MOY YA LIM YAO ALIAS EDILBERTO AGUINALDO LIM AND LAU YUEN YEUNG, PETITIONERS-APPELLANTS, VS. THE COMMISSIONER OF IMMIGRATION, RESPONDENT-APPELLEE.

Appeal from the following decision of the Court of First Instance
of Manila in its Civil Case No. 49705 entitled Moy Ya Lim Yao, etc. et al. vs. The
Commissioner of Immigration which, brief as it is, sufficiently depicts the
factual setting of and the fundamental issues involved in this case thus:

“In the instant case, petitioners seek the issuance of a writ
of in­junction against the Commissioner of Immigration, ‘restraining the latter
and/or his authorized representative from ordering plaintiff Lau Yuen Yeung to leave the Philippines and causing her arrest and
deportation and the confiscation of her bond, upon her failure to do so.’

“The prayer for preliminary in­junction embodied in the
complaint, having been denied, the case was heard on the merits and the parties
submitted their respective evidence.

“The facts of the case, as sub­stantially and correctly stated
by the Solicitor General are these:

‘On February
8, 1961, Lau Yuen Yeung applied for a
pass­port visa to enter the Philip­pines
as a non-immigrant.  In the interrogation
made in con­nection with her application for a temporary visitor’s visa to
enter the Philippines, she stated that she was a Chinese residing at Kowloon, Hongkong, and that she
desired to take a pleasure trip to the Philip­pines to visit her great (grand)
uncle Lau Ching Ping for a period of one month
(Exhibits ‘1’, ‘1-a ‘, and ‘2’).  She was
permitted to come into the Philippines
on March 13, 1464 and was
permitted to stay for a period of one month which would expire on April 13, 1961.  On the date of her ar­rival, Asher Y. Cheng
filed a bond in the amount of P1,000.00 to undertake, among others, that said
Lau Yuen Yeung would actually depart from the
Philippines or before the expiration of her authorized period of stay in this
country or within the pe­riod as in his discretion the Commissioner of
Immigration or his authorized representative might pro­perly allow.  After re­peated extensions, peti­tioner Lau
Yuen Yeung was allowed to stay in the Philippines
up to February 13, 1962 (Exhibit
‘4’).  On January 25, 1962, she contracted marriage with Moy Ya Lim Yao
alias Edilberto Aguinaldo
Lim an alleged Filipino citizen.  Because
of the contemplated action of respondent to confis­cate her bond and order her
arrest and immediate deportation, after the ex­piration of her authorized stay,
she brought this act­ion for injunction with preliminary injunction.  At the hearing which took place one and a
half years after her arrival, it was admitted that petitioner Lau Yuen Yeung could not write either English or Tagalog.  Except for a few words, she
could not speak either English or Tagalog.  She could not name any Fi­lipino neighbor,
with a Filipino name except one, Rosa. 
She did not know the names of her brothers-in-law, or sisters-in-law.

“Under the facts unfolded above, the Court is of the
considered opinion, and so holds, that the instant petition for injunction
cannot be sustained for the same reasons set forth in the Order this Court,
dated March 19, 1962, the pertinent portions of which read:

‘First, Section 15 of the Re­vised Naturalization Law provides:

‘“Effect of the natura­lization on wife and children.  – Any woman who is now or may hereafter be
married to a citizen of the Philip­pines,
and who might her­self be lawfully naturaliz­ed shall be deemed a citi­zen of
the Philippines.”

The above-quoted provision is clear and its
import unequivocal and hence it should be held to mean what it plainly and
explicitly expresses in unmistakable terms. 
The clause ‘who might herself be lawfully naturalized’ incontestably
implies that an alien woman may be deem­ed a citizen of the Philippines by vir­tue
of her marriage to a Filipino citi­zen only if she possesses all the
qualifications and none of the disqualifications specified in the law,
because these are the explicit requisites pro­vided by law for an alien to be
natu­ralized.  (Lee Suan
Ay, Alberto Tan’ and Lee Chiao vs. Emilio Galang, etc., G. R. No. L-11855).  However, from the allegation of paragraph 3
of the com­plaint, to wit:

‘”3.  That plaintiff Lau Yuen Yeung,
Chinese by birth, who might herself be lawfully natu­ralized as a Filipino
citizen (not being disqualified to be­come such by naturalization), is a
Filipino citizen by virtue of her marriage on January 25, 1962 to plaintiff MOY
YA LIM YAO alias EDILBERTO AGUINALDO LIM, under the Naturalization Laws of the
Philippines.”

it can be deduced beyond debate that
petitioner Lau Yuen Yeung while claim­ing not to be
disqualified, does not and cannot allege that she possesses all the
qualifications to be naturalized, naturally because, having been admitted as a
temporary visitor only on March 13, 1961, it is obvious at once that she lacks,
at least, the requisite length of residence in the Philippines (Revised
Naturalization Law, See. 2, Case No. 2, Sec. 3, Case No. 3).

‘Were it the intention of the law that the alien woman, to be
deemed a citizen of the Philippines by virtue of mar­riage to a Filipino
citizen, need only be not disqualified under the Naturalization Law, it would
have been worded “and who herself is not dis­qualified to become a citizen
of the Philippines.”

‘Second, Lau Yuen Yeung, a temporary
Chinese woman visi­tor, whose authorized stay in the Philippines, after repeat­ed
extensions thereof, was to expire last February 28, 1962, having married her
co-plain­tiff only on January 25, 1962, or just a little over one month before
the expiry date of her stay, it is evident that said marriage was effect­ed
merely for convenience to defeat or avoid her then impending compulsory
departure, not to say deportation.  This
cannot be permitted.

‘Third, as the Solicitor General has well stated:

‘”5.  That petitioner Lau Yuen Yeung,
having been admitted as a temporary alien visitor on the strength of a
deliberate and voluntary representation that she will enter and stay only for a
period of one month and thereby secured a visa, cannot go back on her
representation to stay permanently with­out first departing from the
Philippines as she had promised.” (Chung Tiao
Bing, et al. vs. Commissioner of Immigra­tion, G. R. No. L-9966, September 29, 1956; Ong Se Lun vs. Board of Com­missioners,
G. R. No. L­6017, September 16, 1954;
Sec. 9, last par., Phil. Immigration Law).

The aforequoted
argument of the Solicitor General is well but­tressed, not only by the decided
cases of the Supreme Court on the point mentioned above, but also on the very
provisions of Section 9, sub-paragraph (g) of the Phi­lippine Immigration Act
of 1940 which reads:

‘”An alien who is ad­mitted as a non-immigrant cannot remain
in the Phi­lippines
permanently.  To obtain permanent
admission, a non-immigrant alien must depart voluntarily to some foreign
country and procure from the appropriate Philippine Consul the proper visa and
thereafter undergo examination by the Officers of the Bureau of Immigration at
a Philippine port of entry for de­termination of his admis­sibility in
accordance with the requirements of this Act. 
(This paragraph is added by Republic Act 503).'” (Sec. 9,
subparagraph (g) of the Philip­pine Immigration Act of 1940).

‘And fourth, respondent Com­missioner of Immigration is charged
with the administration of all laws relating to immigra­tion (Sec. 3, Com. Act
No. 613) and in the performance of his duties in relation to alien im­migrants,
the law gives the Commissioner of Immigration a wide discretion, a quasi-judi­cial
function in determining cases presented to him (Pedro Uy
So vs. Commissioner of Immi­gration CA-G. R. No. 23336-R, Dec. 15, 1960), so that his de­cision thereon
may not be disturbed unless he acted with abuse of discretion or in ex­cess of
his jurisdiction.’

“It may also be not amiss to state that wife Lau Yuen Yeung, while she barely and insufficiently talk in broken Tagalog and English, she admitted that she cannot write
either language.”

The only matter of fact not clearly passed upon by His Ho­nor
which could have some bearing in the resolution of this appeal is the
allegation in the brief of petitioners-appellants, not denied in the
government’s brief, that “in the hearing ….., it was shown thru the testimony
of the plaintiff Lau Yuen Yeung that she does not
possess any of the disqualifications for naturalization.” Of course, as an
additional somehow relevant factual matter, it is also emphasized by said
appellants that during the hearing in the lower court, held almost ten months
after the alleged marriage of petitioners, “Lau Yuen Yeung
was already carrying in her womb for seven months a child by her husband.”

Appellants have assigned six errors allegedly commit­ted by the
court a quo, thus:

I

THE LOWER COURT ERRED IN HOLDING THAT THE CLAUSE ‘WHO MIGHT HERSELF
BE LAWFULLY NATURALIZED’ (OF SECTION 15, REVISED NATURALIZATION LAW)
INCONTESTABLY IMPLIES THAT AN ALIEN WOMAN MAY BE DEEMED A CITIZEN OF THE
PHILIPPINES BY VIRTUE OF HER MARRIAGE TO A FILIPINO CITIZEN, ONLY IF SHE
POSSESSES ALL THE QUALIFICATIONS AND NONE OF THE DISQUALIFICATIONS SPECIFIED IN
THE LAW.

II

THE LOWER COURT ERRED IN HOLDING THAT A WOMAN FOREIGNER WHO DOES
NOT POSSESS ANY OF THE DISQUALIFICATIONS FOR CITIZENSHIP AND WHO MARRIED A
FILIPINO CITIZEN IS STILL CONSIDERED AN ALIEN EVEN AFTER SUCH MARRIAGE AS TO
FALL WITHIN THE REQUIREMENT OF SECTION 9, SUB-PARAGRAPH (9) OF THE PHILIPPINE
IMMIGRATION ACT OF 1940.

III

THE COURT ERRED IN CONCLUDING THAT LAU YUEN YEUNG’S MARRIAGE TO A
FILI­PINO CITIZEN WAS ONLY FOR CONVENIENCE, MERELY BECAUSE THE SAME WAS
CELEBRATED JUST OVER A MONTH BEFORE THE EXPIRY DATE OF HER AUTHORIZED STAY.

IV

THE LOWER COURT ERRED IN FAILING TO FIND THAT THE COMMISSIONER OF
IMMIGRATION ACTED WITH ABUSE OF DISCRETION OR IN EXCESS OF HIS JURISDICTION
WHEN SAID OFFICER THREATENED TO SEND OUT OF THE COUNTRY PLAINTIFF LAU YUEN
YEUNG WITH WARNING THAT HER FAILURE TO DO SO WOULD MEAN CONFISCATION OF HER
BOND, ARREST AND IMMEDIATE DEPORTATION, IN SPITE OF THE FACT THAT LAU YUEN
YEUNG IS NOW A FILIPINO CITIZEN.

V

THE LOWER COURT ERRED IN DISMIS­SING PLAINTIFFS-APPELLANTS’
COMPLAINT AND IN REFUSING TO PERMANENTLY ENJOIN THE COMMISSIONER FROM ORDERING
PLAIN­TIFF LAU YUEN YEUNG TO LEAVE THE PHI­LIPPINES AS A TEMPORARY VISITOR WHICH
SHE IS NOT.

VI

THE LOWER COURT
ERRED IN REFUSING TO GRANT PLAINTIFFS-APPELLANTS’ MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY
INJUNCTION EMBODIED IN THEIR COMPLAINT, IN AN OR­DER DATED MARCH 19, 1962. 
(PAGES 36­41, RECORD ON APPEAL)

We need not discuss these assigned errors separately.  In effect, the above-decision upheld the two
main grounds of objection of the Solicitor General to the petition in the court
below, viz:

“That petitioner Lau Yuen Yeung, having
been admitted as a temporary alien visitor on the strength of a deliberate and
voluntary representation that she will enter and stay only for a period of one
month and thereby secured a visa, cannot go back on her representation to stay
permanently without first departing from the Philippines as she had promised.  (Chung Tiao Bing,
et al., vs. Commissioner of Immigration, G. R. No. L-9966, September 29, 1956; Ong
Se Lun vs. Board of Commissioners, G. R. No. L-6017, Sept. 16, 1954; Sec. 9, last par.
Phil. Immigration Law);

“That the mere marriage of a Fi­lipino citizen to an alien
does not automatically confer on the latter Philippine citizenship.  The alien wife must possess all the qualifi­cations
required by law to become a Filipino citizen by naturalization and none of the
disqualifications.  (Lee Suan Ay, Alberto Tan and Lee Chiao
vs. Galang, etc., G. R. No. L-11855, Dec. 25, 1959)”

It is obvious from the mature of these
objections that their proper resolution would necessarily cover all the points
raised in appellants’ assignments of error, hence, We will base our discussions,
more or less, on said objections.

I.

The first objection of the Solicitor General which co­vers the
matters dealt with in appellants’ second and fourth assignments of error does
not require any lengthy discussion.  As a
matter of fact, it seems evident that the Solicitor General’s pose that an
alien who has been admit­ted into the Philippines as a non-immigrant cannot
remain here permanently unless he voluntarily leaves the country first and goes
to a foreign country to secure thereat from the appropriate Philippine consul
the proper visa and thereafter undergo examination by officers of the Bureau of
Immigration at a Philippine port of entry for determination of his
admissibility in accordance with the requirements of the Philippine Immigration
Act of 1940, as amended by Re­public Act 503, is premised on the assumption
that peti­tioner Lau Yuen Yeung is not a Filipino
citizen.  We note the same line of
reasoning in the appealed decision of the court a quo.  Accordingly, it is but safe to assume that
were the Solicitor General and His Honor of the view that said petitioner had
become ipso facto a Filipina by virtue of her marriage to her
Filipino husband, they would have held her as entitled to assume the status of
a permanent resident without having to depart as required of aliens by Section
9 (g) of the law.

In any event, to set this point at rest, We hereby hold that that
portion of Section 9 (g) of the Immigration Act providing:

“An alien who is admitted as a non-immigrant cannot remain in
the Philippines
permanently.  To obtain permanent
admission, a non-immigrant alien must depart voluntarily to some foreign
country and procure from the appropriate Philippine consul the proper visa and
thereafter undergo examination by the officers of the Bureau of Immigration at
a Philippine port of entry for deter­mination of his admissibility in
accordance with the requirements of this Act.”

does not apply to aliens who after coming
into the Philip­pines
as temporary visitors, legitimately become Filipino citizens or acquire
Filipino citizenship.  Such change of
nationality naturally bestows upon them the right to stay in the Philippines
permanently or not, as they may choose, and if they elect to reside here, the
immigration autho­rities may neither deport them nor confiscate their
bonds.  True it is that this Court has
vehemently expressed dis­approval of convenient ruses employed by aliens to con­vert
their status from temporary visitors to permanent residents in circumvention of
the procedure prescribed by the legal provision already mentioned, such as in Chiong Tiao Bing vs. Commissioner
of Immigration, 99 Phil. 1020, wherein, thru Mr. Justice J. B. L. Reyes, the
Court reiterating the ruling in Ong Se Lun vs. Board of Immigration Commissioners, 95 Phil. 785, said:

“x x x It
is clear that if an alien gains admission to the Islands on the strength of a
deliberate and voluntary representation that he will enter only for a limited
time, and thereby secures the benefit of a temporary visa, the law will not
allow him subsequently to go back on his representation and stay permanently,
without first departing from the Philippines as he had promised.  No officer can relieve him of the departure
requirements of section 9 of the Immigration Act, under the guise of ‘change’
or ‘cor­rection’, for the law makes no distinctions, and no officer is above
the law.  Any other ruling would, as
stated in our previous decision, encourage aliens to enter the Is­lands on
false pretences; every alien so permitted to enter for a limited time, might
then claim a right to permanent admission, how­ever flimsy such claim should
be, and thereby compel our government to spend time, money and effort to
examining and verifying whether or not every such alien really has a right to
take up permanent residence here.  In the
meanwhile, the alien would be able to prolong his stay and evade his return to
the port whence he came, contrary to what he promised to do when he
entered.  The damages inherent in such
ruling are self-evident.”

