The issues being of constitutional dimension, however, we now concisely deal with them seriatim.
1. The first objection posed by the respondent is that the Court is without power to compel him to become a member of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines, hence, Section 1 of the Court Rule is unconstitutional for it impinges on his constitutional right of freedom to associate (and not to associate). Our answer is: To compel a lawyer to be a member of the Integrated Bar is not violative of his constitutional freedom to associate.[6]
Integration does not make a lawyer a member of any group of which he is not already a member. He became a member of the Bar when he passed the Bar examinations.[7] All that integration actually does is to provide an official national organization for the well-defined but unorganized and incohesive group of which every lawyer is already a member.[8]
Bar integration does not compel the lawyer to associate with anyone. He is free to attend or not attend the meetings of his Integrated Bar Chapter or vote or refuse to vote in its elections as he chooses. The only compulsion to which he is subjected is the payment of annual dues. The Supreme Court, in order to further the State's legitimate interest in elevating the quality of professional legal services, may require that the cost of improving the profession in this fashion be shared by the subjects and beneficiaries of the regulatory program - the lawyers.[9]
Assuming that the questioned provision does in a sense compel a lawyer to be a member of the Integrated Bar, such compulsion is justified as an exercise of the police power of the State.[10]
2. The second issue posed by the respondent is that the provision of the Court Rule requiring payment of a membership fee is void. We see nothing in the Constitution that prohibits the Court, under its constitutional power and duty to promulgate rules concerning the admission to the practice of law and the integration of the Philippine Bar (Article X, Section 5 of the 1973 Constitution) - which power the respondent acknowledges - from requiring members of a privileged class, such as lawyers are, to pay a reasonable fee toward defraying the expenses of regulation of the profession to which they belong. It is quite apparent that the fee is indeed imposed as a regulatory measure, designed to raise funds for carrying out the objectives and purposes of integration.[11]
3. The respondent further argues that the enforcement of the penalty provisions would amount to a deprivation of property without due process and hence infringes on one of his constitutional rights. Whether the practice of law is a property right, in the sense of its being one that entitles the holder of a license to practise a profession, we do not here pause to consider at length, as it is clear that under the police power of the State, and under the necessary powers granted to the Court to perpetuate its existence, the respondent's right to practise law before the courts of this country should be and is a matter subject to regulation and inquiry. And, if the power to impose the fee as a regulatory measure is recognized, then a penalty designed to enforce its payment, which penalty may be avoided altogether by payment, is not void as unreasonable or arbitrary.[12]
But we must here emphasize that the practice of law is not a property right but a mere privilege, [13] and as such must bow to the inherent regulatory power of the Court to exact compliance with the lawyer's public responsibilities.
4. Relative to the issue of the power and/or jurisdiction of the Supreme Court to strike the name of a lawyer from its Roll of Attorneys, it is sufficient to state that the matters of admission, suspension, disbarment and reinstatement of lawyers and their regulation and supervision have been and are indisputably recognized as inherent judicial functions and responsibilities, and the authorities holding such are legion.[14]
In In Re Sparks (267 Ky. 93, 101 S.W. (2d) 194), in which the report of the Board of Bar Commissioners in a disbarment proceeding was confirmed and disbarment ordered, the court, sustaining the Bar Integration Act of Kentucky, said: "The power to regulate the conduct and qualifications of its officers does not depend upon constitutional or statutory grounds. It is a power which is inherent in this court as a court - appropriate, indeed necessary, to the proper administration of justice ... the argument that this is an arbitrary power which the court is arrogating to itself or accepting from the legislative likewise misconceives the nature of the duty. It has limitations no less real because they are inherent. It is an unpleasant task to sit in judgment upon a brother member of the Bar, particularly where, as here, the facts are disputed. It is a grave responsibility, to be assumed only with a determination to uphold the ideals and traditions of an honorable profession and to protect the public from overreaching and fraud. The very burden of the duty is itself a guaranty that the power will not be misused or prostituted..."
The Court's jurisdiction was greatly reinforced by our 1973 Constitution when it explicitly granted to the Court the power to "promulgate rules concerning pleading, practice . . . and the admission to the practice of law and the integration of the Bar . . ." (Article X, Sec. 5(5)) The power to pass upon the fitness of the respondent to remain a member of the legal profession is indeed undoubtedly vested in the Court.
We thus reach the conclusion that the provisions of Rule of Court 139-A and of the By-Laws of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines complained of are neither unconstitutional nor illegal.
No comments:
Post a Comment