiciary and to the appointment of the Chief Justice and Associate Justices of the Supreme Court and the judges of the Courts of First Instance.

Said section ratified the jurisdiction which Act No. 136, prior to the Philippine Bill, has already conferred upon the Supreme Court and the Courts of First Instance, and also clearly stated that such Supreme Court and Courts of First Instance should thereafter have such additional jurisdiction as might be conferred upon them by the Government of the Philippine Islands, subject to the power of said Government to change the practice and method of procedure.

Jurisdiction is the power or authority one has to govern and to execute the laws, and especially the power with which judges are invested for administering justice — that is, for trying civil or criminal cases, or both, and deciding them and rendering judgment in accordance with the laws. (Escriche, Diccionario de Legislacion y Jurisprudencia, vol. 3, p. 743, ed. 1875. )

Jurisdiction, when applied to courts, is defined to be the power to hear and determine the cause. (Wightman vs. Karsner, 20 Ala. , 446, 451; Pullman Palace Car Co. vs. Harrison, 25 South, 697, 699; 82 Am. St. Rep. , 68; In re Greenough St. , 32 Atl. , 427, 428; State vs. Wakefield, 15 Atl. , 181, 183; and innumerable cases. )

In the meaning of the law, “jurisdiction” is the authority or power which a man hath to do justice in causes of complain brought before him. (State vs. Whitford, 11 N. W. , 424, 426; 54 Wis. , 150. )

The term “jurisdiction,’ when confined to the judicial department of the Government, means the legal authority to administer justice. (Holmes vs. Campbell, 12 Minn. 221, 227, [141, 146]. )

“Jurisdiction” is “controlling authority; the right of making or enforcing laws or regulations, the capacity of determining rules of action or use, and exacting penalties; the function or capacity of judging or governing in general; the inherent power of decision or control. ” (People vs. Pierce, 41 N. Y. Suppl. , 858, 860. )

Jurisdiction is the power of hearing and determining causes, and of doing justice in matters of complaint. (State vs. Whitford, 11 N. W. , 424, 426; Wis. , 150. )

So there can be no doubt that in speaking in said section 9 of the Philippine Bill of the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and the Courts of First Instance of these Islands, the Congress of the United States referred to the power of First Instance of these Islands are invested by Act No. 136, which organized the courts of justice of these Islands, and to such as they might in the future be invested with or as might be granted to them by the Government of the Islands, subject to the power of said Government to change the practice and method of procedure; but in no way did it refer to the districts or provinces wherein the Courts of First Instance or the judges appointed to exercise such jurisdiction were then exercising it by virtue of Act No. 140, which was passed by the same United States Commission in these Islands on June 12, 1901, prior to the Philippine bill itself; or, rather, this Act did not refer to the place where said jurisdiction was to be exercised, or the particular extent of territory in which it was then being exercised, or to the place or the particular extent of territory in which it might be exercised, by virtue of the laws which might in the future be enacted for such purpose by the Government of these Islands through the medium of the Philippine Commission or Philippine Legislature. In short, the Congress of the United States did not in the Philippine Bill pay any attention to the organization of the judiciary with reference to the creation and establishment of judicial districts, or to the number of such districts, or, finally, to the number of provinces that should be comprised in each district; it accepted the organization of the judiciary in this respect as had been provided by said Act No. 140, and it did not restrict, limit, or modify the authority which the Philippine Commission had exercised in said Act No. 140 in dividing the judicial territory of the Islands into various districts, each of which embraced one or more provinces of the Archipelago, and in establishing therein the Courts of First Instance, or courts of justice, in accordance with the provision of section 1 of the same Organic Act, No. 136, nor did it attempt to assume authority or to establish regulations or procedure to which the Philippine Commission or the Philippine Legislature must conform in its future exercise of that authority. Otherwise the said Congress would have stated, as it did state in section 9 of the Philippine Bill in speaking of the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and of the Courts of First Instance as well as the jurisdiction of the municipal courts, that the establishment by the Philippine Government of judicial districts or the determination of the provinces to be comprised in each district should be made subject to certain regulations or to the changes or amendments which might be necessary in the future. Since the Congress of the United States in the said Philippine Bill did not so state, it is evident that it left the Philippine Commission and the Philipppine Legislature (which was created by the same Act and which succeeded said Commission in the exercise of the legislative power) at liberty to enact such laws as said Legislature might deem expedient or necessary to modify or change the division of the judicial territory of the Islands, as effected under Act No. 140, and to establish new districts which might be included in such divisions of the judicial territory, as has in fact been done, first by the Philippine Commission and afterwards by the Philippine Legislature through the medium of Acts Nos. 450, 496, 501, 552, 867, 1345, 1708, 1952, and 2038, all these being Acts of which the Congress of the United States had knowledge, in compliance with the provision in section 86 of the same Philippine Bill, without annulling them in the exercise of the authority it naturally reserved to itself in that section.

