Legaspi: Rule of law

LAST week, Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno was in our midst at the University of Negros Occidental–Recoletos.

She was invited by the Dean of the School of Law, lawyer John Paolo Villasor, to talk to the students about judicial reforms based on the rule of law.

The Chief Justice was so good that she did not speak ill of the administration where she belongs but she was simply saying that we should stand on the rule of law.

We have to respect rules, especially laws.

I remembered our teacher in Ethics, he told us that law is the objective norm of morality. You are judged according to your laws. We have to trust that laws are ordinances based on reason and sound judgment promulgated by those entrusted with authority.

This is the best definition of law as drawn from St. Thomas Aquinas’s definition.

It is an ordinance for it speaks for a certain community. The maxim which states that “when in Rome do as the Romans do” capsulizes the essence of this definition. One has to act in accordance to the law of a certain place. This refers to the human law.

Even looking at the Divine Law, one will be judged according to the law of his tribe. Take the case of the tribes of Israel. There are laws and ordinance proper for each tribe and there are also those that are universal. In some tribes monogamy is enforced while in some, polygamous relationships are allowed. This is why the law is an ordinance.

However, the law is not just simply an ordinance that was thought of the night before. It is an ordinance of reason. In short, the law is something that has been thought of well.

The opinion of the community members should be asked before passing a law. Debates, discourses, and argumentations shall be permitted to test the validity of the law.

If it is an ordinance passed or approved by the minority or by a leader alone, then this is a questionable and illogical ordinance which needs to be trashed or thrown away.

We have to admit that in this country, there are laws passed by our legislators of the past and the present, which did not pass through public hearings or scrutiny.

Much of which are laws that could gain political advantage to the author. Let us take the case of the membership of the country in the International Criminal Court (ICC).

No hearing was conducted but the President signed up for the Filipino people and now we are entangled by a court that meddles with our affairs. So, we need to have laws that are logical and that have passed through the scrutiny of the ordinary Filipino and not by the “big bellied politicians.”

Promulgation shall be done by those who are entrusted with authority. Our leaders should see to it that any law passed should never destroy or degrade the human person.

Laws should be for the common welfare and not for the few. If a law ceases to work for common good, then we have to trash it or to throw it away. There is a need for our dear legislators to always review the laws that were passed in the past.

So, once again the rule of law should always be our basis for anything legal and moral. But it should pass through the test of being just, charitable and for the common welfare. If it does not pass this test then the law is nothing but a set of words for law students to argue and memorize.

St. Ezekiel Moreno, St. Lorenzo Ruiz, St. Pedro Calungsod, Pope St. John Paul II, Mons. John Liu and Su, Fr. Cornelio Moral, OAR and Fr. Loreto Dacanay, OAR, Manoy Bill and Sir Faraon Lopez, pray for us.

Belated birthday greetings to Bishop Patricio Buzon, SDB, DD. (March 14) and congratulations to Bishop-elect Louie Galbines of the Diocese of Kabankalan.

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