On the Malleability of Laws

To be clear and upfront, this is not a defense of the unqualified view that the law may be bent, which to some means that compliance with the law may be dispensed with. No, this is merely a philosophical and off-the-cuff musing on the rigidity or flexibility of law, in general.

Sanchez Roman defines law as "a rule of conduct, just and obligatory, promulgated by legitimate authority for the common observance and benefit." This definition admits that: first, laws are made, unmade, and amended by legitimate authority; second, that laws are for the common observance, and; third, that it is for the common benefit.

The State, through its legislative organ, makes, amends, or repeals laws. Through the executive arm, the State makes rules implementing the law and executes them. Through the judiciary, it interprets the law and applies it to controversies. In such sense, not only can the law be bent, it can be made, unmade, and amended, for the common benefit, either directly in the laws, in the rules, or in its interpretation.

The people, the sovereign power in our democracy, also contribute to the malleability of law. The practical effectivity of the law rests on its common observance. Individuals, consciously or subconsciously, select not only what laws to follow but also what violations to report or condone. What the group collectively condones as acceptable bends the law towards acceptance of that act. Even if there is a rule or law against nepotism, when society accepts it as inevitable, the law loses and yields to practical reality.

Thus, while the law is structurally and practically malleable, the popular and historical view is that it is rigid. The old adage dura lex sed lex provides that the law may be harsh but it is the law. In Philosophy of Law, we learned of legal positivism, the view that the law needs only application, not wisdom. No matter how harsh the law is, society must at all times follow the law.

In that same class, we were also introduced to Ronald Dworkin, who argued against the strictness of positivism. He forwards the theory that the law is not merely a system of rules, but an evolving narrative that integrates moral principles where the law is unclear or lacking. In the Philippine context, jurists and legal scholars note that our Courts are not only courts of law, but of equity where the law is ambiguous or unclear.

Outside of ambiguity and equity, our Supreme Court does not shy away from interpreting against strict textual adherence, in favor of justice and modern norms. In family law, the Court has interpreted the text of the law in favor of Filipinos who would otherwise receive the short end of divorce decrees. In other cases, the Court allows interpretations of the law to adapt to the exigencies and modern norms.

The above-given definition of the law provides the ultimate goal of laws: the common benefit, the collective benefit of the people.

The Constitution is clear that in our republican democracy, the people are sovereign and all powers of the State emanate from them. This power of the people is exercised through the election of government officials who will speak and act on their behalf and benefit. In this context, the voice of the people is akin to the voice of God: vox populi vox Dei.

More than their voice, the welfare of the people is one of the primary charges of the State. Enshrined in the Constitution, too, is the goal of social justice, which case law has defined as "the promotion of the welfare of all the people, the adoption by the Government of measures calculated to insure economic stability of all the competent elements of society, through the maintenance of a proper economic and social equilibrium in the interrelations of the members of the community, constitutionally, through the adoption of measures legally justifiable, or extra-constitutionally, through the exercise of powers underlying the existence of all governments on the time-honored principle of salus populi est suprema lex." The welfare of the people is the supreme law.