Ormoc Sugar Company, Inc. v. Treasurer of Ormoc City [G.R. No.

23794 February 17, 1968] Post under case digests, Taxation at Thursday, March 29, 2012 Posted by Schizophrenic Mind Facts: The Municipal Board of Ormoc City passed Ordinance No. 4 imposing on any and all productions of centrifugal sugar milled at the Ormoc Sugar Company, Inc., in Ormoc City a municipal tax equivalent to one per centum (1%) per export sale to USA and other foreign countries. Payments for said tax were made, under protest, by Ormoc Sugar Company, Inc. Ormoc Sugar Company, Inc. filed before the Court of First Instance of Leyte a complaint against the City of Ormoc as well as its Treasurer, Municipal Board and Mayor alleging that the ordinance is unconstitutional for being violative of the equal protection clause and the rule of uniformity of taxation. The court rendered a decision that upheld the constitutionality of the ordinance. Hence, this appeal.

Issue: Whether or not constitutional limits on the power of taxation, specifically the equal protection clause and rule of uniformity of taxation, were infringed?

Held: Yes. Equal protection clause applies only to persons or things identically situated and does not bar a reasonable classification of the subject of legislation, and a classification is reasonable where 1) it is based upon substantial distinctions; 2) these are germane to the purpose of the law; 3) the classification applies not only to present DUMLAO VS. COMELEC [95 SCRA 392; L-52245; 22 JAN 1980] Monday, February 02, 2009 Posted by Coffeeholic Writes Labels: Case Digests, Political Law

Facts: Petitioner questions the constitutionality of section 4 of Batas Pambansa Blg. 52 as discriminatory and contrary to the equalprotection and due process guarantees of the Constitution.

Section 4 provided that any retired municipal or provincial city officialthat already received retirement benefits and is 65 years of age shall not be qualified to run for the same local elective office from which he has retired.

Issue: Whether or Not Sec. 4 of BP.52 is unconstitutional being contrary to the equal protection and due process rights.

Held: No. The guarantee of equal protection is subject to rational classification based on reasonable and real differentiations. In the present case, employees 65 years of age have been classified differently from younger employees. the The former are subject to

compulsory retirement while

latter

are

not.

Retirement is not a reasonable disqualification for elective localofficials because there can be retirees who are even younger and a 65 year old retiree could be as good as a 65 year old official who is not a retiree. But there is reason to disqualify a 65 year old elective officialwho is trying to run for office because there is the need for new blood to assume relevance. When an official has retired he has already declared himself tired and unavailable for the same government work.

WHEREFORE, the first paragraph of section 4 of Batas pambansa Bilang 52 is hereby declared valid. PEOPLE VS. CAYAT [68 PHIL 12; G.R. NO. 45987; 5 MAY 1939] Monday, February 02, 2009 Posted by Coffeeholic Writes Labels: Case Digests, Political Law

Facts: Law prohibits any member of a non-Christian tribe to buy, receive, have in his possession, or drink, any intoxicating liquors of any kind. The law, Act No. 1639, exempts only the so-called nativewines or liquors which the members of such tribes have been accustomed to take.

Issue: Whether or Not the law denies equal protection to one prosecuted and sentenced for violation of said law.

Held: No. It satisfies the requirements of a valid classification, one of which is that the classification under the law must rest on real or substantial distinctions.

The distinction is reasonable. The classification between the members of the non- Christian

and the members of the Christian tribes is not based upon accident of birth or parentage but upon the degree of civilization and culture. The term non -Christian tribes refers to a geographical area and more directly to natives of the Philippines of a low grade civilization usually living in tribal relationship apart from settled communities. The distinction is reasonable for the Act was intended to meet the peculiar conditions existing in the nonChristian tribes

The prohibition is germane to the purposes of the law. It is designed to insure peace and order in and among the non- Christian tribes has often resulted in lawlessness and crime thereby hampering the efforts of the government to raise their standards of life and civilization. This law is not limited in its application to conditions existing at the time of the enactment. It is intended to apply for all times as long as thoseconditions exists. The Act applies equally to all members of the class. That it may be unfair in its operation against a certain number of non- Christians by reason of their degree of culture is not an argument against the equality of its operation nor affect the reasonableness of the classification thus established. ICHONG VS. HERNANDEZ [101 PHIL 1155; L-7995; 31 MAY 1957] Sunday, February 01, 2009 Posted by Coffeeholic Writes Labels: Case Digests, Political Law

Facts: Republic Act 1180 or commonly known as An Act to Regulate the Retail Business was passed. The said law provides for a prohibition against foreigners as well

as corporations owned by foreigners from engaging from retail trade in our country. This was protested by the petitioner in this case. According to him, the said law violates the international and treaty of the Philippines therefore it is unconstitutional. Specifically, the Treaty of Amity between thePhilippines and China was violated according to him.