From all of the foregoing it necessarily follows that the Courts of First Instance for these Islands, which are the ones to which the appellant refers in the question raised on the appeal, are not constitutional courts, or courts created by the Constitution, but by the Legislature of the Philippine Islands, as territory not incorporated into the United States of America and governed by the Congress of those States through the medium of the Act of July 1, 1902. This Act has come to be the constitution of the Philippine Islands, and the fact that the creation of said courts was sanctioned by that constitution did not convert them into constitutional courts in the sense understood and maintained by petitioner’s counsel — that is, in such manner that the Philippine Legislature cannot act with respect to the division of the judicial territory without awaiting the consent or approval of Congress, for the simple reason that Congress by virtue of the constitution of the Philippines did not arrogate to itself or assume any authority on this point concerning the organization of the judicial power, and, consequently, the courts have, by virtue of Act No. 2347, replaced or supplanted those that had been previously established above, are also created by the Legislature by virtue of the powers which said constitution confers upon it.

If, as has already been seen, jurisdiction is the power with which judges are invested to try civil and criminal cases and to decide them or render judgment in accordance with the law, the increase in the number of districts in the judicial division of the territory of the Philippine Islands and the formation of each of these new districts by a larger or smaller number of provinces than those assigned to each district by Act No. 140 and the other Acts mentioned above, as well as changes in the designation of some of those districts and of some of the provinces comprised in the former district for others finally designated in Act No. 2347, and the reduction in some of the new districts, according to the same Act, of the number of provinces comprised, to the extent that the Fourteenth Judicial District should include only the Province of Tayabas, which, with the Province of Batangas had formed the Seventh Judicial District under Act No. 501 and prior thereto under Act No. 140 the Sixth District, along with the Provinces of Laguna, Cavite, Principe and Infanta, and Polillo Island, do not constitute limitation or increase of the jurisdiction of those courts, because the power and authority to hear, try, and decide civil and criminal cases pertaining to each court are always the same, and what was increased or diminished by said Act No. 2347 was the places wherein said jurisdiction is exercised or the exercise of the jurisdiction itself with reference to the place in which it is publicly manifested.

It is true that the word “jurisdiction” is also understood, according to Escriche in his work above cited, “as the district or territory over which a judge’s authority extends; and as the boundary of a place or province; and likewise as the court in which justice is administered;” but this is not the sense in which the word “jurisdiction” is used in section 9 of the Philippine Bill, as petitioner’s counsel seem to have understood in saying that the Philippine Legislature had no authority to limit the jurisdiction of what they call the constitutional courts, created by the Organic Act, and in establishing as to the grounds for the whole argument developed in their brief that the Philippine Legislature has by Act No. 2347 limited such jurisdiction. Though that is the meaning commonly given to the word, it is there employed in its strictly legal acception as defined above, for there can be no doubt that when the Congress of the United States said in section 9 “that the Supreme Court and the Courts of First Instance of the Philippine Islands shall possess and exercise jurisdiction as heretofore provided and such additional jurisdiction as shall hereafter be prescribed by the Government of said Islands, etc. ,” it referred only to the powers of the Supreme Court and of the Courts of First Instance to have original and appellate jurisdiction of the case mentioned — the former by sections 16, 17, and 18, and the latter by sections 55, 56, and 57, of Act No. 136 — and to perform the acts specified in some of those sections. This is so perfectly plain that at the close of section 9 of the Philippine Bill it is stated that the admiralty jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and Courts of First Instance shall not be changed except by Act of Congress — that is, that the power and authority of the Supreme Court and of the Courts of First Instance with reference to said actions and to deciding the cases arising thereunder shall be the same as stated in section 56, No. 4, of Act No. 136 — that is, original for the Courts of First Instance, irrespective of the value of the property in controversy or the amount of the demand, and appellate for the Supreme Court, according to section 18 of the same Act. It cannot be altered except by act of Congress. And if petitioner’s counsel have tried, in the second of the hypotheses they have started from in laying down the five propositions contained in their brief, to show that by Act No. 2347 in the Philippine Legislature has limited the jurisdiction, strictly speaking, of the courts — that is, of the Courts of First Instance from among those in question — created by the Organic Act, and the particular extent of the exercise of that jurisdiction by reason of the increase of new judicial districts, they have also fallen into a flagrant inaccuracy, because the fact really is that said Act No. 2347 contains no provision which alters or modifies the provisions in section 55, 56, and 67 of said Act for the organization of the judiciary.