On the other hand, however, We cannot see any rea­son why an
alien who has been here as a temporary visi­tor but who has in the meanwhile
become a Filipino should be required to still leave the Philippines for a
foreign country, only to apply thereat for a re-entry here and undergo the
process of showing that he is entitled to come back, when after all, such right
has become incon­testible as a necessary concomitant
of his assumption of our nationality by whatever legal means this has been
conferred upon him.  Consider, for example,
precisely the case of the minor children of an alien who is naturalized.  It is indubitable that they become ipso
facto citizens of the Philippines.  Could it be the law that before they can be
allowed permanent residence, they still have to be taken abroad so that they
may be processed to determine whether or not they have a right to have perma­nent
residence here?  The difficulties and
hardships which such a requirement entails and its seeming unreasonable­ness
argue against such a rather absurd construction.  In­deed, as early as 1957, in Ly Giok Ha v. Galang, 101 Phil. 459,
Mr. Justice Concepcion, our present Chief Justice,
already ruled thus:

x x x (P)etitioners allege that, upon her marriage to a Filipino, Ly
Giok Ha became also a citizen of the Philippines.  Indeed, if this conclu­sion were correct, it
would follow that, in consequence of her marriage, she had been naturalized as
such ci­tizen, and, hence the decision ap­pealed from would have to be
affirmed, for section 40(c) of Commonwealth Act 613 provides that ‘in the event
of the naturalization as a Philippine citizen x x x of the alien on whose behalf the bond deposit is given, the
bond shall be cancelled or the sum deposited shall be re­turned to the
depositor or his le­gal representative.'” (At. pp. 462­-463)

In other words, the applicable statute
itself more than implies that the naturalization of an alien visitor as a
Philippine citizen logically produces the effect of conferring upon him ipso
facto all the rights of citizenship including that of being entitled to
permanently stay in the Philippines outside the orbit of authority of the
Commissioner of Immigration vis-a-vis aliens, if only
because by its very nature and express provisions, the Immigration Law is a law
only for aliens and is inapplicable to citizens of the Philippines.  In the sense thus discussed, therefore,
appellants’ second and fourth assignments of error are well taken.

II.

Precisely, the second objection of the Solicitor Ge­neral sustained
by the trial judge is that appellant Lau Yuen Yeung’s
marriage to appellant Moya Lim Yao
alias Edilberto Aguinaldo
whose Filipino citizenship is not de­nied did not have the effect of making her
a Filipino, since it has not been shown that she “might herself be
lawfully naturalized”, it appearing clearly in the re­cord that she does
not possess all the qualifications required of applicants for naturalization by
the Revised Naturalization Law, Commonwealth Act 473, even if she has proven
that she does not suffer from any of the disqualifications thereunder.  In other words, the Solicitor Gene­ral
implicitly concedes that had it been established in the proceedings below that
appellant Lau Yuen Yeung pos­sesses all the
qualifications required by the law of applicants for naturalization, she would
have been recognized by the respondent as a Filipino citizen in the instant
case, without requiring her to submit to the usual proceedings for
naturalization.

To be sure, this position of the Solicitor General is in accord
with what used to be the view of this Court since Lee Suan
Ay, et al. v. Emilio Galang, etc., et al., G. R. No.
L-11855 promulgated December 23, 1959,
106 Phil., 706, 713,^[1]
for it was only in Zita Ngo. Burca
vs. Republic, G. R. No. L-24252 which was promulgated on January 30, 1967 (19
SCRA 186), that over the pen of Mr. Justice Conrado
Sanchez, this Court held that for an alien woman who marries a Filipino to be
deemed a Filipina, she has to apply for naturalization in accordance with the
procedure prescribed by the Revised Naturaliza­tion Law and prove in said
naturalization proceeding not only that she has all the qualifications and none
of the disqualifications provided in the law but also that she has complied
with all the formalities required thereby like any other applicant for
naturalization,^[2]
albeit said decision is not yet part of our jurisprudence inas­much as the
motion for its reconsideration is still pending resolution.  Appellants are in effect urging Us, however,
in their first and second assignments of error, not only to reconsider Burca but to even reexamine Lee Suan
Ay which, as a matter of fact, is the prevailing rule, having been reiterated
in all subsequent decisions up to So Im Ty.^[3]

Actually    the first case
in which Section 15 of the Naturalization Law, Commonwealth Act 473, underwent
judicial construction was in the first Ly Giok Ha
case,^[4]
one almost identical to the one at bar. 
Ly Giok Ha, a woman of Chinese nationality,
was a temporary visitor here whose authority to stay was to expire on March 14, 1956.  She filed a bond to guaranty her timely depar­ture.  On March
8, 1956, eight days before the expira­tion of her authority to
stay, she married a Filipino by the name of Restituto
Lacasta.  On
March 9, 1956,her husband notified the Commissioner of Immigration of said
marriage and, contending that his wife had become a Fi­lipina by reason of said
marriage, demanded for the cancellation of her bond, but instead of acceding to
such request, the Commissioner required her to leave, and u­pon her failure to
do so, on March 16, 1956, the Commis­sioner confiscated her bond; a suit was
filed for the recovery of the bond; the lower court sustained her con­tention
that she had no obligation to leave because she had become Filipina by marriage,
hence her bond should be returned.  The
Commissioner appealed to this Court.  In
the said appeal, Mr. Justice Roberto Concepcion, our
present Chief Justice, spoke for the Court, thus:

“The next and most important ques­tion for determination is
whether her marriage to a Filipino justified or, at least, excused the
aforesaid fai­lure of Ly Giok Ha to depart from the Philippines
on or before March 14, 1956.  In maintaining the affirmative view,
petitioners alleged that, upon her marriage to a Filipino, Ly Giok Ha became, also, a citizen of the Philippines.  Indeed, if this con­clusion were correct, it
would follow that, in consequence of her marriage, she had been naturalized as
such citizen, and, hence, the decision appealed from would have to be affirmed,
for section 40 (c) of Com­monwealth Act No. 613 provides that ‘in the event of
the natura­lization as a Philippine citizen x x x of the alien on whose behalf the bond deposit is given, the
bond shall be cancelled or the sum deposited shall be returned to the
depositor or his legal repre­sentative.” Thus the issue boils down to whether
an alien female who marries a male citizen of the Philippines
follows ipso facto his political status.

“The pertinent part of section 15 of Commonwealth Act No. 473,
upon which petitioners rely, reads:

‘Any woman who is now or may hereafter be married to a citizen of
the Philippines,
and who might herself be lawfully naturalized shall be deemed a citizen Philippines.’

“Pursuant thereto, marriage to a male Filipino does not
vest Philip­pine citizenship to his foreign wife, unless she ‘herself may be
lawfully naturalized.’ As correctly held in an opinion of the secretary of
Justice (Op. No. 52, series of 1950)#
this limitation of section 15 ex­cludes, from the benefits of natura­lization
by marriage, those disquali­fied from being naturalized as citizens of the Philippines
under section 4 of said Commonwealth Act No. 473, namely:

‘(a)  Persons opposed to or­ganized government or
affiliat­ed with any association or group of persons who uphold and teach
doctrines opposing all organized governments;

‘(b)  Persons defending or teaching the necessity or
propriety of violence, personal assault, or assas­sination for the success and
predominance of their ideas;

‘(c)  Polygamists or be­lievers in the practice of
polygamy;

‘(d)  Persons convicted of crimes involving moral
turpitude;

‘(e)  Persons suffering from mental alienation or
incurable contagious di­seases;

‘(f)   Persons who, during the period of their resi­dence
in the Philippines,
have not mingled socially with the Filipinos, or who have not evinced a sincere
desire to learn and embrace the customs, traditions, and ideals of the
Filipinos;

‘(g)  Citizens or subjects of nations with whom the
x x x Philippines
are at war, during the period of such war;

‘(h)  Citizens or subjects of a foreign country
other than the United States, whose laws do not grant Filipinos the right to
become natura­lized citizens or subjects thereof.’

“In the case at bar, there is neither proof nor allegation in
the pleadings that Ly Giok Ha does not fall under any
of the classes disqualified by law. 
Moreover, as the parties who claim that, despite her failure to depart
from the Philippines
within the pe­riod specified in the bond in ques­tion, there has been no breach
thereof, petitioners have the burden of proving her alleged change of political
status, from alien to citizen.  Strictly
speaking, peti­tioners have not made out, there­fore, a case against the
respondents-appellants.

“Considering, however, that neither in the administrative pro­ceedings,
nor in the lower court, had the parties seemingly felt that there was an issue
on whether Ly Giok Ha may be lawfully naturalized,’
and this being a case of first im­pression in our courts, we are of the opinion
that, in the interest of equity and justice, the parties here­in should be
given an opportunity to introduce evidence, if they have any, on said
issue.” (At pp. 462-464.)

As may be seen, although not specifically in so many words, no
doubt was left in the above decision as regards the following propositions:

1.     
That under Section 15 of Commonwealth Act 473,
the Revised Naturalization Law, the marriage of an alien woman to a Filipino
makes her a Filipina, if she “herself might be lawfully naturalized”;

2.     
That this Court declared as correct the opinion
of the Secretary of Justice that the limitation of Sec­tion 15 of the
Naturalization Law excludes from the bene­fits of naturalization by marriage,
only those disquali­fied from being naturalized under Section 4 of the
law quoted in the decision;

3.     
That evidence to the effect that she is not dis­qualified
may be presented in the action to recover her bond confiscated by the
Commissioner of Immigration;

4.     
That upon proof of such fact, she may be recog­nized
as Filipina; and

5.  That in referring to the
disqualifications enumerated in the law, the Court somehow left the impression
that no inquiry need be made as to qualifications^[5]
specially considering that the decision cited and footnoted several opinions of
the Secretary of Justice, the immediate superior of the Commissioner of
Immigration, the most important of which are the following:

“Paragraph (a), section 13 of Act No. 2927, as amended, (now
section 15, Commonwealth Act No. 473), pro­vided that ‘any woman who is now or
hereafter be married to a citizen of the Philippines, and who might her­self be
lawfully naturalized shall be deemed a citizen of the Philippines.’ A similar
provision in the naturalization law of the United States has been construed as
not re­quiring the woman to have the qualifications of residence, good charac­ter,
etc., as in the case of natura­lization by judicial proceedings, but
merely that she is of the race of persons who may be naturalized.  (Kelly v. Owen [Dist. Col. 1868] 7 Wall 496,
57, 11, 12; ex parte Tryason
[D. C. Wash. 1914] 215 F. 449, 27 Op. Atty. Gen. 507).  (Op. No. 168 s. 1940 of Justice Sec.
Jose Abad Santos.)

“In a previous opinion rendered for your Office, I stated that
the clause ‘who might herself be lawful­ly naturalized’, should be construed as
not requiring the woman to have the qualifications of residence, good
character, etc., as in cases of naturalization by judicial proceedings, but
merely that she is of the race of persons who may be natura­lized.  (Op. No. 79, s. 1940)

“Inasmuch as the race qualifica­tion has been removed by the
Revised Naturalization Law, it results that any woman who married a citizen of
the Philippines prior to or after June 17, 1939, and the marriage not having
been dissolved, and on the assumption that she possesses none of the
disqualifications mentioned in Section 4 of Commonwealth Act No. 473, follows
the citizenship of her husband.” (Op. No. 176, s. 1940 of Justice Sec.
Jose Abad Santos.)

“From the foregoing narration of facts, it would seem that the
only material point of inquiry is as to the citizenship of Arce
Machura.  If he
shall be found to be a citizen of the Philippines,
his wife, Mrs. Lily James Machura, shall likewise be
deemed a citizen of the Philippines
pursuant to the provision of Section 15, Commonwealth Act No. 473, which reads
in part as follows:

‘Any woman who is now or may hereafter be married to a citizen of
the Philippines,
and who might herself be law­fully naturalized shall be deemed a citizen of the
Phi­lippines.’

“The phrase ‘who might herself be lawfully naturalized’, as
contained in the above provision, means that the woman who is married to a
Filipi­no citizen must not belong to any of the disqualified classes enumerated
in Section 4 of the Naturalization Law (Ops., Sec. of Jus., No. 28, s. 1950;
No. 43 s. 1948; No. 95, s. 1941; Nos. 79 and 168, s. 1940).  Un­der the facts stated in the within papers,
Mrs. Machura does not appear to be among the
disqualified classes mentioned in the law.

“It having been shown that Arce Machura or Arsenio Guevara was
born as an illegitimate of a Filipino mother, he should be considered as a
citizen of the Philippines in conso­nance with the well-settled rule that an
illegitimate child follows the ci­tizenship of his only legally recog­nized
parent, the mother (Op., Sec. of Just., Nos. 5b, 98 & 281, s. 1948; No. 96,
s. 1949).  Her husband be­ing a Filipino,
Mrs. Machura must necessarily be deemed as a citizen
of the Philippines
by marriage (Sec. 15, Com. Act No. 473). 
(Op. No. 52, s. 1950 of Justice Sec. Ricardo Nepomuceno.)

The logic and authority of these opinions, compel­ling as they
are, must have so appealed to this Court that five days later, on May 22, 1957, in Ricardo Cua v. The Board of Commissioners, 101 Phil. 521, Mr. Just­ice
J. B. L. Reyes, reiterated the same ruling on the basis of the following facts:

Tjioe Wu Suan,
an Indonesian, arrived in Manila on
November 1, 1952, but it
turned out that her passport was forged. 
On December 10, 1953,
a warrant was issued for her arrest for purposes of deportation.  Later on December 20, 1953, she married Ricardo Cua, a Filipino, and because of said marriage, the Board of
Special In­quiry considered her a Filipina. 
Upon a review of the case, however, the Board of Immigration
Commissioners insisted on continuing with the deportation proceedings and so,
the husband filed prohibition and mandamus proceedings.  The lower court denied the petition.  Al­though this Court affirmed said decision,
it held, on the other hand, that:

“Granting the validity of mar­riage, this Court has ruled in
the recent case of Ly Giok Ha v. Ga­lang,
supra, p. 459, that the bare fact of a valid marriage to a citi­zen does
not suffice to confer his citizenship upon the wife.  Sec­tion 15 of the Naturalization Law
requires that the alien woman who marries a Filipino must show, in addition,
that she ‘might herself be lawfully naturalized’ as a Fili­pino citizen.  As construed in the decision cited, this
last condition requires proof that the woman who married a Filipino is herself
not disqualified under section 4 of the Naturalization Law.

