Delos Santos vs Torres G.R. No. L-3881 August 31, 1950

Delos Santos vs Torres G.R. No. L-3881 August 31, 1950

Stripped of details unessential to the solution of the case, the facts are that Eduardo de los Santos, the petitioner, was appointed City Engineer of Baguio on July 16, 1946, by the President, appointment which was confirmed by the Commission on Appointments on August 6, and on the 23rd of that month, he qualified for and began to exercise the duties and functions of the position. On June 1, 1950, Gil R. Mallare was extended an ad interim appointment by the President to the same position, after which, on June 3, the Undersecretary of the Department of Public Works and Communications directed Santos to report to the Bureau of Public Works for another assignment. Santos refused to vacate the office, and when the City Mayor and the other officials named as Mallare's co-defendants ignored him and paid Mallare the salary corresponding to the position, he commenced these proceedings.

It seems plain beyond doubt that the provision of section 2545 of the Revised Administrative Code, he (Governor-General now President) may remove at pleasure any of the said appointive officers," is incompatible with the constitutional inhibition that "No officer or employee in the Civil Service shall be removed or suspended except for cause as provided by law." The two provisions are mutually repugnant and absolutely irreconcilable. One in express terms permits what the other in similar terms prohibits.

We are not declaring any part of section 2545 of the Revised Administrative Code unconstitutional. What we declare is that the particular provision thereof which gave the Chief Executive power to remove officers at pleasure has been repealed by the Constitution and ceased to be operative from the time that instrument went into effect. Unconstitutionally, as we understand it, denotes life and vigor, and unconstitutional legislation presupposes posteriority in point of time to the Constitution. It is a statute that "attempts to validate and legalize a course of conduct the effect of which the Constitution specifically forbids (State ex-rel. Mack vs. Guckenberger, 139 Ohio St., 273; 39 NE. [2d], 840.) A law that has been repealed is as good as if it had never been enacted, and can not, in the nature of things, contravene or pretend to contravene constitutional inhibition. So, unlike legislation that is passed in defiance of the Constitution, assertive and menacing, the questioned part of section 2545 of the Revised Administrative Code does not need a positive declaration of nullity by the court to put it out of the way. To all intents and purposes, it is non-existent, outlawed and eliminated from the statute book by the Constitution itself by express mandate before this petitioner was appointed.

Incidentally, the last discussion answers and disposes of the proposition that in accepting appointment under section 2545 of the Revised Administrative Code, the petitioner must be deemed to have accepted the conditions and limitations attached to the appointment. If the clause of section 2545 which authorized the President to remove officers of the City of Baguio at pleasure had been abrogated when petitioner's appointment was issued, the appointee can not presumed to have abided by this condition.

We therefore hold that the petitioner is entitled to remain in office as City Engineer of Baguio with all the emoluments, rights and privileges appurtenant thereto, until he resigns or is removed for cause, and that respondent Mallare's appointment is ineffective in so far as it may adversely affect those emoluments, rights and privileges. Without costs.