SYLLABUS

1. CONSTITUTIONAL LAW; BILL OF RIGHTS; RIGHT TO RETURN TO ONE'S

COUNTRY, NOT AMONG THE RIGHTS GUARANTEED. — The right to return to one's
country is not among the rights specifically guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, which
treats only of the liberty of abode and the right to travel.
2. ID.; ID.; RIGHT TO RETURN CONSIDERED AS A GENERALLY ACCEPTED
PRINCIPLE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW. — It is the court's well-considered view that
the right to return may be considered, as a generally accepted principle of
international law and under our Constitution, is part of the law of the land [Art. II Sec.
2 of the Constitution.]
3. ID.; ID.; RIGHT TO RETURN, DISTINCT AND SEPARATE FROM THE RIGHT
TO TRAVEL. — It is distinct and separate from the right to travel and enjoys a
different protection under the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights, i.e.,
against being "arbitrarily deprived" thereof [Art. 12 (4).]
4. ID.; ALLOCATION OF POWER IN THE THREE BRANCHES OF
GOVERNMENT A GRANT OF ALL THE POWERS INHERENT THERETO. — As the
Supreme Court in Ocampo v. Cabangis [15 Phil. 626 (1910)] pointed out "a grant of the
legislative power means a grant of all legislative power; and a grant of the judicial
power means a grant of all the judicial power which may be exercised under the
government." [At 631-632.] If this can be said of the legislative power which is
exercised by two chambers with a combined membership of more than two hundred
members and of the judicial power which is vested in a hierarchy of courts, it can
equally be said of the executive power which is vested in one official — the President.
5. ID.; PRESIDENT'S POWER UNDER THE 1987 CONSTITUTION; EXTENT
AND LIMITATION. — Consideration of tradition and the development of presidential
power under the different constitutions are essential for a complete understanding
of the extent of and limitations to the President's powers under the 1987
Constitution. Although the 1987 Constitution imposes limitations on the exercise
of specific powers of the President, it maintains intact what is traditionally considered
as within the scope of "executive power." Corollarily, the powers of the President
cannot be said to be limited only to the specific powers enumerated in the
Constitution. In other words, executive power is more than the sum of specific powers
so enumerated.
6. ID.; PRESIDENT'S RESIDUAL POWER TO PROTECT THE GENERAL
WELFARE OF THE PEOPLE; THE POWERS INVOLVED. — The power involved is the
President's residual power to protect the general welfare of the people. It is founded
on the duty of the President, as steward of the people. To paraphrase Theodore
Roosevelt, it is not only the power of the President but also his duty to do anything
not forbidden by the Constitution or the laws that the needs of the nation demand.
The President is not only clothed with extraordinary powers in times of emergency,
but is also tasked with attending to the day-to-day problems of maintaining peace
and order and ensuring domestic tranquillity in times when no foreign foe appears on
the horizon. Wide discretion, within the bounds of law, in fulfilling presidential duties
in times of peace is not in any way diminished by the relative want of an emergency
specified in the commander-in-chief provision.
7. ID.; LIBERTY OF ABODE AND RIGHT TO TRAVEL; REQUEST TO BE
ALLOWED TO RETURN TO THE PHILIPPINES; TO BE TREATED AS ADDRESSED TO
THE RESIDUAL UNSTATED POWERS OF THE PRESIDENT. — The request or
demand of the Marcoses to be allowed to return to the Philippines cannot be
considered in the light solely of the constitutional provisions guaranteeing liberty of
abode and the right to travel, subject to certain exceptions, or of case law which
clearly never contemplated situations even remotely similar to the present one. It
must be treated as a matter that is appropriately addressed to those residual
unstated powers of the President which are implicit in and correlative to the
paramount duty residing in that office to safeguard and protect general welfare. In
that context, such request or demand should submit to the exercise of a broader
discretion on the part of the President to determine whether it must be granted or
denied.
8. ID.; JUDICIAL REVIEW; POWER TO DETERMINE GRAVE ABUSE OF
DISCRETION OR EXCESS OF JURISDICTION ON ANY BRANCH OR
INSTRUMENTALITY OF THE GOVERNMENT. — The present Constitution limits
resort to the political question doctrine and broadens the scope of judicial inquiry into
areas which the Court, under previous constitutions, would have normally left to the
political departments to decide. The deliberations of the Constitutional Commission
cited by petitioners show that the framers intended to widen the scope of judicial
review but they did not intend courts of justice to settle all actual controversies before
them. When political questions are involved, the Constitution limits the
determination to whether or not there has been a grave abuse of discretion
amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction on the part of the official whose action is
being questioned.
9. ID.; LIBERTY OF ABODE AND RIGHT TO TRAVEL; DENIAL OF REQUEST
TO BE ALLOWED TO RETURN TO THE PHILIPPINES, NOT A GRAVE ABUSE OF
DISCRETION. — We find that from the pleadings filed by the parties, from their oral
arguments, and the facts revealed during the briefing in chambers by the Chief of
Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the National Security Adviser,
wherein petitioners and respondents were represented, there exist factual bases for
the President's decision. The documented history of the efforts of the Marcoses and
their followers to destabilize the country, as earlier narrated in this ponencia bolsters
the conclusion that the return of the Marcoses at this time would only exacerbate and
intensify the violence directed against the State and instigate more chaos. With these
before her, the President cannot be said to have acted arbitrarily and capriciously and
whimsically in determining that the return of the Marcoses poses a serious threat to
the national interest and welfare and in prohibiting their return.
