JOSE V. RODRIGUEZ, RECURRENTE, CONTRA VICENTE DEL ROSARIO, ETC., Y OTROS, RECURRIDOS.

Rodriguez versus Del Rosario

The Case

This is a petition for quo warranto — the special civil action by which one person challenges another's right to hold a public office. Jose V. Rodriguez, who had been appointed mayor of the City of Cebu, asks to be restored to that office after the President designated him as a technical assistant in the Office of the President and, on the same day, placed Vicente del Rosario in the mayoralty as acting mayor. The case matters because it draws the line between a lawful temporary designation and an indirect removal of a civil service officer without just cause, a line the Constitution itself forbids the government to cross.

Procedural History

Rodriguez filed his petition for quo warranto directly with the Supreme Court in late May 1953, asking to be reinstated as mayor of Cebu. The respondents, Vicente del Rosario and the other officers impleaded, defended the designation of an acting mayor under the provisions of Commonwealth Act Number 588. The case therefore reached the Supreme Court as an original action, and the Court decided it on the merits in a single opinion.

Facts

On November 9, 1952, Jose V. Rodriguez was appointed mayor of the City of Cebu. He immediately took possession of the office and assumed its powers and duties, and on March 26, 1953, the Commission on Appointments approved his appointment.

On April 6, 1953, he received a letter from the acting executive secretary informing him that, by order of the President, he had been designated to act as technical assistant in the Office of the President, effective immediately. On that same day, Vicente del Rosario was designated acting mayor of Cebu, and he began discharging the office on April 9.

Rodriguez never actually served as technical assistant. While he was still considering whether to accept the designation, he learned of del Rosario's designation as acting mayor. He demanded that del Rosario yield the office, and del Rosario refused; the city treasurer and auditor likewise refused to pay his salary. The records showed that Rodriguez received the salary of technical assistant from April 9 to May 31, 1953, without serving as mayor, but neither did he report to Malacañang; in truth he performed no work at all.

Issues

• Whether or not the temporary designation of Rodriguez as technical assistant in the Office of the President operated as an effective deprivation of his office as mayor of Cebu.
• Whether or not Rodriguez, having accepted the temporary designation and its salary, is barred from abandoning it and reclaiming the mayoralty.
• Whether or not the acting mayor, Vicente del Rosario, may remain in the office for as long as the President pleases.

Applicable Provisions

Article 1 of Commonwealth Act Number 588, the law on temporary designations in case of vacancy or inability, provides:

No obstante cualquiera disposicion de la ley vigente en contrario, cuando un funcionario en el Departamento Ejecutivo del Gobierno, nombrado por el Presidente de Filipinas con el consentimiento de la Comision de Nombramientos de la Asamblea Nacional o solo por el Presidente, no pudiere desempeñar los deberes de su cargo por enfermedad, ausencia u otro motivo, o en caso de vacancia del cargo, el Presidente podra designar a otro funcionario que este ya en el servicio o a cualquier otra persona idonea para actuar temporalmente en dicho cargo, y esa persona, durante el periodo en que este en posesion temporal del mismo, percibira la remuneracion que corresponde al que ejercia el cargo, la cual se pagara, de las consignaciones correspondientes a la oficina respectiva, a menos que dicha persona estuviere ya en el servicio del Gobierno, en cuyo caso, percibira solamente la remuneracion adicional que, juntamente con su sueldo actual, no exceda del sueldo autorizado por la ley para el cargo que ha ocupado: Entendiendose, Que con respecto a las vacancias en los cargos cuyos ocupantes regulares son nombrados por el Presidente con el consentimiento de la Comision de Nombramientos de la Asamblea Nacional, dicha designacion provisional y cualquiera otra que se haga para el mismo cargo durante el periodo de dicha vacancia, no continuaran en ningun caso hasta despues de la fecha de la clausura del periodo ordinario de sesiones de la Asamblea Nacional siguiente a dicha designacion.

The provision authorizes a temporary designation only when the regular officer cannot discharge his duties or the office is vacant; here the mayoralty was neither, since Rodriguez held it and had not been removed.

Article 4, Title Twelve of the Constitution of the Philippines, the security of tenure clause, provides:

Ningun funcionario o empleado del servicio civil sera destituido o suspendido sin causa justificada y de conformidad con la ley.

This is the clause the Court applies to hold that a regularly appointed city mayor cannot be removed, directly or indirectly, without just cause and in accordance with law.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that the designation as technical assistant was a mere temporary appointment that Rodriguez was free to accept or decline, and, having accepted, free to resign. Because the designation required him to be absent from the mayoralty of Cebu, it was in substance an effective deprivation of his office. The Court reasoned that if his stay in the temporary post were compulsory, as the respondents urged, then he would be unduly deprived of the mayoralty. A permanent appointment to another office, such as director of a bureau with the consent of the Commission on Appointments, would cause him to lose the mayoralty automatically; a temporary designation does not.

On the second issue, the Court held that acceptance of the temporary designation did not prevent Rodriguez from abandoning it and reclaiming his own office. When he demanded the mayoralty, he clearly showed that he no longer wished to continue in a post without work, and he cannot be compelled to remain in that state in order to strip him of the office to which he was appointed with the approval of the Commission on Appointments.

On the third issue, the Court rejected the claim that the acting mayor may stay for as long as the President wills. The proviso of Commonwealth Act Number 588 speaks only of vacancies, and it does not say that a designate to a non-vacant office may remain at the President's pleasure. Such a claim would subvert the spirit of the Constitution and violate the security of tenure clause. The Court warned that the President could then move the entire personnel of the government into offices not their own for as long as he wished, and all, under the threat of the sword of Damocles, would serve reluctantly at the mere indication of the Chief Executive rather than according to their sound discretion, moving like puppets and not as responsible officials.

Anchoring the rule in precedent, the Court recalled Borromeo versus Mariano, where it held that judges could not be transferred without their consent, and applied the constitutional clause to hold that a provincial fiscal, a city engineer of Baguio, and the mayor of Iloilo could not be transferred or removed from their offices without consent or in accordance with law. The only causes for removal of a municipal or city officer are disloyalty to the Republic and those enumerated in the Revised Administrative Code; Rodriguez incurred none of them.

Doctrine

A public officer appointed to a fixed term may not be removed, directly or indirectly, except for just cause and in accordance with law, as the Constitution commands:

Ningun funcionario o empleado del servicio civil sera destituido o suspendido sin causa justificada y de conformidad con la ley.

A temporary designation to another office, made under Commonwealth Act Number 588, does not vacate the officer's regular office and does not sever his tenure; it is optional, and the officer may decline it or resign from it and reclaim his own office. The temporary designation of another to act in an office that is not vacant cannot be prolonged at the President's pleasure, for that would be an indirect removal without just cause.

Disposition

The Court ordered Rodriguez restored to the office of mayor of the City of Cebu, with the right to receive the emoluments from June 1 of that year, and directed Vicente del Rosario to vacate the office he had illegally occupied.

Remember This

The one line to memorize: a temporary designation to another office is not a removal, and the officer may abandon it and reclaim his own office, because no civil service officer may be removed, directly or indirectly, without just cause and in accordance with law. Examiners use this case on security of tenure, on the difference between a temporary designation and a permanent appointment, and on quo warranto against an acting official holding a non-vacant office.