Issue: Whether

or

Not

Republic

Act

1180

is

valid exercise of

police

power.

Held: According to the Court, RA 1180 is a valid exercise of police power. It was also then provided that police power can not be bargained away through the medium of a treaty or a

contract. The Court also provided that RA 1180 was enacted to remedy a real and actual danger to national economy posed by alien dominance and control. If ever the law infringes upon the said treaty, the latter is always subject to qualification or amendment by a subsequent law and the same may never curtain or restrict the scope of the police power of the state. Korematsu v. United States Share on facebookShare on emailShare on print|More Sharing ServicesMore View this case and other resources at: Citation. 323 U.S. 214, 65 S. Ct. 193, 89 L. Ed. 194, 1944 U.S. 1341. Brief Fact Summary. During World War II, a military commander ordered all persons of Japanese descent to evacuate the West Coast. The Petitioner, Korematsu (Petitioner), a United States citizen of Japanese descent, was convicted for failing to comply with the order. Synopsis of Rule of Law. Legal restrictions that curtail the civil rights of a single racial group are subject to the most rigid scrutiny. But, pressing public necessity may sometimes justify such restrictions. Facts. President of the United States Franklin Roosevelt (President Roosevelt) issued an executive order authorizing military commanders to prescribe military areas from which any or all persons may be excluded. Thereupon, a military commander ordered all persons of Japanese descent, whether or not they were United States citizens, to leave their homes on the West Coast and to report to Assembly Centers. The Petitioner, a United States citizen of unchallenged loyalty, but of Japanese descent, was convicted under a federal law making it an offense to fail to comply with such military orders. Issue. Was it within the power of Congress and the Executive to exclude persons of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast at the time that they were excluded?

Held. Yes. At the time the exclusion was ordered, it was justified. Justice Hugo Black stated that although the exclusion order imposed hardships upon a large number of American citizens, hardships are part of war. When, under conditions of warfare, our shores are threatened by hostile forces, the power to protect them must be commensurate with the threatened danger. Dissent. Justice Frank Murphy (J. Murphy) argued that the exclusion at issue here goes over the brink of constitutional power and falls into the abyss of racism. Although we must extend great deference to the judgments of the military, it is essential that there be definite limits to military discretion. Moreover, the military order is not reasonably related to the dangers it seeks to prevent. Justice Robert Jackson (J. Jackson) stated he would not distort the United States Constitution (Constitution) to approve everything the military may deem expedient.

Discussion. Ironically, this case establishes the strict scrutiny standard of review, thereby leading to the invalidation of much race-based discrimination in the future.

Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case concerning the constitutionality of Executive Order 9066, which ordered Japanese Americans into internment camps during World War II regardless of citizenship. In a 6-3 decision, the Court sided with the government, ruling that the exclusion order was constitutional. The opinion, written by Supreme Court justice Hugo Black, held that the need to protect against espionage outweighed Fred Korematsu's individual rights, and the rights of Americans of Japanese descent. (The Court limited its decision to the validity of the exclusion orders, adding, "The provisions of other orders requiring persons of Japanese ancestry to report to assembly centers and providing for the detention of such persons in assembly and relocation centers were separate, and their validity is not in issue in this proceeding.") During the case, Solicitor General Charles Fahy is alleged to have suppressed evidence by keeping from the Court a report from the Office of Naval Intelligence indicating that "there was no evidence Japanese Americans were disloyal, were acting as [3] spies or were signaling enemy submarines." The decision in Korematsu v. United States has been very controversial. Korematsu's conviction for evading internment was overturned on November 10, 1983, after Korematsu challenged the earlier decision by filing for a writ of coram nobis. In a ruling by Judge Marilyn Hall Patel, the United States District Court for the Northern District of California granted the writ (that is, it voided Korematsu's original conviction) because in Korematsu's original case, the government had knowingly submitted false information to the Supreme Court that had a material effect on the Supreme Court's decision. The Korematsu decision has not been explicitly overturned, although in 2011 the Department of Justice [4] filed official notice , conceding that it was in error, thus erasing the case's value as precedent for interning citizens. However, the Court's opinion remains significant both for being the first instance of the Supreme Court applying the strict scrutiny standard to racial discrimination by the government and for being one of only a handful of cases in which the Court held that the government met that standard.
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On May 20, 2011, Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal released an unusual statement denouncing one of [5] his predecessors of more than 65 years ago, Solicitor General Charles Fahy. He accused Mr. Fahy of having suppressed critical evidence in the Hirabayashi and Korematsu cases before the Supreme Court during World War II. The historical record shows that the allegedly suppressed document, known as the Ringle Report, did not originate within "the Office of Naval Intelligence," but was written by a junior intelligence officer in the field and was specifically disavowed by the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations in a letter to the FBI dated February 14, 1942. The letter enclosed a copy of the report, and stated that the report ...does not [6] represent the final and official opinion of the Office of Naval Intelligence. Only two years after the "internment" did the FCC and FBI officially state they had found no evidence of collaborationist radio transmissions by Japanese Americans being sent from the West Coast, but they did find some evidence