“No such evidence appearing on record, the claim of assumption
of Filipino citizenship by Tjioe Wu Suan, upon her marriage to petitioner, is untenable.  The lower court, therefore, committed no
error in refusing to interfere with the deportation proceedings, where she can
anyway establish the requisites indispensable for her acquisition of Filipino
citizenship, as well as the alleged validity of her Indonesian passport.”
(Ricardo Cua v. The Board of Immigration
Commissioners, G. R. No. L-9997, May 1957, 101 Phil. 521, 523.) [Underscoring
supplied]

For emphasis, it is reiterated that in the above two cases, this
Court expressly gave the parties concerned opportunity to prove the fact that
they were not suffering from any of the disqualifications of the law without
the need of undergoing any judicial naturalization proceeding.  It may be stated, therefore, that, according to
the above decisions, the law in this country, on the matter of the effect of
marriage of an alien woman to a Filipino is that she thereby becomes a
Filipina, if it can be proven that at the time of such marriage, she does not
possess any of the disqualifications enumerated in Section 4 of the
Naturalization Law, without the need of submitting to any naturalization
proceedings under said law.

It is to be admitted that both of the above decisions made no
reference to qualifications, that is, as to whether or not they need also to be
proved, but, in any event, it is a fact that the Secretary of Justice
understood them to mean that such qualifications need not be possessed nor
proven.  Then Secre­tary of Justice Jesus
Barrera, who later became a distinguished members of this Court^[6]
so ruled in opinions rendered by him subsequent to Ly Giok
Ha, the most illustrate of which held:

“At the outset it is important to note that an alien woman,
married to a Filipino citizen needs only to show that she ‘might herself be
lawfully naturalized’ in order to acquire Phi­lippine citizenship.  Compliance with other condition of the
statute, such as those relating to the qualifications of an applicant for
naturalization through judicial proceedings, is not necessary.  (Sec. Leonard v. Grant, 5 Fed. 11; 27 Ops.
Atty. Gen. [U.S] 507; Ops. Sec. of Justice No. 776, s. 1940, and No. 111, s.
1953.

“This view finds support in the case of Ly Giok
Ha et al. v. Galang et al., G. R. No. L-10760,
promulgated May 17, 1957, where the Sup­reme Court, construing the above-quoted
section of the Naturalization Law, held that ‘marriage to a male Filipino does
not vest Philippine citizenship to his foreign wife, un­less she ‘herself may
be lawfully naturalized,’ and that ‘this limit­ation of Section 15 excludes,
from the benefits of naturalization by marriage, those disqualified from being
naturalized as citizens of the Philippines under Section 4 of said
Commonwealth Act No. 473.’ In other words, disqualification for any of the
causes enumerated in Section 4 of the Act is the deci­sive factor that defeats
the right of the foreign wife of a Philip­pine citizen to acquire Philippine
citizenship.

x        x          x          x          x

“Does petitioner, Lim King Bian,
belong to any of these groups?  The
Commissioner of Immigration does not say so but merely predicates his ne­gative
action on the ground that a warrant of deportation for ‘over­staying’ is
pending against-the peti­tioner.

“We do not believe the position is well taken.  Since the grounds for disqualification for
naturalization are expressly enumerated in the law, a warrant of deportation not
based on a finding of unfitness to become na­turalized for any of those
specified causes may not be invoked to negate acquisition of Philippine
citizenship by a foreign wife of a Philippine ci­tizen under Section 15 of the Natura­lization
Law.  (Inclusio
unius est exclusio alterius.)”
(Op. No. 12, s. 1958 of Justice Undersec. Jesus G.
Barrera.)

“Regarding the steps that should be taken by an alien woman
married to a Filipino citizen in order to acquire Philippine citizenship, the
procedure followed in the Bureau of Immigration is as follows:  The alien woman must file a petition for the
cancellation of her alien certificate of registration alleging, among other
things, that she is married to a Fi­lipino citizen and that she is not
disqualified from acquiring her husband’s citizenship pursuant to sec­tion 4 of
Commonwealth Act No. 473, as amended. 
Upon the filing of said petition, which should be accompanied or
supported by the joint affidavit of the petitioner and her Filipino husband to
the effect that the peti­tioner does not belong to any of the groups
disqualified by the cited section from becoming naturalized Filipino ci­tizen
(please see attached CEB Form 1), the Bureau of Immigration conducts an
investigation and thereafter promul­gates its order or decision granting or
denying the petition.” (Op. No. 38, s, 1958 of Justice Sec. Jesus G.
Barrera.)

“This view finds support in the case of Ly Giok
Ha et al., v. Galang et al. (G. R. No. L-10760,
promulgated May 17, 1957), where the Supreme Court, construing the above-quot­ed
section in the Revised Naturaliza­tion Law, held that ‘marriage to a male
Filipino does not vest Philippine citizenship to his foreign wife, unless she
‘herself may be lawfully naturalized,’ and that ‘this limita­tion of Section
15 excludes, from the benefits of naturalization by marriage, those
disqualified from being naturalized as citizen of the Philippines under Section
4 of said Commonwealth Act No. 473.’ In other words, disqua­lification for
any of the causes enumerated in section 4 of the Act is the decisive factor
that defeats the right of an alien woman married to a Filipino citizen to
acquire Philip­pine citizenship.” (Op. 57, s. 1958 of Justice Sec. Jesus
G. Barrera.)

“The contention is untenable. 
The doctrine enunciated in the Ly Giok Ha case
is not a new one.  In that case, the
Supreme Court held that under paragraph 1 of Section 15 of Commonwealth Act No.
473, ‘marriage to a male Filipino does not vest Philippine citizenship to his
foreign wife unless she “her­self may be lawfully naturalized”‘ and,
quoting several earlier opi­nions of the Secretary of Justice, namely:  No. 52, s. 1950; No. 168, s. 1940; No. 95, s.
1941; No. 63, s. 1948; No. 28, s. 1950, ‘this limitation of section 15 excludes
from the benefits of naturaliza­tion by marriage, those disquali­fied from
being naturalized as citizens of the Philippines under section 4 of said
Commonwealth Act No. 473.” (Op. 134, s. 1962 of Justice Undersec. Magno S. Gatmai­tan.)

It was not until more than two years later that, in one respect,
the above construction of the law was import­antly modified by this Court in
Lee Suan Ay, supra, in which the facts were as
follows:

“Upon expiration of the appel­lant Lee Suan
Ay’s authorized pe­riod of temporary stay in the
Philippines (25 March 1955), on 26 March 1955 the Commissioner of Immigration
asked the bonds­man to present her to the Bureau of Immigration within 24 hours
from receipt of notice, otherwise the bond will be confiscated (An­nex 1).  For failure of the bonds­man to comply with
the foregoing order, on 1 April 1955 the Commissioner of Immigration ordered
the cash bond confiscated (Annex E). 
Therefore, there was an order is­sued by the Commissioner of Immi­gration
confiscating or forfeit­ing the cash bond. 
Unlike in forfeiture of bail bonds in crimi­nal proceedings, where the
Court must enter an order forfeiting the bail bond and the bondsman must be
given an opportunity to present his principal or give a satisfac­tory reason
for his inability to do so, before final judgment may be entered against the
bondsman, (section 15, Rule 110; U. S. v. Bonoan, 22
Phil. 1.) in forfeiture of bonds posted for the temporary stay of an alien in
the Philip­pines, no court proceeding is ne­cessary.  Once a breach of the terms and conditions of
the under­taking in the bond is committed, the Commissioner of Immigration may,
under the terms and conditions thereof, declare it forfeited in favor of the
Government.” (In the meanwhile, on April 1, 1955, Lee Suan
Ay and Alberto Tan, a Fili­pino, were joined in marriage by the Justice of the
Peace of Las Piñas, Rizal.)

Mr. Justice Sabino
Padilla speaking for a unanimous court which included Justices Concepcion and Reyes who had pen­ned Ly Giok
Ha and Ricardo Cua, ruled thus:

“The fact that Lee Suan Ay (a
Chinese) was married to a Filipino citizen does not relieve the bonds­man from
his liability on the bond.  The marriage
took place on 1 April 1955, and the violation of the terms and conditions of
the under­taking in the bond – failure to depart from the Philippines upon
expiration of her authorized period of temporary stay in the Philip­pines (25
March 1955) and failure to report to the Commissioner of Immigration within 24
hours from receipt of notice – were committed before the marriage.  Moreover, the marriage of a Filipino citizen
to an alien does not automatically confer Philippine citizenship upon the
latter.  She must possess the qualifications
required by law to become a Filipino citizen by naturalization.# There is no showing that the appellant Lee Suan Ay pos­sesses all the qualifications and none of the
disqualifications pro­vided for by law to become a Fili­pino citizen by
naturalization.”

Pertinently to be noted at once in this ruling, which, to be
sure, is the one relied upon in the appealed decision now before Us, is the
fact that the footnote of the statement therein that the alien wife “must
possess the qualifications required by law to be­come a Filipino citizen by
naturalization” makes refer­ence to Section 15, Commonwealth Act 473 and
precisely, also to Ly Giok Ha v. Galang,
supra.  As will be recall­ed, on
the other hand, in the opinions of the Secretary of Justice explicitly adopted
by the Court in Ly Giok Ha, among them, Opinion No.
176, Series of 1940, above-quot­ed, it was clearly held that “(I)n a
previous opinion rendered for your Office, I stated that the clause ‘who might
herself be lawfully naturalized’, should be cons­trued as not requiring the
woman to have the qualifications of residence, good character, etc., as in
cases of naturalization by judicial proceedings, but merely that she is of
the race of persons who may be natura­lized.” (Op. No. 79, s. 1940)

Since Justice Padilla gave no reason at all for the obviously
significant modification of the construction of the law, it could be said that
there was need for clarification of the seemingly new posture of the
Court.  The occasion for such
clarification should have been in Kua Suy etc., et al. vs. The Commissioner of Im­migration, G.
R. No. L-13790, October 31, 1963, penned by Mr. Justice J. B. L. Reyes, who had
rendered the opinion in Ricardo Cua, supra,
which followed that in Ly Giok Ha, supra, but
apparently seeing no immediate rele­vancy in the case on hand then of the
particular point in issue now, since it was not squarely raised therein
similarly as in Lee Suan Ay, hence, anything said on
the said matter would at best be no more than obiter dictum,
Justice Reyes limited himself to holding that “Under Section 15 of the
Naturalization Act, the wife is deemed a citizen of the Philippines only if she
‘might herself be lawfully naturalized’, so that the fact of marriage to a
citizen, by itself alone, does not suffice to confer citizenship, as this Court
has previously ruled in Ly Giok Ha v. Galang, 54 O. G. 356, and in Cua
v. Board of Immigration Commissioners, 53 O. G. 8567; and there is here no
evidence of record as to the qualifications or absence of disqualifications of appellee Kua Suy“,
with­out explaining the apparent departure already pointed out from Ly Giok Ha and Ricardo Cua.  Even Justice Makalintal
who wrote a separate concurring and dissenting opinion merely lumped together
Ly Giok Ha, Ricardo Cua and
Lee Suan Ay and opined that both qualifications and
non-dis­qualifications have to be shown without elucidating on what seemed to
be departure from the said first two deci­sions.

It was only on November
30, 1963 that to Mr. Just­ice Roberto Regala
fell the task of rationalizing the Court’s position.  In Lo San Tuang v. Galang, G. R. No. L-18775, November 30, 1963, 9 SCRA 638,
the facts were simply these:  Lo San Tuang, a Chinese woman, arrived in the Philippines on July
1, 1960 as a temporary visitor with authority to stay up to June 30, 1961.  She married a Filipino on January 7, 1961,
almost six months before the expiry date of her permit, and when she was
request­ed to leave after her authority to stay had expired, she refused to do
so, claiming she had become a Filipina by marriage, and to bolster her
position, she submitted an affidavit stating explicitly that she does not
possess any of the disqualifications enumerated in the Naturali­zation Law,
Commonwealth Act 473.  When the case
reached the court, the trial judge held for the government that in addition to
not having any of the disqualifications referred to, there was need that Lo San
Tuang should have also possessed all the
qualifications of residence, moral character, knowledge of a native principal
dialect, etc., provided by the law. 
Recognizing that the issue squarely to be passed upon was whether or not
the posses­sion of all the qualifications were indeed needed to be shown apart
from non-disqualification, Justice Regala held
affirmatively for the Court, reasoning out thus:

“It is to be noted that the peti­tioner has anchored her claim
for citizenship on the basis of the de­cision laid down in the case of Leo­nard
v. Grant, 5 Swy. 603, 5 F 11, where the Circuit Court
of Oregon, held that it was only necessary that the woman ‘should be a person
of the class or, race permitted to be naturalized by existing laws, and that in
respect of the qualifications arising out of her conduct or opinions, being the
wife of a citizen, she is to be regarded as qualified for citizenship, and
therefore considered a citizen.’ (In explanation of its conclusion, the Court
said:  ‘If, whenever dur­ing the life of
the woman or after­wards, the question of her citizen­ship arises in a legal
proceeding, the party asserting her citizenship by reason of her marriage with
a citizen must not only prove such marriage, but also that the woman then
possessed all the further qua­lifications necessary to her becom­ing
naturalized under existing laws, the statute will be practically nugatory, if
not a delusion and a snare.  The proof of
the facts may have existed at the time of the marriage, but years after, when a
controversy arises upon the sub­ject, it may be lost or difficult to find.’)

“In other words, all that she was required to prove was that
she was a free white woman or a woman of African descent or nativity, in order
to be deemed an American ci­tizen, because, with respect to the rest of the
qualifications on resi­dence, moral character, etc., she was presumed to be
qualified.

“Like the law in the United
States, our former Naturalization Law (Act
No. 2927, as amended by Act No. 3448) specified the classes of persons who
alone might become citizens of the Philippines,
even as it provided who were disqualified. 
Thus, the pertinent provisions of that law provided:

‘Section 1.  Who may
become Philippine citizens.  –
Philippine citizenship may be acquired by (a) natives of the Philippines
who are not citizens thereof un­der the Jones Law; (b) na­tives of the Insular
posses­sions of the United States;
(c) citizens of the United States,
or foreigners who under the laws of the United
States may become citizens of said country
if residing therein.

‘Section 2.  Who are dis­qualified.  – The following cannot be naturalized as
Philippine citizens:  (a) Persons opposed
to organized government or affiliated with any association or group of persons
who uphold and teach doctrines opposing all organized government; (b) persons
defending or teaching the necessity or propriety of violence, personal assault
or assassina­tion for the success and predominance of their ideas; (c)
polygamists or believers in the practice of polygamy; (d) persons convicted of
crimes involving moral turpi­tude; (e) persons suffering from mental alienation
or in­curable contagious diseases; (f) citizens or subjects of nations with
whom the United States and the Philippines are at war, during the period of
such war.

