WEE BIN, PETITIONER-APPELLEE, VS. REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES, OPPOSITOR-APPELLANT.

Wee Bin versus Republic of the Philippines

The Case

This is the case of Wee Bin versus the Republic of the Philippines, an appeal brought by the Government from an order of the Court of First Instance of Zamboanga City refusing to disturb a twenty-year-old order that had restored the records of Wee Bin's naturalization case and had led to the issuance of a replacement certificate of naturalization. The action is, in substance, the State's belated attempt to set aside that order of restoration and to cancel the certificate issued in its place, on the ground that the restoration proceedings were void for want of publication and for want of authentic documents. The case matters because it fixes the line between the reconstitution of records of pending judicial proceedings, governed by the old Act Numbered Three Thousand One Hundred Ten, and the restoration of records of finished cases, governed by the Rules of Court, and because it teaches how little a naturalized citizen must prove when all he seeks is to establish the fact of a naturalization already granted.

Procedural History

Wee Bin filed with the Court of First Instance of Zamboanga City a petition for reconstitution, later amended into a petition for restoration of record, invoking Section 5, paragraph h, of Rule 124 of the old Rules of Court. The court, then presided by Judge Pablo Villalobos, heard the petition, and on the ninth of May, 1951, issued an order restoring Special Case Numbered 60 in its docket and directing the issuance of the corresponding certificate of naturalization bearing Number 57. The Republic did not appeal from that order. In lieu of the lost certificate, the Clerk of Court issued Certificate of Naturalization Number 6 on the fourteenth of July, 1951.

Almost two decades later, on the twenty-fifth of March, 1970, the Office of the Solicitor General filed with the same court, now presided by Judge Abdulwahid M. Bidin, a motion to set aside the order of May 1951 and to cancel the certificate of naturalization. Wee Bin opposed the motion and moved for its dismissal. After protracted hearings, in which the trial court struck out evidence touching the 1937 naturalization proceedings as irrelevant to the 1951 restoration, the court, on the twenty-seventh of September, 1972, denied the Government's motion and declared the certificate of naturalization valid and effective. The Republic appealed to the Supreme Court.

Facts

Sometime in 1937, Wee Bin filed a petition for naturalization as a Filipino citizen, docketed in the Court of First Instance of Zamboanga City as Special Case Numbered 60. After hearing, the court ordered the preparation of a naturalization certificate, and once the decision became final, the clerk issued Naturalization Certificate Number 57. In March 1942, the Japanese invasion destroyed the courthouse and with it the entire record of the case. Later that year, while Wee Bin was in the mountains of Tigbao, robbers stole his personal papers, including his certificate of naturalization.

In 1944, the Japanese began freezing the deposits of Chinese citizens in the Philippine National Bank in Zamboanga. Because of his Chinese name, Wee Bin executed an affidavit establishing his Filipino citizenship, and his deposit was reactivated. In March 1945, the records of the City of Zamboanga, including the register of naturalization certificates, were destroyed when the American forces liberated the city.

In January 1951, Wee Bin filed his petition for restoration of record, amended in April 1951. At the hearing, he presented oral and documentary evidence, including deeds of sale in which notaries had certified him to be a Filipino citizen, his bank affidavit, and the testimony of the clerk of court. The City Attorney appeared for the Solicitor General, cross-examined one witness, but presented no evidence in opposition. The court granted the petition in May 1951, and the replacement certificate was issued. Nearly twenty years later, the Government moved to set aside that order, alleging lack of publication, absence of an authentic document as basis, and reliance on false documents. The trial court found an absolute failure of proof on the part of the Government and upheld the proceedings.

Issues

• Whether or not it was necessary for Wee Bin to have published his petition for reconstitution or restoration of records, and to have based the restoration on authentic documents.
• Whether or not, if publication and authentic documents were required, the trial court erred in ruling that the Government failed to prove the absence of publication, the absence of an authentic document, and the use of false documents.
• Whether or not the trial court erred in disallowing the State to present evidence assailing the validity of Wee Bin's naturalization in 1937.