of such illicit radio transmissions from Hawaii. Accordingly, it was long felt that any suspicion of "suppression of evidence" by Solicitor General Fahy was ill-advised. Korematsu's vindication in 1983, however, was a ruling that the internment was fatally flawed. Acting Solicitor General Katyal remarked in 2011 that, in the pre-war era of ethnic segregation in public accommodations, which on the West Coast included wide refusal of equal treatment of "Japs," the Chief's office was easily prejudiced to disavow the Ringle Report in its 1942 letter. He noted that Fahy's subordinates had actually alerted Fahy in writing that failing to investigate that report, or at least to disclose its existence in the briefs or argument in the Supreme Court, might approximate the suppression of evidence. Thus, Katyal concluded that Mr. Fahy did not inform the Court that a key set of allegations used to justify the internment had been doubted, if not fully discr edited, within the government's own agencies. Katyal therefore announced his office's filing of a formal "admission of error" negating the precedent value of the Supreme Court decision the government had thereby won. He reaffirmed the extraordinary duty of the Solicitor General to address the Court with "absolute candor," due to the "special credence" the Court explicitly grants to his court submissions.

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Plessy v. Ferguson Share on facebookShare on emailShare on print|More Sharing ServicesMore View this case and other resources at: Citation. 163 U.S.537, 16 S. Ct. 1138, 41 L. Ed. 256, 1896 U.S. 3390. Brief Fact Summary. A Louisiana statute required railroad companies to provide separate, but equal accommodations for its Black and White passengers. The Plaintiff, Plessy (Plaintiff), was prosecuted under the statute after he refused to leave the section of a train reserved for whites. Synopsis of Rule of Law. A law, which authorizes or requires the separation of the two races on public conveyances, is consistent with the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution (Constitution) unless the law is unreasonable. Facts. A Louisiana statute required railroad companies to provide separate, but equal accommodations for its Black and White passengers. An exception was made for nurses attending to the children of the other race. Plaintiff, who was seven-eighths white, was prosecuted under the statute after he refused to leave the section of a train reserved for whites. The alleged purpose of the statute was to preserve public peace and good order and to promote the comfort of the people. Issue. Was the statute requiring separate, but equal accommodations on railroad transportation consistent with the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution?

Held. Yes. The State Supreme Court is affirmed. Justice Henry Brown (J. Brown) stated that although the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution was

designed to enforce the equality between the races, it was not intended to abolish distinctions based on color, or to enforce a commingling of the races in a way unsatisfactory to either. Laws requiring the separation of the races do not imply the inferiority of either. If the law stamps the colored race with a badge of inferiority, it is because the colored race chooses to put that construction upon it. Therefore, the statute constitutes a valid exercise of the States police powers. The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution does, however, require that the exercise of a States police powers be reasonable. Laws enacted in good faith, for the promotion of the public good and not for the annoyance or oppression of another race are reasonable. As such, the statute was reasonable. Dissent. Justice John Harlan (J. Harlan) said that everyone knows that the purpose of the statute was to exclude the colored people from coaches occupied by whites. The Constitution is color-blind. It neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. Discussion. This case marks the beginning of the separate but equal doctrine. It is later overturned by Brown v. Board of Education.