‘Section 3.  Qualifications.  – The persons comprised in sub­section (a) of
section one of this Act, in order to be able to acquire Philippine citizen­ship,
must be not less than twenty-one years of age on the day of the hearing of
their pe­tition.

‘The persons comprised in sub­sections (b) and (c) of said sec­tion
one shall, in addition to being not less than twenty-one years of age on the
day of the hearing of the petition, have all and each of the following
qualifications:

‘First.  Residence in the Phi­lippine
Islands for a continuous period of not less than five years, except as provided
in the next fol­lowing section;

‘Second.  To have conducted
themselves in a proper and irre­proachable manner during the en­tire period of
their residence in the Philippine Islands, in their relation with the
constituted government as well as with the com­munity in which they are living;

‘Third.  To hold in the
Philip­pine Islands real estate worth not less than one thousand pesos, Phi­lippine
currency, or have some known trade or profession; and

‘Fourth.  To speak and write
Eng­lish, Spanish, or some native tongue.

‘In case the petitioner is a fo­reign subject, he shall, besides,
declare in writing and under oath his intention of renouncing absolutely and
perpetually all faith and allegiance to the foreign authority, state or
sovereignty of which he was a native, citizen or subject.’

“Applying the interpretation given by Leonard v. Grant, supra,
to our law as it then stood, alien women married to citizens of the Philippines
must, in order to be deemed citizens of the Philippines, be either (1) natives
of the Philippines who were not citizens thereof under the Jones Law, or (2)
natives of other Insular possessions of the United States, or (3) citizens of
the United States or foreigners who under the laws of the United States might
become citizens of that country if residing therein.  With respect to the qualifications set forth
in Section 3 of the former law, they were deemed to have the same for all
intents and purposes.

“But, with the approval of the Re­vised Naturalization Law
(Commonwealth Act No. 473) on June 17, 1939, Cong­ress has since discarded
class or ra­cial consideration from the qualifica­tions of applicants for
naturalization (according to its proponent, the pur­pose in eliminating this
consideration was, first, to remove the features of the existing naturalization
act which discriminated in favor of the Cauca­sians and against Asiatics who are our neighbors, and are related to us by
racial affinity and, second, to fos­ter amity with all nations [Sinco, Phil. Political Law 502 – 11 ed.]), even as it
retained in Section 15 the phrase in question. 
The result is that the phrase ‘who might herself be lawfully
naturalized’ must be understood in the context in which it is now found, in a
setting so different from that in which it was found by the Court in Leonard v.
Grant.

“The only logical deduction from the elimination of class or
racial con­sideration is that, as the Solicitor General points out, the phrase
‘who might herself be lawfully naturalized’ must now be understood as referring
to those who under Section 2 of the law are qualified to become citizens of the
Philippines.

“There is simply no support for the view that the phrase ‘who
might herself be lawfully naturalized’ must now be understood as requiring
merely that the alien woman must not belong to the class of disqualified
persons under Section 4 of the Revised Naturalization Law.  Such a proposition misreads the ru­ling laid
down in Leonard v. Grant.  A person who
is not disqualified is not necessarily qualified to become a citizen of the Philippines,
because the law treats qualifications and disqualification in separate sections.  And then it must not be lost sight of that
even under the interpretation given to the for­mer law, it was to be understood
that the alien woman was not disqua­lified under Section 2 of that law.  Leonard v. Grant did not rule that it was
enough if the alien woman does not belong to the class of dis­qualified persons
in order that she may be deemed to follow the citizen­ship of her husband:  What that case held was that the phrase ‘who
might herself be lawfully naturalized’ merely means that she belongs to the
class or race of persons qualified to become citizens by naturalization – the
assumption being always that she is not otherwise disqualified.

“We therefore hold that under the first paragraph of Section
15 of the Naturalization Law, an alien woman, who is married to a citizen of
the Philippines,
acquires the citizen­ship of her husband only if she has all the qualifications
and none of the disqualifications provided by law.  Since there is no proof in this case that
petitioner has all the qualifications and is not in any way disqualified, her
marriage to a Filipino citizen does not auto­matically make her a Filipino ci­tizen.  Her affidavit to the ef­fect that she is not
in any way disqualified to become a citizen of this country was correctly
disregarded by the trial court, the same being self-serving.”

Naturally, almost a month later in Sun Peck Yong v. Commissioner
of Immigration, G. R. No, L-20784, December 27, 1963, 9 SCRA 875,
wherein the Secretary of Foreign Affairs reversed a previous resolution of the
preceding administration to allow Sun Peck Yong and her minor son to await the
taking of the oath of Filipino citizenship of her husband two years after the
decision granting him nationalization and required her to leave and this order
was contested in court, Justice Barrera held:

“In the case of Lo San Tuang v.
Commissioner of Immigration (G. R. No. L-18775, promulgated November 30, 1963; Kua Suy v. Commissioner of
Immigration, G.R. No. L-13790, promulgat­ed October 31, 1963), we held that the fact that the husband
became a naturalized citizen does not auto­matically make the wife a citizen of
the Philippines.  It must also be shown that she herself posses­ses
all the qualifications, and none of the disqualifications, to become a
citizen.  In this case, there is no
allegation, much less showing, that petitioner-wife is qualified to
become a Filipino ci­tizen herself. 
Furthermore, the fact that a decision was favorably made on the
naturalization petition of her husband is no assurance that he (the husband) would
become a citizen, as to make a basis for the extension of her temporary
stay.”

On the same day, in Tong Siok Sy v. Vivo, G. R. No. L-­21136,
December 27, 1963, 9 SCRA 876, Justice Barrera re­iterated the same ruling and
citing particularly Lo San Tuang and Kua Suy, held that the marriage
of Tong Siok Sy to a
Filipino on November 12, 1960 at Taichung, Taiwan and
her taking her oath of Filipino citizenship before the Philippine Vice-Consul
at Taipeh, Taiwan on January 6, 1961 did not make her
a Filipino citizen, since she came here only in 1961 and obviously, she had not
had the necessary ten-year residence in the Philippines required by the law.

Such then was the status of the jurisprudential law on the matter
under discussion when Justice Makalintal sought a
reexamination thereof in Choy King Tee v. Galang, G.
R. No. L-18351, March 26, 1965,
13 SCRA 402.  Choy King Tee’s husband was
granted Philippine citizenship on Jan­uary
13, 1959 and took the oath on January 31 of the same year.  Choy King Tee first came to the Philippines
in 1955 and kept commuting between Manila and Hongkong
since then, her last visa before the case being due to expire on February 14,
1961.  On January 27, 1961, her husband
asked the Commissioner of Immigration to cancel her alien certificate of
registration, as well as their child’s, for the reason that they were
Filipinos, and when the re­quest was denied as to the wife, a mandamus was
sought, which the trial court granted. 
Discussing anew the issue of the need for qualifications, Justice Makalintal not only reiterated the arguments of Justice Regala in Lo San Tuang but added
further that the ruling is believed to be in line with the national policy of
selective admission to Philippine citizenship.^[7]

No wonder, upon this authority, in Austria
v. Con­chu, G. R. No. L-20716, June 22, 1965, 14 SCRA
336, Just­ice J. P. Bengzon readily reversed the
decision of the lower court granting the writs of mandamus and prohibi­tion
against the Commissioner of Immigration, considering that Austria’s wife, while
admitting she did not possess all the qualifications for naturalization, had
submitted only an affidavit that she had none of the disqualifica­tions therefor.  So also
did Justice Dizon similarly hold eight days later in Brito v. Commissioner, G. R. No. L-16829, June 30, 1965, 14 SCRA 539.

Then came the second Ly Giok Ha case^[8]
wherein Justice J. B. L. Reyes took occasion to expand on the reasoning of Choy
King Tee by illustrating with examples “the danger of relying exclusively
on the absence of disqualifications, without taking into account the other
affirmative requirements of the law.”^[9]

Lastly, in Go Im Ty
v. Republic, G. R. No. L-17919, decided on July 30, 1966,^[10]
Justice Zaldivar held for the Court that an alien
woman who is widowed during the pendency of the
naturalization proceedings of her husband, in order that she may be allowed to
take the oath as Fili­pino, must, aside from proving compliance with the
require­ments of Republic Act 530, show that she possesses all the
qualifications and does not suffer from any of the disqualifications under the
Naturalization Law, citing in the process the decisions to such effect
discussed above,^[11]
even as he impliedly reversed pro tanto
the ruling in tan Lin v. Republic, G. R. No. L-13786, May 31, 1961, 2 SCRA 383.

Accordingly, in Burca, Justice Sanchez
premised his opinion on the assumption that the point now under discussion is
settled law.

In the case now at bar, the Court is again called upon to rule on
the same issue.  Under Section 15 of the
Naturalization Law, Commonwealth Act 473, providing that:

“SEC. 15.  Effect of
the naturali­zation on wife and children. 
– Any woman, who is now or may hereafter be married to a citizen of the Philippines,
and who might herself be lawfully naturalized shall be deemed a citizen of the Philippines.

“Minor children of persons natu­ralized under this law who
have been born in the Philippines
shall be con­sidered citizens thereof.

“A foreign-born minor child, if dwelling in the Philippines at
the time of the naturalization of the parent, shall automatically become a
Philippine citizen, and a foreign-born minor child, who is not in the
Philippines at the time the parent is naturalized, shall be deemed a Philippine
citizen only during his minority, unless he begins to re­side permanently in
the Philippines when still a minor, in which case, he will continue to be a
Philippine citizen even after becoming of age.

“A child born outside of the Philippines after the naturali­zation
of his parent, shall be considered a Philippine citizen, unless within one year
after reaching the age of majority he fails to register himself as a Philippine
citizen at the American Consulate of the coun­try where it he resides, and to
take the necessary oath of al­legiance.

Is it necessary, in order
that an alien woman who marries a Filipino or who is married to a man who
subsequently becomes a Filipino, may become a Filipino citizen herself, that,
aside from not suffering from any of the disqualifi­cations enumerated in the
law, she must also possess all the qualifications required by said law?  If nothing but the unbroken line from Lee Suan Ay to Go Im Ty, as recoun­ted above, were to be considered, it is
obvious that an affirmative answer to the question would be inevitable, specially,
if it is noted that the present case was act­ually submitted for decision on
January 21, 1964 yet, shortly after Lo San Tuang,
Tong Siok Sy and Sun Peck
Yong, all supra, and even before Choy King Tee, supra, were
decided.  There are other circumstances,
however, which make it desirable, if not necessary, that the Court take up the
matter anew.  There has been a
substantial change in the membership of the Court since Go Im
Ty, and of those who were in the Court already when Burca was de­cided, two members, Justices Makalintal and Castro concur­red only in the result,
precisely, according to them, be­cause they wanted to leave the point now under
discussion open in so far as they are concerned.12 Truth to tell, the views and
arguments discussed at length with copious relevant authorities, in the motion
for reconsideration as well as in the memorandum of the amici
curae13
in the Burca case cannot just be taken lightly and
summarily ignored, since they project in the most forceful manner, not only the
legal and logical angles of the issue, but also the imperative practical
aspects thereof in the light of the actual situation of the thousands of alien
wives of Filipinos who stay so long, even decades, consi­dered themselves as
Filipinas and have always lived and acted as such, officially or otherwise,
relying on the long standing continuous recognition of their status as such by
the administrative authorities in charge of the matter; as well as by the
courts.  Under these circum­stances, and
if only to afford the Court an opportunity to consider the views of the five
justices who took no part in Go Im Ty (including the writer of this opinion), the Court
decided to further reexamine the matter. 
After all, the ruling first laid in Lee Sean Ay, and later in Lo
San Tuang, Choy King Tee
and the second (1966) Ly Giok Ha,
did not categorically repudiate the opinions of the Secretary of Justice relied
upon by the first (1959) a Giok Ha.  Besides, some points brought to light dur­ing
the deliberations in this case would seem to indicate that the premises of the
later cases can still bear fur­ther consideration.

Whether We like it or not, it is undeniably factual that the
legal provision We are construing, Section 15, aforequoted,
of the Naturalization Law has been taken directly, copied and adopted from its
American counter­part.  To be more
accurate, said provision is nothing less than a reenactment of the American
provision.  A brief re­view of its
history proves this beyond per adventure of doubt.

The first Naturalization Law of the Philippines
approved by the Philippine Legislature under American so­vereignty was that of March 26, 1920, Act No. 2927.  Be­fore then, as a consequence of the Treaty
of Paris, our citizenship laws were found only in the Organic Laws, the
Philippine Bill of 1902, the Act of the United States Con­gress of March 23, 1912 and later the Jones
Law of 1916.  In fact, Act No. 2927 was
enacted pursuant to express autho­rity granted by the Jones Law.  For obvious reasons, the Philippines
gained autonomy on the subjects of citizen­ship and immigration only after the effectivity of the Philippine Independence Act.  This made it practically impossible for our
laws on said subject to have any perspective or orientation of our own;
everything was Ameri­can.

The Philippine Bill of 1902 provided pertinently:

“SECTION 4.  That all
inhabitants of the Philippine Islands continuing to reside therein who were
Spanish subjects on the eleventh day of April, eighteen-hundred and
ninety-nine, and then resided in said Islands, and their children born
subsequent thereto, shall be deemed and held to be citizens of the Philippine
Islands and as such entitled to the protection of the United-States except such
as shall have elected to preserve their alle­giance to the Crown of Spain in
accordance with the provi­sions of the treaty of peace between the United
States and Spain signed at Paris Decem­ber tenth, eighteen hundred and
ninety-eight.”

This Section 4 of the Philippine Bill of
1902 was amen­ded by Act of Congress of March 23, 1912, by adding a, provision
as follows:

“Provided, That the Phi­lippine Legislature is hereby
authorized to provide by law for the acquisition of Phi­lippine citizenship by
those natives of the Philippine Islands who do not come with­in the foregoing
provisions, the natives of other insular possessions of the United States, and
such other per­sons residing in the Philip­pine Islands who would be­come
citizens of the United States, under the laws of the United States, if resid­ing
therein.”

The Jones Law reenacted these provisions substan­tially:

“SECTION 2.  That all
inhabit­ants of the Philippine Islands who were Spanish subjects on the
eleventh day of April, eighteen hundred and ninety-nine, and then resided in
said islands, and their children born subsequent thereto, shall be deemed and
held to be citizens of the Philippine Is­lands, except such as shall have
elected to preserve their alle­giance to the Crown of Spain in accordance with
the provisions of the treaty of peace between the United States and Spain,
signed at Paris December tenth, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, and except
such others as have since become citizens of some other country:  Pro­vided, That the Philippine Le­gislature,
herein provided for, is hereby authorized to provide by law for the acquisition
of Philippine citizenship by those natives of the Philippine Is­lands who do
not come within the foregoing provisions, the natives of the insular
possessions of the United States, and such other persons residing in the Philip­pine
Islands who are citizens of the United States under the laws of the United
States if residing therein.”