GUTIERREZ, JR., J.: dissenting:
1. CONSTITUTIONAL LAW; CONSTITUTION; ITS PROVISIONS PROTECT
ALL MEN, AT ALL TIMES AND UNDER ALL CIRCUMSTANCES. — "The Constitution
. . . is a law for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace, and covers with the
shield of its protection all classes of men, at all times, and under all circumstances. No
doctrine involving more pernicious consequences was ever invented by the wit of
man than that any of its provisions can be suspended during any of the great
exigencies of government." (Ex Parte Milligan, 4 Wall. 2; 18 L. Ed. 281 [1866]).
2. ID.; POLITICAL QUESTIONS; OUTSIDE THE SCOPE OF JUDICIAL
DETERMINATION. — It is a well-settled doctrine that political questions are not
within the province of the judiciary, except to the extent that power to deal with such
questions has been conferred on the courts by express constitutional or statutory
provisions.
3. ID.; ID.; CONSTRUED. — It is not so easy, however, to define the phrase
political question, nor to determine what matters fall within its scope. It is frequently
used to designate all questions that lie outside the scope of the judicial power. More
properly, however, it means those questions which, under the constitution, are to be
decided by the people in their sovereign capacity, or in regard to which full
discretionary authority has been delegated to the legislative or executive branch of
the government.
4. ID.; ID.; CONSTITUTIONAL POWER VESTED EXCLUSIVELY IN THE
PRESIDENT OR CONGRESS, BEYOND PROHIBITION OR EXAMINATION BY THE
COURT REQUIRED FOR ITS EXISTENCE. — For a political question to exist, there
must be in the Constitution a power vested exclusively in the President or Congress,
the exercise of which the court should not examine or prohibit. A claim of plenary or
inherent power against a civil right which claim is not found in a specific provision is
dangerous. Neither should we validate a roving commission allowing public officials
to strike where they please and to override everything which to them represents evil.
The entire Government is bound by the rule of law. The authority implied in Section
6 of the Bill of Rights itself does not exist because no law has been enacted specifying
the circumstances when the right may be impaired in the interest of national security
or public safety. The power is in Congress, not the Executive.
5. ID.; LIBERTY OF ABODE AND RIGHT TO TRAVEL; RIGHT TO TRAVEL
INCLUDES RIGHT TO TRAVEL OUT OF OR BACK TO THE PHILIPPINES. — Section 6
of the Bill of Rights states categorically that the liberty of abode and of changing the
same within the limits prescribed by law may be impaired only upon a lawful order of
a court. Not by an executive officer. Not even by the President. Section 6 further
provides that the right to travel, and this obviously includes the right to travel out of
or back into the Philippines, cannot be impaired except in the interest of national
security, public safety, or public health, as may be provided by law.
6. ID.; POLITICAL QUESTION DOCTRINE NO LONGER UTILIZED BY THE
COURT; COURT COMPELLED TO DECIDE THE CASE UNDER THE 1987
CONSTITUTION. — The framers of the Constitution believed that the free use of the
political question doctrine allowed the Court during the Marcos years to fall back on
prudence, institutional difficulties, complexity of issues, momentousness of
consequences or a fear that it was extravagantly extending judicial power in the cases
where it refused to examine and strike down an exercise of authoritarian power.
Parenthetically, at least two of the respondents and their counsel were among the
most vigorous critics of Mr. Marcos (the main petitioner) and his use of the political
question doctrine. The Constitution was accordingly amended. We are now
precluded by its mandate from refusing to invalidate a political use of power through
a convenient resort to the political question doctrine. We are compelled to decide
what would have been non-justiceable under our decisions interpreting earlier
fundamental charters.
7. ID.; LIBERTY OF ABODE AND RIGHT TO TRAVEL; DENIAL A GRAVE ABUSE
OF DISCRETION. — We do not have to look into the factual bases of the
ban Marcos policy in order to ascertain whether or not the respondents acted with
grave abuse of discretion. Nor are we forced to fall back upon judicial notice of the
implications of a Marcos return to his home to buttress a conclusion. In the first place,
there has never been a pronouncement by the President that a clear and present
danger to national security and public safety will arise if Mr. Marcos and his family are
allowed to return to the Philippines. It was only after the present petition was filed
that the alleged danger to national security and public safety conveniently surfaced
in the respondents' pleadings. Secondly, President Aquino herself limits the reason
for the ban Marcos policy to (1) national welfare and interest and (2) the continuing
need to preserve the gains achieved in terms of recovery and stability. Neither ground
satisfies the criteria of national security and public safety. The "confluence theory" of
the Solicitor General or what the majority calls "catalytic effect," which alone sustains
the claim of danger to national security is fraught with perilous implications. Any
 difficult problem or any troublesome person can be substituted for the Marcos threat
as the catalysing factor. It was precisely the banning by Mr. Marcos of the right to
travel by Senators Benigno Aquino, Jr., Jovito Salonga, and scores of other
"undesirables" and "threats to national security" during that unfortunate period
which led the framers of our present Constitution not only to re-enact but to
strengthen the declaration of this right.
||| (Marcos v. Manglapus, G.R. No. 88211, [September 15, 1989], 258 PHIL 479-541)