1. What is the significance of the rule of law in our government?

How does the government uphold

the rule of law?

The rule of law is a principle of governance in which all persons, institutions and entities, public and
private, including the State itself, are accountable to laws that are publicly promulgated, equally
enforced and independently adjudicated, and which are consistent with international human rights
norms. It also gives peace and order to the country. The government upholds the rule of law by
putting it in the Philippine Constitution.

2. Differentiate the Senate and House of Representatives.

The House of Representatives of the Philippines is the lower house of Congress. Members of the
House are officially styled as representative and sometimes informally called congressmen or
congresswomen and are elected to a three-year term. They can be re-elected, but cannot serve
more than three consecutive terms except with an interruption of one term like the senate. Party-
List Representatives are elected through the party-list system which constitutes not more thn twenty
percent of the total number of representatives.

The Senate of the Philippines is the upper house of Congress of the bicameral legislature of the
Philippines with the House of Representatives as the lower house. The Senate is composed of 24
senators. Senators serve six-year terms with a maximum of two consecutive terms, with half of the
senators elected in elections every three years. The President of the Senate is the presiding officer
and highest-ranking official of the Senate. They are elected by the entire body to be their leader, and
are second in the Philippine presidential line of succession.

3. Explain the Legislative Process in the Philippines.

Bills are laws in the making. They pass into law when they are approved by both houses and the
President of the Philippines. A bill may be vetoed by the President, but the House of
Representatives may overturn a presidential veto by garnering a 2/3rds vote. The procedures for
introducing legislation and seeing it through committees are similar in both the House of
Representatives and the Senate. Once a measure has been introduced and given a number, it is
read and referred to an appropriate committee. It must be noted that during the reading of the bill,
only the title and the author is read on the floor. The Senate President is responsible for referring
bills introduced to appropriate committees. Committee members and staff frequently are experts in
the subjects under their jurisdiction, and it is at the committee stage that a bill comes under the
sharpest scrutiny. If a measure is to be substantially revised, the revision usually occurs at the
committee level.A committee may dispose of a bill in one of several ways: it may approve, or reject,
the legislation with or without amendments; rewrite the bill entirely; reject it, which essentially kills the
bill; report it favorably or without recommendation, which allows the chamber to consider the bill at
all.