For aught that appears, there was nothing in any of the said
organic laws regarding the effect of marriage to a Filipino upon the
nationality of an alien woman, albeit under the Spanish Civil Code provisions
on citizenship, Articles 17 to 27, which were, however, abrogated upon the
change of sovereignty, it was unquestionable that the ci­tizenship of the wife
always followed that of the husband.  Not
even Act 2927 contained any provision regarding the effect of naturalization of
an alien upon the citizenship of his alien wife, nor of the marriage of such
alien wo­man with a native born Filipino or one who had become a Filipino
before the marriage, although Section 13 there­of provided thus:

“SEC. 13.  Right of
widow and child­ren of petitioners who have died.  – In case a petitioner should die before the
final decision has been rendered, his widow and minor children may con­tinue
the proceedings.  The decision rendered
in the case shall, so far as the widow and minor children are con­cerned,
produce the same legal effect as if it had been rendered during the life of the
petitioner.”

It was not until November
30, 1928, upon the approval of Act 3448, amending Act 2927, that
the following provi­sions were added to the above Section 13:

“SECTION 1.  The
following new sec­tions are hereby inserted between sections thirteen and
fourteen of Act Numbered Twenty-nine hundred and Twenty-seven:

‘SEC. 13(a).  Any woman who
is now or may hereafter be mar­ried to a citizen of the Philippine Islands and
who might herself be lawfully naturalized, shall be deemed a citizen of the
Philippine Islands.

‘SEC. 13(b).  Children of per­sons
who have been duly natu­ralized under this law, being under the age of
twenty-one years at the time of the natu­ralization of their parents, shall, if
dwelling in the Philippine Islands, be considered citizens thereof.

‘SEC. 13(c).  Children of
persons naturalized under this law who have been born in the Philippine Islands
after the naturalization of their parents shall be considered citizens
thereof.'”

When Commonwealth Act 473, the current naturalization law, was
enacted on June 17, 1939,
the above Section 13 be­came its Section 15 which has already been quoted
earlier in this decision.  As can be
seen, Section 13(a) above-quoted was re-enacted practically word for word in
the first paragraph of this Section 15 except for the change of Philippine Islands
to Philippines.  And it could not have
been on any other basis than this legislative history of our naturalization law
that each and everyone of the deci­sions of this Court from the first Ly Giok Ha to Go Im Ty, discussed above, were rendered.

As stated earlier, in the opinion of Chief Concepcion
in the first Ly Giok Ha, it was quite clear that for
an alien woman who marries a Filipino to become herself a Filipino citizen,
there is no need for any natu­ralization proceeding because she becomes a Filipina
ipso facto from the time of such marriage, provided she does not
suffer any of the disqualifications enumerated in Sec­tion 4 of Commonwealth
Act 473, with no mention being made of whether or not the qualifications
enumerated in Section 2 thereof need be shown. 
It was only in Lee Suan Ay
in 1959 that the possession of qualifications were specifical­ly required, but
it was not until 1963, in Lo San Tuang,
that Justice Regala reasoned out why the possession
of the qualifications provided by the law should also be shown to be possessed
by the alien wife of a Filipino, for her to become a Filipina by marriage.

As may be recalled, the basic argument advanced by Justice Regala was briefly as follows:  That “like the law in the United States,
our Naturalization Law specified the classes of persons who alone might become
citizens, even as it provided who were disqualified”, and inasmuch as
Commonwealth Act 473, our Naturalization Law since 1939 did not reenact the
section providing who might become ci­tizens, allegedly in order to remove
racial discrimination in favor of Caucasians and against Asiatics,
“the only lo­gical deduction . . . . is that the phrase ‘who might herself
be lawfully naturalized’ must now be understood as referring to those who under
Section 2 of the law are qua­lified to become citizens of the Philippines”
and “there is simply no support for the view that the phrase ‘who might
herself be lawfully naturalized’ must now be under­stood as requiring merely
that the alien woman must not belong to the class of disqualified persons under
Section 4 of the Revised Naturalization Law”.14

A similar line of reasoning was followed in Choy King
Tee, which for ready reference may be quoted:

“The question has been settled by the uniform ruling of
this Court in a number of cases.  The
alien wife of a Filipino citizen must first prove that she has all the
qualifications required by Section 2 and none of the disqualifications enume­rated
in Section 4 of the Naturalization Law before she may be deemed a Philippine
citizen (Lao Chay v. Galang,
G.R. No. L-19977, Oct. 30, 1964,
citing Lo San Tuang v. Galang,
G.R. No. L-18775, Nov. 30, 1963;
Sun Peck Yong v. Commissioner of Immigration, G.R. No. L-20784, December 27, 1963; Tong Siok Sy v. Vivo, G.R. No. L-21136,
December 27, 1963).  The writer of this opinion has submitted the
ques­tion anew to the court for a possible re-examination of the said ruling in
the light of the interpretation of a si­milar law in the United
States after which Section 15 of our
Naturaliza­tion Law was patterned.  That
law was section 2 of the Act of February
10, 1855 (Section 1994 of the Revised Statutes of the U.S.).  The local law, Act No. 3448, was passed on November 30, 1928 as an amendment to
the for­mer Philippine Naturalization Law, Act No. 2927, which was approved on March 26, 1920.  Under this Naturali­zation Law, acquisition
of Philippine citizenship was limited to three class­es of persons, (a) Natives
of the Philippines who were not citizens thereof (b) natives of the other in­sular
possessions of the United States; and (c) citizens of the United States, or
foreigners who, under the laws of the United States, may become citizens of the
latter country if residing three.  The
reference in, subdivision (c) to foreigners who may become American Citizens is
restrictive in character, for only persons of certain specified races were
qualified thereunder. 
In other words, in so far as racial restrictions were concerned there
was at the time a similarity between the na­turalization laws of the two
countries, and hence there was reason to accord here persuasive force to the
inter­pretation given in the United States
to the statutory provision concerning the citizenship of alien women marry­ing
American citizens.

“This Court, however, believes that such reason has ceased to
exist since the enactment of the Revised Naturalization Law (Commonwealth Act
No. 473) on June 17, 1939.  The racial restrictions have been eliminated
in this Act, but the provision found in Act No. 3448 has been maintained.  It is logical to presume that when Congress
chose to retain the said provision – that to be deemed a Philippine citizen
upon marriage the alien wife must be one ‘who might herself be lawfully
naturalized,’ the refer­ence is no longer to the class or race to which the
woman belongs, for class or race has become immaterial, but to the
qualifications and disqua­lifications for naturalization as en­umerated in
Sections 2 and 4 of the statute. 
Otherwise the requirement that the woman ‘might herself be lawfully
naturalized’ would be mean­ingless surplusage,
contrary to set­tled norms of statutory construction.

“The rule laid down by this Court in this and in other cases
hereto­fore decided is believed to be in line with the national policy of se­lective
admission to Philippine citi­zenship, which after all is a privi­lege granted
only to those who are found worthy thereof, and not indiscriminately to anybody
at all on the basis alone of marriage to a man who is a citizen of the
Philippines, ir­respective of moral character, ideo­logical beliefs, and identification
with Filipino ideals, customs and traditions.

“Appellee here having failed to
prove that she has all the qualifi­cations for naturalization, even, in­deed,
that she has none of the disqualifications, she is not entitled to recognition
as a Philippine citi­zen.”

In the second Ly Giok Ha, the Court
further forti­fied the arguments in favor of the same conclusion thus:

“On cross-examination, she (Ly Giok
Ha) failed to establish that:  (1) she
has been residing in the Philippines for a continuous period of at least ten
(10) years (p. 27, t.s.n., id.); (2) she has a
lucrative trade, profession, or lawful occupation (p. 13, t.s.n.,
id.); and (3) she can speak and write English, or any of the princi­pal
Philippine languages (pp. 12, 13, t.s.n., id.).

“While the appellant Immigration Commissioner contends that
the words emphasized indicate that the present Naturalization Law requires that
an alien woman who marries a Filipino husband must possess the qualifica­tions prescribed
by section 2 in ad­dition to not being disqualified un­der any of the eight
(‘a’ to ‘h’) subheadings of section 4 of Commonwealth Act No. 473, in order to
claim our citizenship by marriage, both the appellee
and the court be­low (in its second decision) sustain the view that all that
the law demands is that the woman be not disqualified under section 4.

“At the time the present case was remanded to the court of
origin (1960) the question at issue could be regarded as not conclusively
settled, there being only the concise pronouncement in Lee Suan
Ay, et al. v. Galang, G. R. No. L-11855, Dec. 23, 1959, to the effect that:

‘The marriage of a Filipino citizen to an alien does not
automatically confer Philip­pine citizenship upon the lat­ter.  She must possess the qualifications required
by law to become a Filipino citizen by naturalization.’

“Since that time, however, a long line of decisions of this
Court has firmly established the rule that the requirement of section 15 of
Commonwealth Act 473 (the Naturalization Act), that an alien woman married to a
citizen should be one who ‘might herself be lawfully naturalized’, means
not only woman free from the disqualifications enumerated in sec­tion 4 of the
Act but also one who possesses the qualifications prescribed by section 2 of
Commonwealth Act 473 (San Tuan v. Galang, G.R.
No.  L­18775, Nov. 30, 1963; Sun Peck Yong v. Com. of
Immigration, G.R. No. L-20784, Dec.
27, 1963; Tong Siok Sy
v. Vivo, G.R. No. L-21136, Dec, 27,
1963; Austria
v. Conchu, G.R. No. L-20716, June 22, 1965; Choy King Tee v. Galang, G.R. No. L-18351, March 26, 1965; Brito v. Com. of
Im­migration, G.R. No. L-16829, June
30, 1965).

“Reflection will reveal why this must be so.  The qualifications pres­cribed under section
2 of the Natura­lization Act, and the disqualifications enumerated in its
section 4 are not mutually exclusive; and if all that were to be required is
that the wife of a Filipino be not dis­qualified under section 4, the re­sult
might well be that citizenship would be conferred upon persons in violation of
the policy of the stat­ute.  For example,
section 4 disqua­lifies only –

‘(c) Polygamists or be­lievers in the practice of polygamy; and

‘(d) Persons convicted of crimes involving mo­ral turpitude,’

so that a blackmailer, or a maintain­er of
gambling or bawdy houses, not previously convicted by a competent court would
not be thereby disquali­fied; still, it is certain that the law did not intend
such person to be admitted as a citizen in view of the requirement of section 2
that an applicant for citizenship ‘must be of good moral character.’

“Similarly, the citizen’s wife might be a convinced believer
in ra­cial supremacy, in government by certain selected classes, in the right
to vote exclusively by certain ‘herrenvolk‘, and thus
disbelieve in the principles underlying the Philip­pine Constitution; yet she
would not be disqualified under section 4, as long as she is not ‘opposed to
orga­nized government’, nor affiliated to groups ‘upholding or teaching doc­trines
opposing all organized governments’, nor ‘defending or teaching the necessity
or propriety of vio­lence, personal assault or assassination for the success or
predominance of their ideas.’ Et sic
de caeteris.

“The foregoing instances should suffice to illustrate the
danger of relying exclusively on the absence of disqualifications, without
taking in­to account the other affirmative requirements of the law, which, in
the case at bar, the appellee Ly Giok
Ha admittedly does not possess.

“As to the argument that the phrase ‘might herself be lawfully
na­turalized’ was derived from the U. S. Revised Statutes (section 1994) and
should be given the same territorial and racial significance given to it by
American courts, this Court has rejected the same in Lo San Tuang
v. Galang, G.R. No. L-18775, November 30, 1963; and in Choy King Tee v. Galang, G.R. No. L-18351, March 26, 1965.”

It is difficult to minimize the persuasive force of the foregoing
rationalizations, but a closer study there­of cannot but reveal certain
relevant considerations which adversely affect the premises on which they are
pre­dicated, thus rendering the conclusions arrived thereby not entirely
unassailable.

1.  The main proposition, for
instance, that in eliminating Section 1 of Act 2927 providing who are eligible
for Philippine citizenship, the purpose of Commonwealth Act 473, the Revised
Naturalization Law, was to remove the racial requirements for naturalization,
thereby opening the door of Filipino nationality to Asiatics
instead of allowing the admission thereto of Caucasians only, suffers from lack
of exact accuracy.  It is important to
note, to start with, that Commonwealth Act 473 did away with the whole Section
1 of Act 2927 which reads thus:

“SECTION 1.  Who may
become Philippine citizens.  –
Philippine citizenship may be acquired by: 
(a) natives of the Philippines who are not citi­zens thereof under the
Jones Law; (b) natives of the other Insular pos­sessions of the United States;
(c) citizens of the United States, or foreigners who under the laws of the
United States may become citizens of said country if residing therein.”

and not only subdivision (c)
thereof.  Nowhere in this whole provision
was there any mention of race or color of the persons who were then eligible
for Philippine citizenship.  What is more
evident from said provision is that it reflected the inevitable subordination
of our legislation during the pre-Commonwealth American regime to the
understandable limitations flowing from our status as a territory of the United
States by virtue of the Treaty of Paris. 
In fact, Section 1 of Act 2927 was precisely approved pursuant to
express authority, without which it could not have been done, granted by an
amend­ment to Section 4 of the Philippine Bill of 1902 intro­duced by the Act
of the United States Congress of March 23, 1912 and which was reenacted as part
of the Jones Law of 1916, the pertinent provisions of which have al­ready been
quoted earlier.  In truth, therefore, it
was because of the establishment of the Philippine Commonwealth and in the
exercise of our legislative autonomy on citizenship matters under the
Philippine Independence Act that Section 1 of Act 2927 was eliminated,15
and not purposely to eliminate any racial discrimination contained in our
Naturalization Law. The Philippine Le­gislature naturally wished to free our
Naturalization Law from the impositions of American legislation.  In other words, the fact that such
discrimination was removed was one of the effects rather than the intended
purpose of the amendment.

