Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Enrile Doctrine on Supreme Court and Senate Impeachment Court

Senate President JUAN PONCE ENRILE speaks on the central and most germane topic of the Supreme Court and the Senate Impeachment Court here in Rappler Dot Com. Since everything that comes before is a gimme,  the take away line for me is at the end where JPE says in the clearest possible way.

Look at the very last declarative sentence in JPE peroration on Impeachment:
JPE: "But it is my humble view that the Supreme Court, in spite of the fact that it has the power of judicial review, cannot assume jurisdiction over the power, the sole power of this Senate sitting as an impeachment court to try and decide this impeachment case."
In other words, the Senate Impeachment Court will obey the Law and the laws (of course!) But it will NOT surrender the "JURISDICTION over the sole power" given to it by the 1987 Constitution in Article XI Sec 3.6  to TRY and DECIDE all cases of impeachment (now and until the Constitution is amended!)

This means to me that IF the Supreme Court should attempt to "assume JURISDICTION over the power, the solve power of this Senate sitting as an impeachment court" then the Supreme Court itself could be deemed to be in GRAVE ABUSE of its DISCRETION  amounting to what JPE and SIC and the People would deem to be an UTTER LACK of JURISDICTION under the 1987 Constitution!

Therefore, the Supreme Court CAN be found guilty of Grave Abuse of Discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction should it try to assume the Senate's sole power over impeachment cases under the Constitution under the very Article VIII that it currently uses against the political departments. Everyone should read the EXACT TEXT and not what others say the Constitution says:

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.
The Senate Impeachment Court can make such a finding of Grave Abuse against the Supreme Court itself because it is indubitably a "Court of Justice" as the entirety of the Enrile Doctrine definitely proclaims and upholds.

JPE's lasting contribution to impeachment-related jurisprudence is the establishment of the principle that even Article VIII Section 1 can be made to apply to the grave abuses of discretion by the Supreme Court itself, at least under the auspices of a competent, coordinate, Constitutional Court, like the Senate Impeachment Court! (So ordered!)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Grave abuse by the SC will happen if the it tries to stop the impeachment proceeding and the eventual consequence will be impeachment of the justices of the SC who vote to issue such an order.

Anonymous said...

Justices from the name itself comes from the word "Just" or "Fair" and one who assume this position must be the right man. Documents as best evidences shows how wrong Mr. Corona to this position. "Justice must be for the people" and Mr. Corona must vacate the place for the right one, that is justce for all!!!!