Neither it is true that the Philippine Legislature has by Act No. 2347 abolished, suppressed, or destroyed the courts to which the appellant’s counsel refer, to wit, the Courts of First Instance in these Islands, created by the Act organizing the judiciary, for an organism is not destroyed, abolished, or suppressed by varying its original form, and said Act has done nothing more than make a new division of the judicial territory by increasing the number of districts and by including only one, or two or more provinces in each district, but preserving the Courts of First Instance in each province, according to the purport of the prescription in section 1 of said Judiciary Act, or, what amounts to the same thing, has reorganized the Courts of First Instance of the Islands without altering the organism thereof or the system of which they form a part, and without also depriving them of any portion of the jurisdiction conferred upon them from the time of their creation.

For the same reason it cannot be said that the jurisdiction of those same courts has been limited to certain causes pending, as has occurred in the present case, according to petitioner’s counsel, with relation to the case instituted against said petitioner, Eustaquio Conchada, by virtue of the provisions of section 24 of said Act No. 2347, in that it was tried and decided by a judge other than the one who presided over the Court of First Instance of Tayabas, Seventh Judicial District when the complaint was filed against him, for the cause was submitted to the same Court of First Instance of Tayabas wherein the complaint had been filed, and was tried in said court, belonging then to the Fourteenth District, presided over by the judge who had jurisdiction to try it, as successor and continuator of the judge who preceded him, having the same jurisdiction as the former in his character of judge of the Court of First Instance of said province, and it cannot thereby be understood that any jurisdiction was taken away from said court or from the judge who had formerly officiated therein.

It is true that section 7 of Act No. 2347 of the Philippine Legislature provided that the judges of the Courts of First Instance, judges-at-large, and judges of the Court of Land Registration should vacate their positions on the date when said Act went into effect, but the same section went on to say further that the Governor-General, with the advice and consent of the Philippine Commission, should make new appointments of judges of the Courts of First Instance and auxiliary judges in accordance with the provisions of that Act. So that the ceasing to hold their respective positions in the cases of the judges to whom said section referred is not and cannot be considered really as a removal or dismissal of said judicial officers, as petitioner’s counsel characterize it, but a measure related to the new division of the judicial territory into a greater number of districts and the assignment to each district of different provinces — in some of them, of the provinces that composed the districts theretofore existing — which made necessary the new appointment of the respective judge for each district, an appointment which the Governor-General of the Islands, with the advice and consent of the Philippine Commission, was empowered to make, according to section 9 of the Act of Congress, the Philippine bill, nor can it be in any way maintained, as petitioner’s counsel contend, that the ceasing of said judges to hold their positions, call it removal or not, has necessarily implied the destruction, abolition, or suppression of the courts in which they discharge their duties, for the court as an entity is one thing and the person of the officer who exercises his jurisdiction therein is another.

The case cited by petitioner’s counsel on page 23 of their brief (People vs. Dubois, 23 Ill. , 498), in support of their contention to the effect that the Philippine Legislature had no authority, according to the Philippine Bill, to reorganize the Courts of First Instance of the Islands and that in doing so it violated said Act — that is, the constitution — making null and void both the ceasing of the old judges to hold their positions as well as the appointment of the new, effected by virtue of said Act No. 2347, shows that error into which said counsel have fallen and the erroneous hypotheses on which they have based their whole argument.

In fact, the seventh section of the fifth article the constitution of the State of Illinois provides:

The State shall be divided into nine judicial districts, in each of which one circuit judge shall be elected by the qualified voters thereof, who shall hold his office for the term of six years, and until his successor shall be commissioned and qualified: Provided, The General Assembly may increase the number of circuits to meet the future exigencies of the State.

The question that arose in the case cited, People vs. Dubois (23 Ill. , 498), is the following: “Can the legislature expel a circuit judge from his office by creating a new district, and taking from him the territory which constitute his district?”