2.  Again, the statement in
Choy King Tee to the effect that “the reference subdivision (c) (of Section 1
of Mt 2927) foreigners who may become American citizen is restrictive
character, for only persons of certain specified races were qualified thereunder” fails to consider the exact import of the
said subdivision.  Ex­plicitly, the thrust
of the said subdivision was to con­fine the grant under it of Philippine
citizenship only to the three classes of persons therein mentioned, the third
of which were citizens of the United States
and, corol­larily, persons who could be American
citizens under her laws.  The words used
in the provision do not convey any idea of favoring aliens of any particular
race or color and of excluding others, but more accurately, they refer to all
the disqualifications of foreigners for American citizenship under the laws of
the United States.  The fact is that even as of 1906, or long
before 1920,when our Act 2927 became a law, the naturalization laws of
the United States
already provided for the following disqualifications in the Act of the Congress
of June 29, 1906:

“SEC. 7.  That no person
who dis­believes in or who is opposed to or­ganized government, or who
is a mem­ber of or affiliated with any organization entertaining and teaching
such disbelief in or opposition to organized government, or who advo­cates or
teaches the duty, necessity, or propriety of the unlawful assaulting or killing
of any offi­cer or officers, either of specific individuals or of officers
generally, of the Government of the United States, or of any other organized
government, because of his or their official character, or who is a polygamist,
shall be naturalized or be made a citizen of the United States.”

and all these disqualified persons were,
therefore, ineli­gible for Philippine citizenship under Section 1 of Act 2927
even if they happened to be Caucasians. 
More importantly, as a matter of fact, said American law, which was the
first “Act to Establish a Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization and to
Provide for a Uniform Rule for Naturali­zation of Aliens throughout, the United
States” contained no racial disqualification requirement, except as to Chi­nese,
the Act of May 6, 1882 not being among those expressly repealed by this law,
hence it is clear that when Act a 2927 was enacted, subdivision (c) of its
Section 1 could not have had any connotation of racial exclusion necessarily,
even if it were traced back to its origin in the Act of the United States
Congress of 1912 already mentioned above.16 Thus, it would seem that the
rationalization in the quoted decisions predicated on the theory that the
elimination of Section 1 of Act 2927 by Commonwealth Act 473 was purposely for
no other end than the abolition of racial discrimination in our naturalization
law has no clear factual basis.17

3.  In view of these
considerations, there appears to be no cogent reason why the construction
adopted in the opinions of the Secretary of Justice referred to in the first Ly
Giok Ha decision of the Chief Justice should not
prevail.  It is beyond dispute that the
first paragraph of Section 15 of Commonwealth Act 473 is a reenactment of
Section 13(a) of Act 2927, as amended by Act 3448, and that the latter is
nothing but an exact copy, deliberate­ly made, of Section 1994 of the Revised
Statutes of the, United States as it stood before its repeal in 1922.18 Before
such repeal, the phrase “who might herself be law­fully naturalized”
found in said Section 15 had a definite unmistakable construction uniformly
followed in all courts of the United States that had had occasion to apply the
same and which, therefore, must be considered as if it were written in the
statute itself.  It almost trite to say
that when our legislators enacted said section, they knew of its unvarying
construction in the United States and that, therefore, in adopting verbatim the
American statute, they have in effect incorporated into the provi­sion, as thus
enacted, the construction given to it by the American courts as well as by the
Attorney General of the United States and all administrative authorities
charged with the implementation of the naturalization and immigration laws of
that country.  (Lo Cham
v. Ocampo, 77 Phil., 635 [1946]; Laxamana
v. Baltazar, 92 Phil., 32 [1952]; Hartley v.
Commissioner, 295 U S 216, 79 L. ed. 1399, 55 S Ct. 756 [1935]; Helvering v. Winmill, 305 U S 79,
83 L ed. 52, 59 S Ct 45 [1938]; Hel­vering v. R. J.
Reynolds Tobacco Co., 306 U.S. 110, 83 L ed. 536, 59 S Ct. 423 [1939]. [p. 32,
Memo of Amicus Curiae]).

A fairly comprehensive summary of the said cons­truction by the
American courts and administrative au­thorities is contained in United
States of America ex rel.
Dora Sejnensky v. Robert E. Tod,
Commissioner of Immigration, Appt., 285 Fed. 523, decided November 14, 1922, 26 A. L. R. 1316 as follows:

“Section 1994 of the Revised Statutes (Comp. Stat. § 3948, 2
Fed. Sta. Anno. 2d ed. p. 117) provides as fol­lows:
‘Any woman who is now or may hereafter be married to a citizen of the United
States, and who might her­self be lawfully naturalized, shall be deemed a
citizen.’

“Section 1994 of the Revised Stat is said to originate in the
Act of Congress, of February 10, 1855 (10 Stat. at L. 604, chap. 71), which in
its second section provided ‘that any woman, who might lawfully be naturalized
under the existing laws, married, or who shall be married to a citizen of the
United States, shall be deemed and taken to be a citizen.’

“And the American Statute of 1855 is substantially a copy of
the ear­lier British Statute 7 & 8 Vict. chap.
66, § 16, 1844, which provided that ‘any woman married, or who shall be
married, to a natural-born subject or person naturalized, shall be deemed and
taken to be herself naturalized, and have all the rights and privileges of a
natural born subject.’

“The Act of Congress of September 22, 1922 (42 Stat. at L. 1021, chap. 411, Comp.
Stat. § 4358b, Fed. Stat. Anna. Supp. 1922, p. 255), being ‘An Act Relative to
the Naturalization and Citizenship of Married Wo­men,’ in § 2, provides ‘that
any wo­man who marries a citizen of the United States after the passage of this
Act, . . . shall not become a citizen of the United States by reason of such
marriage . . . .’

“Section 6 of the act also provides that 1994 of the Revised
Statutes . . .  are repealed.’

“Section 6 also provides that ‘such repeal shall not terminate
ci­tizenship acquired or retained under either of such sections, . . .’ meaning
§§ 2 and 6.  So that this Act of September 22, 1922, has no appli­cation
to the facts of the present case, as the marriage of the relator
took place prior to its passage.  This
case, therefore, depends upon the meaning to be attached to 1994 of the Revised
Statutes.

“In 1868 the Supreme Court, in Kelly v. Owen, 7 Wall. 496,
498, 19 L. ed. 283, 284, construed this pro­vision as found in the Act of 1855
as follows:  ‘The term, “who might
lawfully be naturalized under the existing laws,” only limits the appli­cation
of the law to free white women.  The
previous Naturalization Act, existing at the time, only required that the
person applying for its benefits should be “a free white per­son,”
and not an alien enemy.’

“This construction limited the ef­fect of the statute to those
aliens who belonged to the class or race which might he lawfully naturalized,
and did not refer to any of the other provisions of the naturalization laws as
to residence or moral charac­ter, or to any of the provisions of the
immigration laws relating to the exclusion or deportation of aliens.

“In 1880, in Leonard v. Grant (C. C.) 5 Fed. 11, District
Judge Deady also construed the Act of 1855, de­claring
that ‘any woman who is now or may hereafter be married to a ci­tizen of the
United States, and might herself be lawfully naturalized, shall be deemed a
citizen.’ He held that ‘upon the authorities, and the reas­on, if not the
necessity, of the case, the statute must be construed as in effect declaring
that an alien wo­man, who is of the class or race that may be lawfully
naturalized under the existing laws, and who marries a ci­tizen of the United
States, is such a citizen also, and it was not neces­sary that it should appear
affirmatively that she possessed the other qualifications at the time of her
mar­riage to entitle her to naturalization.’

“In 1882, the Act of 1855 came before Mr. Justice Harlan,
sitting in the circuit court, in United States
v. Kellar, 13 Fed. 82.  An alien woman, a subject of Prussia
came to the United States
and mar­ried here a naturalized citizen. 
Mr. Justice Harlan, with the concurrence of Judge Treat, held that upon
her marriage she became ipso facto a citizen of the United
States as ful­ly as if she had complied with
all of the provisions of the statutes upon the subject of naturalization.  He added: 
‘There can be no doubt of this, in view of the decision of the Supreme
Court of the United States in Kelly v. Owen, 7 Wall. 496, 19 L. ed. 283.’ The
alien ‘belonged to the class of persons’ who might be lawfully naturalized.

“In 1904, in Hopkins
v. Fachant, 65 C. C. A. 1, 130 Fed. 839, an alien
woman came to the United States
from France and
entered the country contrary to the immigration laws.  The immigration autho­rities took her into
custody at the port of New
York, with the view of deporting her.  She applied for her release under a writ of
habeas cor­pus, and pending the disposition of the matter she married a
naturaliz­ed American citizen.  The
circuit court of appeals for the ninth cir­cuit held, affirming the court be­low
that she was entitled to be discharged from custody.  The court declared:  ‘The rule is well settled that her marriage
to a naturalized citizen of the United States
enti­tled her to be discharged.  The sta­tus
of the wife follows that of her husband, and by virtue of her marriage her
husbands,  . . . and domicil
became her domicil.’

“In 1908, the circuit court for the district of Rhode Island
in Re Rustigian, 165 Fed. 980, had before it the
application of a husband for his final decree of naturalization.  It appeared that at that time his wife was
held by the immigration authorities at New York
on the ground that she was afflicted with a dangerous and contagious
disease.  Counsel on both sides agreed that
the effect of the husband’s natura­lization would be to confer citizen­ship
upon the wife.  In view of that
contingency District Judge Brown de­clined to pass upon the husband’s
application for naturalization, and thought it best to wait until it was determined
whether the wife’s di­sease was curable. 
He placed his failure to act on the express ground that the effect of
naturalizing the husband might naturalize her. 
At the same time he expressed his opi­nion that the husband’s naturaliza­tion
would not effect her naturali­zation, as she was not one who could become
lawfully naturalized. ‘Her own capacity (to become naturalized),’ the court
stated, ‘is a prerequisite to her attaining citizenship.  If herself lacking in that capacity, the
married status cannot confer it upon her.’ Nothing, however, was act­ually
decided in that case, and the views expressed therein are really nothing more
than mere dicta.  But, if they can be
regarded as something more than that, we find ourselves, with all due respect
for the learned judge, unable to accept them.

“In 1909, in United States
ex rel. Nicola v. Williams, 173 Fed. 626, District
Judge Learned Hand held that an alien woman, a subject of the Tur­kish Empire,
who married an American citizen while visiting Turkey, and then came to the
United States, could not be excluded, although she had, at the time of her
entry, a disease which under the immigration laws would have been sufficient
ground for her exclusion, if she had not had the status of a citizen.  The case was brought into this court on
appeal, and in 1911 was affirmed, in 106 C. C. A. 464, 184 Fed. 322.  In that case, how­ever, at the time the relators married, they might have been lawfully natura­lized,
and we said:  ‘Even if we assume the
contention of the district attor­ney to be correct that marriage will not make
a citizen of a woman who would be excluded under our immigra­tion laws, it does
not affect these relators.’

“We held that, being citizens, they could not be excluded as
aliens; and it was also said to be inconsistent with the policy of our law that
the husband should be a citizen and the wife an alien.  The distinction bet­ween that case and the
one now before the court is that, in the former case, the marriage took place
before any or­der of exclusion had been made, while in this the marriage was
celebrated after such an order was made. 
But such an order is a mere administra­tive provision, and has not the
force of a judgment of a court, and works no estoppel.  The administrative or­der is based on the
circumstances that existed at the time the order of exclusion was made.  If the cir­cumstances change prior to the or­der
being carried into effect, it cannot be executed.  For example, if an order of exclusion should
be based on the ground that the alien was at the time afflicted with a
contagious disease, and it should be made satisfactorily to appear, prior to
actual deportation, that the alien had entirely recovered from the disease, we
think it plain that the order could not be carried into effect.  So, in this case, if, after the making of the
order of ex­clusion and while she is permitted temporarily to remain, she in
good faith marries an American citizen, we cannot doubt the validity of her
marriage, and that she thereby ac­quired, under international law and under 1994
of the Revised Statutes, American citizenship, and ceased to be an alien.  There upon, the immigration authorities lost
their juris­diction over her, as that jurisdic­tion applies only to aliens, and
not to citizens.

“In 1910, District Judge Dodge, in Ex parte
Kaprielian, 188 Fed. 694, sustained the right of the
officials to deport a woman under the following circumstances:  She entered this country in July, 1910, being
an alien and, having been born in Turkey.  She was taken into custody by the immi­gration
authorities in the following September, and in October a warrant for her
deportation was issued.  Pend­ing
hearings as to the validity of that order, she was paroled in the custody of
her counsel.  The ground alleged for her deportation
was that she was afflicted with a dangerous and contagious disease at the time
of her entry.  One of the reasons
assigned to defeat deportation was that the woman had married a citizen of the United
States pending the proceed­ings for her
deportation.  Judge Dodge declared
himself unable to believe that a marriage under such circumstances ‘is capable
of having the effect claimed, in view of the facts shown.’ He held that it was
no part of the intended po­licy of 1994 to annul or override the immigration
laws, so as to authorize the admission into the country of the wife of a
naturalized alien not other­wise entitled to enter, and that an alien woman,
who is of a class of per­sons excluded by law from admission to the United
States does not come within the provisions of that section.  The court relied wholly upon the dicta con­tained
in the Rustigian Case. No other authorities were
cited.

“In 1914, District Judge Neterer, in
Ex parte Grayson, 215 Fed. 449, cons­trued 1994 and
held that where, pend­ing proceedings to deport an alien na­tive of France as
an alien prostitute, she was married to a citizen of the United States, she
thereby became a citizen, and was not subject to deporta­tion until her
citizenship was revoked by due process of law. 
It was his opi­nion that if, as was contended, her mar­riage was
conceived in fraud, and was entered into for the purpose of evading the
immigration laws and preventing her deportation, such fact should be estab­lished
in a court of competent jurisdic­tion in an action commenced for the
purpose.  The case was appealed and the
appeal was dismissed.  134 C. C. A. 666,
219 Fed. 1022.

“It is interesting also to observe the construction placed
upon the lan­guage of the statute by the Department of Justice.  In 1874, Attorney General Williams, 14 Ops.
Atty. Gen. 402, pass­ing upon the Act of February 10, 1855, held that residence
within the United States for the period required by the naturalization laws was
not necessary in order to constitute an alien woman a citizen, she having
married a citi­zen of the United States abroad, although she never resided in
the United States, she and her husband having con­tinued to reside abroad after
the mar­riage.

“In 1909, a similar construction was given to the Immigration
Act of May 5, 1907, in an
opinion rendered by Attorney General Wickersham.  It appeared an unmarried woman, twenty-eight
years of age and a native of Bel­gium,
arrived in New York and went at
once to a town in Nebraska, where
she continued to reside.  About fifteen
months after her arrival she was taken before a United States commissioner by
way of instituting proceedings under the Immigration Act (34 Stat. at L. 898,
chap. 1134, Comp. Stat. 4242, 3 Fed. Stat. Anno. 2d
ed. p. 637) for her deportation, on the ground that she had entered this
country for the purpose of prostitution, and had been found an inmate of a house
of prostitution and practicing the same within three years after landing.  It appear­ed, however, that after she was
taken before the United States
commissioner, but prior to her arrest under a war­rant by the Department of
Justice, she was lawfully married to a native-born citizen of the United
States. 
The wo­man professed at the time of her mar­riage an intention to
abandon her pre­vious mode of life and to remove with her husband to his home
in Pennsylvania.  He knew what her mode of life had been, but
professed to believe in her good intentions. 
The question was raised as to the right to deport her, the claim being
advanced that by her marriage she had become an American citizen and therefore
could not be de­ported.  The Attorney
General ruled against the right to deport her as she had become an American
citizen.  He held that the words, ‘who
might herself be lawfully naturalized,’ re­fer to a class or race who might be
lawfully naturalized, and that com­pliance with the other conditions of the
naturalization laws was not re­quired. 
27 Ops. Atty. Gen. 507.

“Before concluding this opinion, we may add that it has not
escaped our observation that Congress, in enacting the Immigration Act of 1917,
so as to provide, in 19, ‘that the marriage to an American citizen of a female
of the sexually immoral class­es …. shall not invest such female with United
States citizenship if the marriage of such
alien female shall be solemnized after her arrest or after the commission of
acts which make her liable to deportation under this act.’

“Two conclusions seem irresistibly to follow from the above
change in the law:

“(1)  Congress deemed legislation essential to
prevent women of the im­moral class avoiding deportation through the device of
marrying an American citizen.