Applicable Provisions

Section 2 of Act Numbered Three Thousand One Hundred Ten provides:

SEC. 2. Upon receipt of the notice mentioned in the preceding section, the court shall issue or cause to be issued a general notice which shall be addressed and sent by registered mail to the lawyers and officers mentioned in the preceding section, and to such other persons as might be interested, advising them of the destruction of the records, with a brief list of the proceedings not affected in case the destruction was partial, and of the time fixed by this Act for the reconstitution of the destroyed records. This notice shall also be published in the Official Gazette and in one of the newspapers most widely read in the province, once a week, for four consecutive weeks.

This is the provision the Government invoked to demand publication, and the Court read it to require publication not of the petition but of the court's notice of destruction, and to apply only to pending proceedings.

The title of the same Act, quoted by the Court, provides:

AN ACT TO PROVIDE AN ADEQUATE PROCEDURE FOR THE RECONSTITUTION OF THE RECORDS OF PENDING JUDICIAL PROCEEDINGS AND BOOKS, DOCUMENTS AND FILES OF THE OFFICE OF THE REGISTER OF DEEDS DESTROYED BY FIRE OR OTHER PUBLIC CALAMITIES AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES.

This title confines the Act to pending judicial proceedings, and it is the textual anchor of the Court's holding that the Act does not reach the restoration of records of a decided case.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that neither publication nor authentic documents were required. Act Numbered Three Thousand One Hundred Ten governs the reconstitution of records of pending judicial proceedings, as its title shows, and Wee Bin's petition sought the restoration of the record of a naturalization case already decided and of a certificate already issued. His petition was filed under Section 5, paragraph h, of Rule 124 of the old Rules of Court, now Rule 135, and under the ruling in Yatco versus Cruz, evidence sufficient to prove the contents of a lost or destroyed document under the rules of evidence suffices; an authentic copy is not essential. Even on its own terms, the publication clause of Section 2 requires publication of the court's notice of destruction, not of the petition.

On the second issue, the Court found no reason to disturb the trial court's conclusion that the evidence adduced in the restoration proceeding was genuine and sufficient, especially since the Government presented no contrary evidence despite notice and despite the actual participation of the City Attorney in the 1951 hearing. The Court explained that the rigorous reconstitution of every pleading and order is needed only where the naturalization case is still pending, because no decision can be rendered until the record is complete; where the case has already been decided, the petitioner need only establish the fact of naturalization by restoring the docket number and title of the case and the certificate granted.

On the third issue, the Court sustained the trial court. The proceeding before it was not one for denaturalization but for the cancellation of the 1951 order of restoration, so evidence assailing the 1937 naturalization was irrelevant and immaterial to the issues made out by the pleadings.

Doctrine

First, Act Numbered Three Thousand One Hundred Ten governs only the reconstitution of records of pending judicial proceedings; the restoration of the record of a decided case is governed by Section 5, paragraph h, of Rule 124 of the old Rules of Court, now Rule 135, which requires neither publication nor an authentic document, but only evidence sufficient under the rules of evidence to prove the contents of the lost record.

Second, where the naturalization case has already been decided and the certificate already issued, the petitioner need only prove that the case and the certificate in fact existed in the docket before the war; he need not reconstitute every pleading, document, and order.

Third, an order of restoration of record, long final and unreappealed, carries the presumption of regularity, and a motion to set it aside years later must be supported by competent evidence; the proceeding is not a denaturalization case, and evidence attacking the original naturalization is irrelevant to the validity of the restoration.

Disposition

The Supreme Court denied the appeal and affirmed the order of the trial court, holding the certificate of naturalization issued pursuant to the 1951 order of restoration valid and effective.

Remember This

Memorize the line: Act Numbered Three Thousand One Hundred Ten covers pending proceedings only, while a decided case is restored under the Rules of Court on sufficient evidence, without publication and without an authentic document. Examiners use this case to test the distinction between reconstitution and restoration of records, and the limits of a belated Government motion to cancel a naturalization certificate.