This question was answered as follows: “The bare reading of the constitution [of the State of Illinois] must convince every one that it intended to prohibit such a proceeding. It was the intention of that instrument to place the judges entirely above and beyond the legislative control or interference, except by impeachment or address, as provided for in the twelfth section of the fifth article. It is the constitution which creates the office of circuit judge, and not the legislature. All the latter can do is to create new judicial districts, the constitution in advance having created the office of circuit judge for such district. “

The syllabus of said decision states: “The office of circuit judge is created by the constitution, which also fixes the term. The legislature may increase the number of circuits, but cannot deprive a judge of his office and compensation by creating new circuits of the territory from which he was elected. Once elected, he holds his office under the constitution, unless removed by address or impeachment. “

And in citing the said case petitioner’s counsel have quoted on page 23 of their brief from pages 507 and 508 [vol. 23] of the Cyclopedia of Law and Procedure, as follows: “When the office of judge is created by the constitution, it cannot be abolished by the legislature (State vs. Scott, 9 Ark. , 270); but when created by statute under authority of the constitution, it may be abolished by statute and the incumbent deprived of his office. Thus the legislature cannot expel a circuit judge from his office by creating a new district and taking from him the territory that constituted his district. (People vs. Dubois, 23 Ill. , 498. )”

In the Illinois case cited above, the State constitution had fixed the number of judicial districts into which the State should be divided, the time each circuit judge should hold his office, and had provided, furthermore, that the circuit judge of each district should be chosen through election by the qualified voters of the State.

According to the statement of facts given in the decision mentioned, the legislature of the State of Illinois on February 11, 1859, passed an act creating the twenty-third judicial circuit and providing that the county of Bureau should be added to and form a part of the ninth circuit, thus leaving Judge Ballou, who was holding office by election and should have held it under the constitution for six years, without territory wherein to perform his duties or exercise jurisdiction, or, what amounts to the same thing, thus removing or dismissing him from said office; and this was the point decided in that decision in a favorable sense by granting the mandamus sought, on the grounds already explained that the legislature could increase the number of circuits but could not deprive a judge of his office or of his compensation through the creation of new circuits in the territory for which he had been elected, and that after election he occupied the office under the authority of the constitution and could only be removed therefrom by address or impeachment.

It is perfectly understood that the act passed by the legislature of Illinois to the effect already set forth was unconstitutional, illegal, and null and void, for by reason of the provision in such act that the county of Bureau should form part of the ninth circuit, the same law creating another judicial circuit as the twenty-third, Judge Ballou was removed from the office he was holding before the expiration of the terms of six years, the time that he was entitled to hold it, as no address or proceedings in impeachment had been effected under the authority of the State constitution, which, in the seventh section of its fifth article, contained provision for making the designation for such office of circuit judge — that is, through the medium of election by the qualified voters of the State.

Neither in Act No. 136, the law organizing the courts of justice in the Philippine Islands, nor in the Act of July 1, 1902, the constitutional law or constitution of the Philippines, is there any provision which fixes or indicates the time during which the judges of the Court of First Instance of the Islands are entitled to hold such office, the former Act merely stating in its section 48 that the judge appointed by the Philippine Commission shall hold office during its pleasure. Neither is there in the Act organizing the judiciary or in the Philippine Bill any provision which fixes the precise number of districts of the judicial territory of the Philippines and the number of provinces to be included in each district, it being merely stated in section 1 of aid Act that “courts of justice shall be maintained in every province in the Philippine Islands in which civil government shall be established,” and in section 48 thereof that “there shall be in each province in which civil government has been or shall be organized under the sovereignty of the United States, a Court of First Instance, in each of which a judge shall preside, to be appointed by the Philippine Commission,” and that “each judge so appointed shall preside in all Courts of First Instance in his judicial district, which shall consist of such provinces as shall be hereafter by law designated. “

Act No. 140 was the first to designate the judicial districts and the provinces to be included in each district.

Thereafter and successively, first by the Philippine Commission and afterwards by the Legislature, various laws were enacted modifying the above-cited Act No. 140 with reference to the division of the judicial territory, the designation and numbering of districts, and the provinces that should form part of each district, nor has the Congress of the United States, as has also been said above, declared any of said laws to be null and void, which implies that they were all approved by that Congress.

So there is no similarity at all between the case decided by the supreme court of Illinois in People vs. Dubois (23 Ill. , 498) and the case at bar.