“(2)  If Congress intended that the marriage of an
American citizen with an alien woman of any other of the excluded classes,
either before or after her detention, should not confer upon her American
citizenship, thereby entitling her to enter the country, its intention would
have been expressed, and 19 would not have been confined solely to women of the
immoral class.”

Indeed, We have examined all the leading American decisions on
the subject and We have found no warrant for the proposition that the phrase
“who might herself be lawfully naturalized” in Section 1994 of the
Revised Stat­utes was meant solely as a racial bar, even if loose statements in
some decisions and other treatises and other writings on the subject would seem
to give such impression.  The case of
Kelly v. Owen, supra, which appears to be the most cited among the first
of these decisions19 simply held:

“As we construe this Act, it con­fers the privileges of
citizenship upon women married to citizens of the United
States, if they are of the class of persons
for whose natu­ralization the previous Acts of Con­gress provide.  The terms ‘married’ or ‘who shall be
married,’ do not refer, in our judgment, to the time when the ceremony of
marriage is celebrated, but to a state of mar­riage.  They mean that, whenever a woman, who under
previous Acts might be naturalized, is in a state of marriage to a citizen,
whether his citizenship existed at the passage of the Act or subsequently, or
before or after the marriage, she becomes, by that fact, a citizen also.  His citizenship, whenever it exists, confers,
under the Act, citizenship upon her.  The
cons­truction which would restrict the Act to women whose husbands, at the time
of marriage, are citizens, would exclude far the greater num­ber, for whose
benefit, as we think, the Act was intended. 
Its object, in our opinion, was to al­low her citizenship to follow that
of her husband, without the necessity of any application for naturaliza­tion on
her part; and, if this was the object, there is no reason for the restriction
suggested.

“The terms, ‘who might lawfully be naturalized under the
existing laws,’ only limit the application of the law to free white women.  The previous Naturalization Act, exist­ing at
the time only required that the person applying for its benefits should be ‘a
free white person,’ and not an alien enemy. 
Act of April 14th, 1802,
2 Stat. at L. 153.

“A similar construction was given to the Act by the Court of
Appeals of New York, in Burton v. Burton, 40 N. Y. 373; and is the one which
gives the widest extension to its provisions.”

Note that while the court did say that “the terms, ‘who
might lawfully be naturalized under existing laws’ only limit the application
to free white women”20 it hastened to add that “the
previous Naturalization Act, existing at the time, x x
x required that the per­son applying for its benefits
should be (not only) a ‘free white person’ (but also) x x
x not an alien enemy.” This is simply because
under the Naturalization Law of the United
States at the time the case was deci­ded,
the disqualification of enemy aliens had already been removed by the Act of July 30, 1813, as may be seen in the
corresponding footnote hereof anon.  In
other words, if in the case of Kelly v. 
Owen only the race requirement was mentioned, the reason was that there
was no other non­racial requirement or no more alien-enemy disqualification at
the time; and this is demonstrated by the fact that the court took care to make
it clear that under the previous na­turalization law, there was also such
requirement in addi­tion to race.  This
is important, since as stated in re Rustigian, 165
Fed. Rep. 980, “The expression used by Mr. Jus­tice Field, (in Kelly v.
Owen) the terms ‘who might law­fully be naturalized under existing laws’ only
limit the application of the law to free white women, must be inter­preted in
the application to the special facts and to the incapacities under the then
existing laws,” (at p. 982) meaning that whether or not an alien wife
marrying a ci­tizen would be a citizen was dependent, not only on her race and
nothing more necessarily, but on whether or not there were other
disqualifications under the law in force at the time of her marriage or the
naturalization of her husband.

4.  As already stated, in Lo
San Tuang, Choy King Tee and the second Ly Giok Ha, the Court drew the infer­ence that because Section
1 of Act 2927 was eliminated by Commonwealth Act 473, it follows that in place
of the said eliminated section, particularly its subdivision (c), being the
criterion of whether or not an alien wife “may be lawfully
naturalized,” what should be required is not only that she must not be
disqualified under Sec­tion 4 but that she must also possess the qualifications
enumerated in Section 2, such as those of age, residence, good moral character,
adherence to the underlying prin­ciples of the Philippine Constitution,
irreproachable conduct, lucrative employment or ownership of real estate,
capacity to speak and write English or Spanish and one of the principal local
languages, education of children in certain schools, etc., thereby implying
that, in effect, said Section 2 has been purposely intended to take the place of
Section 1 of Act 2927.  Upon further
considera­tion of the proper premises, We have come to the conclusion that such
inference is not sufficiently justified.

To begin with, nothing extant in the legislative his­tory, which
We have already examined above of the mention­ed provisions has been shown or
can be shown to indicate that such was the clear intent of the
legislature.  Rather, what is definite is
that Section 15 is an exact copy of Section 1994 of the Revised Statutes of the
United States,
which, at the time of the approval of Commonwealth Act 473 had already a
settled construction by American courts and administrative authorities.

Secondly, as may be gleaned from the summary of per­tinent
American decisions quoted above, there can be no doubt that in the construction
of the identically worded provision in the Revised Statutes of the United
States, (Section 1994, which was taken from the Act of February 10, 1855) all
authorities in the United States are unani­mously agreed that the
qualifications of residence, good moral character, adherence to the
Constitution, etc. are not supposed to be considered, and that the only eligibi­lity
to be taken into account is that of the race or class to which the subject belongs,
the conceptual scope of which, We have just discussed.21
In the very case of Leonard v. Grant, supra, discussed by Justice Regala in Lo San Tuang, the
explanation for such posture of the Ameri­can authorities was made thus:

“The phrase, ‘shall be deemed a ci­tizen,’ in section 1994,
Rev. St., or as it was in the Act of 1855, supra, ‘shall be deemed and taken to
be a citizen,’ while it may imply that the person to whom it relates has not
actually become a citizen by ordinary means or in the usual way, as by the
judgment of a competent court, upon a proper application and proof, yet it does
not follow that such person is on that account practically any the less a
citizen.  The word ‘deemed’ is the
equivalent of ‘considered’ or ‘judged’; and, therefore, whatever an act of
Congress requires to be ‘deemed’ or ‘taken’ as true of any per­son or thing,
must, in law, be consi­dered as having been duly adjudged or established
concerning such person or thing, and have force and effect ac­cordingly.  When, therefore, Congress declares that an
alien woman shall, under certain circumstances, be ‘deemed’ an American
citizen, the effect when the contingency occurs, is equivalent to her being
natura­lized directly by an act of Con­gress, or in the usual mode thereby
prescribed.”

Unless We disregard now the long settled
familiar rule of statutory construction that in a situation like this where­in
our legislature has copied an American statute word for word, it is understood
that the construction already given to such statute before its being copied
constitute part of our own law, there seems to be no reason how We can give a
different connotation or meaning to the provision in ques­tion.  At least, We have already seen that the views
sus­taining the contrary conclusion appear to be based on in­accurate factual
premises related to the real legislative background of the framing of our
naturalization law in its present form.

Thirdly, the idea of equating the qualifications enumerated in
Section 2 of Commonwealth Act 473 with the eligibility requirements of Section
1 of Act 2927 cannot bear close scrutiny from any point of view.  There is no question that Section 2 of
Commonwealth Act 473 is more or less substantially the same as Section 3 of Act
2927.  In other words, Section 1 of Act
2927 co-existed already with practically the same provision as Section 2 of
Commonwealth Act 473.  If it were true
that the phrase “who may be law­fully naturalized” in Section 13(a)
of Act 2927, as amend­ed by Act 3448, referred to the so-called racial require­ment
in Section 1 of the same Act, without regard to the provisions of Section 3
thereof, how could the elimination of Section 1 have the effect of shifting the
reference to Section 3, when precisely, according to the American ju­risprudence,
which was prevailing at the time Commonwealth Act 473 was approved, such
qualifications as were embodied in said Section 3, which had their counter-part
in the cor­responding American statutes, are not supposed to be taken into
account and that what should be considered only are the requirements similar to
those provided for in said Section 1 together with the disqualifications
enumerated in Section 4?

Fourthly, it is difficult to conceive that the phrase “who
might be lawfully naturalized” in Section 15 could have been intended to
convey a meaning different than that given to it by the American courts and
administrative authorities.  As already
stated, Act 3448 which contained said phrase and from which it was taken by
Commonwealth Act 473, was enacted in 1928. 
By that time, Section 1994 of the Revised Statutes of the United States
was no longer in force because it had been repealed expressly by the Act of
September 22, 1922 which did away with the automatic naturalization of alien
wives of Ame­rican citizens and required, instead, that they submit to regular
naturalization proceedings, albeit under more liberal terms than those of other
applicants.  In other words, when our
legislature adopted the phrase in ques­tion, which, as already demonstrated,
had a definite cons­truction in American law, the Americans had already aban­doned
said phraseology in favor of a categorical compul­sion for alien wives to be
naturalized judicially.  Simple logic
would seem to dictate that, since our lawmakers, at the time of the approval of
Act 3448, had two choices, one to adopt the phraseology of Section 1994 with
its set­tled construction and the other to follow the new posture of the
Americans of requiring judicial naturalization, and it appears that they have
opted for the first, We have no alternative but to conclude that our law still
follows the old or previous American law on the subject.  Indeed, when Commonwealth Act 473 was
approved in 1939, the Philippine Legislature, already autonomous then from the
American Congress, had a clearer chance to disregard the old American law and
make one of our own, or, at least, follow the trend of the Act of the U. S.
Congress of 1922, but still, our legislators chose to maintain the language of
the old law.  What then is significantly
important is not that the legislature maintained said phraseology after Section
1 of Act 2927 was eliminated, but that it continued insisting on using it even
after the Americans had amended their law in order to provide for what is now
contended to be the construction that should be given to the phrase in
question.  Stated dif­ferently, had our
legislature adopted a phrase from an American statute before the American
courts had given it a construction which was acquiesced to by those called upon
to apply the same, it would be possible for Us to adopt a construction here
different from that of the Americans, but as things stand, the fact is that our
le­gislature borrowed the phrase when there was already a settled construction
thereof, and what is more, it appears that our legislators even ignored the
modifica­tion of the American law and persisted in maintaining the old
phraseology.  Under these circumstances,
it would be in defiance of reason and the principles of Statutory construction
to say that Section 15 has a nationa­listic and selective orientation and that
it should be construed independently of the previous American posture because
of the difference of circumstances here and in VA the United
States. 
It is always safe to say that in the construction of a statute, We
cannot fall on possible judicial fiat or perspective when the demonstrated
legis­lative point of view seems to indicate otherwise.

5.  Viewing the matter from
another angle, there is need to emphasize that in reality and in effect, the so-called
racial requirements, whether under the American laws or the Philippine laws,
have hardly been considered as qualifications in the same sense as those
enumerated in Section 3 of Act 2927 and later in Section 2 of Com­monwealth Act
473.  More accurately, they have always
been considered as disqualifications, in the sense that these who did not
possess them were the ones who could not “be lawfully naturalized”,
just as if they were suf­fering from any of the disqualifications under Section
2 of Act 2927 and later those under Section 4 of Common­wealth Act 473, which,
incidentally, are practically iden­tical to those in the former law, except
those in para­graphs (f) and (h) of the latter.22 Indeed, such is the clear
impression anyone will surely get after going over all the American decisions
and opinions quoted and/or cited in the latest USCA (1970), Title 8, section
1430, pp. 598-602, and the first decisions of this Court on the matter, Ly Giok Ha (1959) and Ricardo Cua,
citing 23 with approval the opinions of the Secretary of Justice.23
Such being the case, that is, that the so-called racial requirements were
always treated as disqualifications in the same light as the other
disqualifications under the law, why should their elimination not be viewed or
understood as a subtraction from or a lessening of the disqua­lifications?  Why should such elimination have instead the
meaning that what were previously considered as irre­levant qualifications have
become disqualifications, as seems to be the import of the holding in Choy King
Tee to the effect that the retention in Section 15 of Commonwealth Act 473 of
the same language of what used to be Sec­tion 13 (a) of Act 2927 (as amended by
Act 3448), notwithstanding the elimination of Section 1 of the latter, neces­sarily
indicates that the legislature had in mind making the phrase in question
“who may be lawfully naturalized” refer no longer to any racial
disqualification but to the qualification under Section 2 of Commonwealth Act
473?  Oth­erwise stated, under Act 2927,
there were two groups of persons that could not be naturalized, namely, those
fal­ling under Section 1 and those falling under Section 2, and surely, the
elimination of one group, i.e. those belonging to Section 1, could not have
had, by any process of reason­ing, the effect of increasing, rather than
decreasing, the disqualifications that used to be before such elimination.  We cannot see by what alchemy of logic such
elimination could have converted qualifications into disqualifications, spe­cially
in the light of the fact that, after all, these are disqualifications clearly
set out as such in the law distinctly and separately from qualifications and,
as already demons­trated, in American jurisprudence, qualifications had never
been considered to be of any relevance in determining “who might be
lawfully naturalized”, as such phrase is used in the statute governing the
status of alien wives of American citizens, and our law on the matter was
merely copied verba­tim from the American statutes.

6.  In addition to these
arguments based on the appli­cable legal provisions and judicial opinions,
whether here or in the United States,
there are practical considerations that militate towards the same
conclusions.  As aptly sta­ted in the
motion for reconsideration of counsel for petitioner-appellee
dated February 23, 1967,
filed in the case of Zits Ngo Burca v. Republic, supra:

“Unreasonableness
of requiring alien wife to prove ‘qualifications’ –

“There is one practical considera­tion that strongly militates
against a construction that Section 15 of the law requires that an alien wife
of a Filipino must affirmatively prove that she possesses the qualifications
pres­cribed under Section 2, before she may be deemed a citizen.  Such condition, if imposed upon an alien
wife, becomes unreasonably onerous and compliance therewith manifestly
difficult.  The unreasonableness of such
requirement is shown by the following:

“1. One of the qualifications required of an
applicant for naturalization under Sec­tion 2 of the law is that the applicant
‘must have resided in the Philippines
for a con­tinuous period of not less than ten years.’ If this requirement is
applied to an a­lien wife married to a Filipi­no citizen, this means that for a
period of ten years at least, she cannot hope to acquire the citizenship of her
husband.  If the wife happens to be a
citi­zen of a country whose law declares that upon her marriage to a foreigner
she automatical­ly loses her citizenship and acquires the citizenship of her
husband, this could mean that for a period of ten years at least, she would be
state­less.  And even after having
acquired continuous residence in the Philippines
for ten years, there is no guarantee that her petition for naturalization will
be granted, in which case she would remain stateless for an indefinite period
of time.