The Illinois legislature could not, without violating the constitution of that State, on the occasion of providing for or modifying the organization of the judicial territory thereof that forms part of a circuit, a certain county, that of Bureau, and of creating a new district, could not, we repeat, remove Judge Ballou from his office or dismiss him, thus depriving him of the jurisdiction he exercised in the territory for which he had been duly elected, but the Philippine Legislature could, without violating the law organizing the judiciary in the Philippine Islands or the Philippine Bill passed by Congress on July 1, 1902, the constitution of the Philippines, by means of Act No. 2347, reorganize the judicial territory of the Islands by creating new districts, changing the numbers of those that previously existed, including in each district one or more provinces, whether or not they were those which formed part of the districts previously created by Act No. 140 and the others already enumerated. Furthermore, by reason of this organization, it could provide that the judges should cease to hold their respective offices in accordance with the previous organization and that new judges should be appointed to hold them in the districts newly created by virtue of such reorganization, for neither the law organizing the judiciary nor the Philippine Bill contains any provisions fixing the number of districts of which the division of the judicial territory of the Philippines must necessarily consist, nor the provinces or the number thereof which must be included in each district, nor has it limited or restricted the power of the Legislature or of the Government of the Philippines in connection with the organization of the judiciary with respect to the Courts of First Instance, nor has it laid down any rules to which their actions must conform in the exercise of such power, the Governor-General having been expressly empowered, as we have already seen, by section 9 of the Philippine Bill, to appoint the judges of the Courts of First Instance with the advice and consent of the Philippine Commission. All this clearly demonstrates that said Courts of First Instance are not constitutional courts, and the hypothesis from which petitioner’s counsel have started in their brief being incorrect, the whole argument advanced by them to show that Act No. 2347, which provides for the organization of the Courts of First Instance of these Islands, is illegal and null and void, falls through. Moreover, without going beyond that same law organizing the courts of justice of these Islands and the Act of Congress of July 1, 1902, the Philippine Bill, we have a plain demonstration of the difference between the constitutional courts and those which are not such, a difference which exists between the Courts of First Instance of these Islands and the Supreme Court thereof.

The appointment of the Chief Justice and Associate Justices of the Supreme Court is made, according to said section 9 of the Philippine Bill, by the President of the United States of America with the advice and consent of the Senate, a provision which repeals that of section 8 of the said Act organizing the judiciary which states that the Justices, including the Chief Justice, of the Supreme Court should be appointed b the Commission and should hold office during its pleasure. The Supreme Court, according to the same section 8 of the Act organizing the judiciary, shall consist of a Chief Justice and six Associate Justices, and the same section provides the number of Justices necessary to form a quorum and to try any case within its jurisdiction, as well as the number of them whose concurrence is necessary to pronounce a judgment; section 11 of the same Act authorizes the Supreme Court to hold sessions, not only in Manila, but also in Iloilo and Cebu, provisions of said Judiciary Act which, not having been modified by Congress in the Act of July 1, 1902, have been ratified and sanctioned thereby, and so the Supreme Court of the Philippines had become a constitutional court, and the Philippine Legislature cannot enact laws upon the subject of this formation, the appointment of the Justices that compose it, or the place where it must hold its sessions. Hence it was necessary for Congress to adopt the joint resolution of April 9, 1910, which petitioner’s counsel mentioned in their brief, in order that this Supreme Court might hold sessions in Baguio, a joint resolution which it is not necessary to secure from the Congress of the United States to enable the Court of First Instance for one district to be transferred to another district or to enable the judge of the Court of First Instance of one district to hold sessions in a different district, it being sufficient that the Legislature so provide. And this is the clearest demonstration that the Supreme Court and the Courts of First Instance do not, as petitioner’s counsel have maintained in their brief, have the same status from the constitutional point of view.

In conclusion, since Act No. 2347 of the Legislature, whereby the reorganization of the Courts of First Instance of these Islands was provided for, is not illegal and null and void, and the said courts are legally constituted by virtue of said reorganization, the Honorable Judge Isidro Paredes had jurisdiction to try and sentence the petitioner. Eustaquio Conchada, for the crime of murder and to order, as he did, the imprisonment of said defendant by virtue of the sentence imposed upon him.

It is therefore held that there is no ground for issuing to the Directors of Prisons the writ of habeas corpus applied for the counsel for said petitioner. So ordered.

Torres and Johnson, JJ. , concur.
Moreland and Trent, JJ. , concur in the result.

Batas Pinas