“2. Section 2 of the law like­wise requires of the
applicant for naturalization that he ‘must own real estate in the Philippines
worth not less than five thousand pesos, Philippine currency, or must have some
known lucrative trade, profession, or lawful occupation.’ Considering the cons­titutional
prohibition against acquisition by an alien of real estate except in cases of
hereditary succession (Art. X111, Sec. 5, Constitution), an alien wife desiring
to acquire the citizen­ship of her husband must have to prove that she has a
lucrative income derived from a lawful trade, profession or occupation.  The income requirement has been interpreted
to mean that the petitioner herself must be the one to possess the said income.
(Uy v. Republic, G.R. No. L-19578, Oct. 27, 1964; Tanpa
Ong vs. Repub­lic, G.R. No. L-20605, June 30, 1965; Li Tong Pek v. Republic, G.R. No. L­20912, November 29, 1965).  In other words, the wife must prove that she
has a lucrative income derived from sources o­ther than her husband’s trade,
profession or calling.  It is of common
knowledge, and judi­cial notice may be taken of the fact that most wives in the
Philippines do
not have gainful occupations of their own. 
Indeed, Philippine Law, recognizing the dependence of the wife upon the
husband, imposes upon the latter the duty of supporting the former.  (Art. 291, Civil Code).  It should be borne in mind that uni­versally,
it is an accepted con­cept that when a woman marries, her primary duty is to be
a wife, mother and housekeeper.  If an a­lien
wife is not to be remiss in this duty, how can she hope to acquire a lucrative
income of her own to qualify her for citizen­ship?

“3. Under Section 2 of the law, the applicant for
naturalization ‘must have enrolled his minor children of school age, in any of
the public schools or private schools recognized by the Office of the Private
Education of the Philippines, where Philippine his­tory, government and civics
are taught or prescribed as part of the school curriculum during the entire
period of residence in the Philippines required of him prior to the hearing of
his petition for naturalization as Philippine citizen.’ If an alien woman has
minor children by a previous mar­riage to another alien before she marries a
Filipino, and such mi­nor children had not been enrolled in Philippine schools
during her period of residence in the coun­try, she cannot qualify for
naturalization under the interpreta­tion of this Court.  The reason behind the requirement that chil­dren
should be enrolled in recog­nized educational institutions is that they follow
the citizen­ship of their father.  (Chan
Ho Lay v. Republic, G.R. No. L-5666, March
30, 1954; Tan Hi v. Republic, 88 Phil. 117 [1951]; Hao Lian Chu
v. Repu­blic, 87 Phil. 668 [1950]; Yap Chin v. Republic, G.R. No. L-4177, May 29, 1953; Lim Lian
Hong v. Republic, G.R. No. L-3575, Dec.
26, 1950).  Conside­ring that
said minor children by her first husband generally fol­low the citizenship of
their a­lien father, the basis for such requirement as applied to her does not
exist.  Cessante
ratione legis cessat ipsa lex.

“4. Under Section 3 of the law, the 10-year
continuous resi­dence prescribed by Section 2 ‘shall be understood as reduced
to five years for any petitioner (who is) married to a Filipino woman.’ It is
absurd that an a­lien male married to a Filipino wife should be required to
reside only for five years in the Philip­pines
to qualify for citizenship, whereas an alien woman married to a Filipino
husband must reside for ten years.

“Thus under the interpretation given
by this Court, it is more difficult for an alien wife related by marriage to a
Fili­pino citizen to become such citizen, than for a foreigner who is not so
relat­ed.  And yet, it seems more than
clear that the general purpose of the first paragraph of Section 15 was
obviously to accord to an alien woman, by reason of her marriage to a Filipino,
a pri­vilege not similarly granted to other aliens.  It will be recalled that prior to the
enactment of Act No. 3448 in 1928, amending Act No. 2927 (the old
Naturalization Law), there was no law granting any special pri­vilege to alien
wives of Filipinos.  They were treated as
any other for­eigner.  It was precisely
to remedy this situation that the Philippine legislature enacted Act No.
3448.  On this point, the observation
made by the Secretary of Justice in 1941 is enlightening:

‘It is true that under Art­icle 22 of the (Spanish) Civil Code, the
wife follows the na­tionality of the husband; but the Department of state of
the United States on October 31, 1921, ruled that the alien wife of a Filipino
citizen is not a Filipino citizen, pointing out that our Supreme Court in the
leading case of Roa v. Collector of Customs (23 Phil.
315) held that Art­icles 17 to 27 of the Civil Code being political have been
abrogated upon the ces­sion of the Philippine Islands to the United
States.  Accord­ingly, the stand taken
by the Attorney-General prior to the enactment of Act No. 3448, was that
marriage of alien women to Philippine citizens did not make the former ci­tizens
of this country.’ (Op. Atty. Gen, March 16, 1928)

‘To remedy this anomalous condition, Act No. 3448 was enacted in
1928 adding sec­tion 13(a) to Act No. 2927 which provides that “any woman
who is now or may hereafter be married to a citi­zen of the Philippine Islands,
and who might her­self be lawfully naturaliz­ed, shall be deemed a citi­zen of
the Philippine Islands.’ (Op. No. 22, s. 1941; emphasis ours).

“If Section 15 of the Revised Natura­lization Law were to be
interpreted, as this Court did, in such a way as to re­quire that the alien
wife must prove the qualifications prescribed in Section 2, the privilege
granted to alien wives would become illusory. 
It is submitted that such a construction, being contrary to the
manifested object of the statute, must, be rejected.

‘A statute is to be cons­trued with reference to its manifest
object, and if the language is susceptible of two constructions, one which will
carry out and the other defeat such manifest object, it should receive the
former construction.’ (In re National Guard, 71
Vt. 493, 45 A. 1051; Singer v. United
States, 323 U.S.
338, 89 L. ed. 285.  See also, U.S.
v. Navarro, 19 Phil. 134 [1911]; U. S.
v. Toribio, 15 Phil. 85 [1910].

‘x x x A construction which will cause
objection­able results should be avoid­ed and the court will, if pos­sible,
place on the statute a construction which will not result in injustice, and in
accordance with the decisions construing statutes, a construction which will
result in oppression, hardship, or in­conveniences will also be avoided, as
will a construct­ion which will prejudice public interest, or construction
resulting in unreason­ableness, as well as a cons­truction which will result in
absurd consequences.’

‘So a construction should, if possible, be avoided if the result
would be an apparent inconsistency in legis­lative intent, as has been de­termined
by the judicial deci­sions, or which would result in futility, redundancy, or a
conclusion not contemplated by the legislature; and the court should adopt that
cons­truction which will be the least likely to produce mis­chief.  Unless plainly shown to have been the
intention of the legislature, an interpre­tation which would render the
requirements of the statute uncertain and vague is to be avoided, and the court
will not ascribe to the legisla­ture an intent to confer an illusory
right.  x x x’ (82 C. J. S., Statutes, sec. 326, pp. 623-632).”

7.  In Choy King Tee and the
second Ly Giok Ha, emphasis was laid on the need for
aligning the construction of Section 15 with “the national policy of selec­tive
admission to Philippine citizenship.” But the question may be asked, is it
reasonable to suppose that in the pursuit of such policy, the legislature
contem­plated to make it more difficult, if not practically impossible in some
instances, for an alien woman marrying a Filipino to become a Filipina than any
ordinary appli­cant for naturalization, as has just been demonstrated
above?  It seems but natural and logical
to assume that Section 15 was intended to extend special treatment to alien
women who by marrying a Filipino irrevocably de­liver themselves, their
possessions, their fate and for­tunes and all that marriage implies to a
citizen of this country, “for better or for worse”.  Perhaps there can and will be cases wherein
the personal conveniences and benefits arising from Philippine citizenship may
moti­vate such marriage, but must the minority, as such cases are bound to be,
serve as the criterion for the construction of law?  Moreover, it is not farfetched to believe
that in joining a Filipino family, the alien woman is somehow disposed to
assimilate the customs, beliefs and ideals of Filipinos among whom, after all,
she has to live and associate, but surely, no one should expect her to do so
even before marriage.  Besides, it may be
con­sidered that in reality the extension of citizenship to her is made by the
law not so much for her sake as for the husband.  Indeed, We find the following observations
anent the national policy rationalization in Choy King Tee and Ly Giok Ha (the second) to be quite persuasive:

“We respectfully suggest that this articulation of the
national policy begs the question.  The
avowed policy of ‘selective admission’ more parti­cularly refers to a case
where citizenship is sought to be acquired in a judicial proceeding for
naturaliza­tion.  In such a case, the
courts should no doubt apply the national policy of selecting only those
who are worthy to become citizens.  There
is here a choice between accepting or rejecting the application for
citizen­ship.  But this policy finds no
appli­cation in cases where citizenship is conferred by operation of law.  In such cases, the courts have no choice
to accept or reject.  If the individual
claiming citizenship by operation of law proves in legal proceedings that he
satisfies the statutory re­quirements, the courts cannot do other­wise than to
declare that he is a ci­tizen of the Philippines.  Thus, an individual who is able to prove that
his father is a Philippine citizen, is a citizen of the Philippines,
‘ir­respective of his moral character; ideological beliefs, and identifica­tion
with Filipino ideals, customs and traditions.’ A minor child of a person
naturalized under the law, who is able to prove the fact of his birth in the Philippines,
is likewise a ci­tizen, regardless of whether he has lucrative income,
or he adheres to the principles of the Constitution.  So it is with an alien wife of a Philippine
citizen.  She is required to prove only that
she may herself be lawfully naturalized, i. e., that
she is not one of the disqualified persons enumerated in Section 4 of the law,
in order to establish her citizenship status as a fact.

“A paramount policy consideration of graver import should not
be over­looked in this regard, for it explains and justifies the obviously
deliberate choice of words.  It is
universally accepted that a State, in extending the privilege of citi­zenship
to an alien wife of one of its citizens could have had no other objective than
to maintain a unity of allegiance among the members of the family.  (Nelson v. Nelson, 113 Neb.
453, 203 N. W. 640 [1925]; see also ‘Convention on the Nationality of Married
Women:  Historical Background and
Commentary.’ UNITED NATIONS, De­partment of Economic and Social Affairs E/CN,
6/399, pp. 8 et seq.).  Such ob­jective
can only be satisfactorily achieved by allowing the wife to acquit citizenship
derivatively through the husband. 
This is particularly true in the Philippines
where tradi­tion and law has placed the husband as head of the family, whose
personal sta­tus and decisions govern the life of the family group.  Corollary to this, our laws look with favor
on the unity and solidarity of the family (Art. 220, Civil Code), in whose
preserva­tion the State has a vital and endur­ing interest.  (See Art. 216, Civil Code).  Thus, it has been said that by tradition in
our country, there is a theoretic identity of person and in­terest between
husband and wife, and from the nature of the relation, the home of one is that
of the other.  (See De la Viña v. Villareal, 41 Phil.
13).  It should likewise be said that
because of the theoretic identity of husband and wife, and the primacy of the
husband, the nationality of the husband should be the nationality of the wife,
and the laws upon one should be the law upon the other.  For as the court, in Hopkins v. Fachant (9th Cir., 1904) 65 C. C. A. 1, 130 Fed. 839,
held:  ‘The status of the wife follows
that of the husband, x x x
and by virtue of her marriage her husband’s domicile became her domicile.’ And
the presumption under Philippine law being that the property relations
of husband and wife are under the regime of conjugal partnership (Art. 119,
Civil Code), the income of one is also that of the other.

“It is, therefore, not congruent with our cherished traditions
of fa­mily unity and identity that a hus­band should be a citizen and the wife
an alien, and that the national treat­ment of one should be different from that
of the other.  Thus, it cannot be that
the husband’s interests in property and business activities re­served by law to
citizens should not form part of the conjugal partnership and be denied to the
wife, nor that she herself cannot, through her own efforts but for the benefit
of the partnership, acquire such interests. 
Only in rare instances should the identity of husband and wife be re­fused
recognition, and we submit that in respect of our citizenship laws, it should
only be in the instances where the wife suffers from the disqualifications
stated in Section 4 of the Revised Naturalization Law.” (Motion for
Reconsideration, Burca vs. Republic,
supra.)

With all these considerations in mind, We are per­suaded that it
is in the best interest of all concerned that Section 15 of the Naturalization
Law be given ef­fect in the same way as it was understood and construed when
the phrase “who may be lawfully naturalized”, found in the American
statute from which it was borrowed and copied verbatim, was applied by the
American courts and administrative authorities. 
There is merit, of course, in the view that Philippine statutes should
be construed in the light of Philippine circumstances, and with par­ticular
reference to our naturalization laws, We should realize the disparity in the
circumstances between the United States, as the so-called “melting
pot” of peoples from all over the world, and the Philippines as a
developing country whose Constitution is nationalistic al­most in the
extreme.  Certainly, the writer of this
opi­nion cannot be the last in rather passionately insisting that our
jurisprudence should speak our own concepts and resort to American authorities,
to be sure, entitled to admiration and respect, should not be regarded as
source of pride and indisputable authority. 
Still, We cannot close our eyes to the undeniable fact that the
provision of law now under scrutiny has no local origin and orien­tation; it is
purely American, factually taken bodily from American law when the Philippines
was under the do­minating influence of statutes of the United States Con­gress.  It is indeed a sad commentary on the work of
our own legislature of the late 1920’s and 1930’s that given the opportunity to
break away from the old American pat­tern, it took no step in that
direction.  Indeed, even after America
made it patently clear in the Act of Con­gress of September 22, 1922 that alien
women marrying Americans cannot be citizens of the United States without
undergoing naturalization proceedings, our legislators still chose to adopt the
previous American law of August 10, 1855 as embodied later in Section 1994 of
the Revised Statutes of 1874, which, it is worth reiterating, was con­sistently
and uniformly understood as conferring American citizenship to alien women
marrying Americans ipso facto, without having to submit to any
naturalization proceed­ing and without having to prove that they possess the
spe­cial qualifications of residence, moral character, adherence to American
ideals and American constitution, provided they could show they did not suffer
from any of the disqualifi­cations enumerated in the American Naturalization
Law.  Ac­cordingly, We now hold, all
previous decisions of this Court indicating otherwise notwithstanding, that
under Sec­tion 15 of Commonwealth Act 473, an alien woman marrying a Filipino,
native-born or naturalized, becomes ipso fac­to a Filipina
provided she is not disqualified to be a citizen of the Philippines under
Section 4 of the same law.  Likewise, an
alien woman married to an alien who is subse­quently naturalized here follows
the Philippine citizenship of her husband the moment he takes his oath as
Filipino ci­tizen, provided that she does not suffer from any of the
disqualifications under said Section 4.

As under any other law rich in benefits for those coming under it,
doubtless there will be instances where unscrupulous persons will attempt to
take advantage of this provision of law by entering into fake and ficti­tious
marriages or male fide matrimonies.  We cannot as a matter of law hold that just
because of these possibi­lities, the construction of the provision should be
otherwise than as dictated inexorably by more ponderous relevant
considerations, legal, juridical and practical. 
There can always be means of discovering such undesir­able practices and
every case can be dealt with accord­ingly as it arises.

III.

The third aspect of this case requires necessarily a
re-examination of the ruling of this Court in Burca, supra,
regarding the need of judicial naturalization proceed­ings before the alien
wife of a Filipino may herself be considered or deemed a Filipino.  If this case which, as already noted, was
submitted for decision in 1964 yet, had only been decided earlier, before Go Im Ty, the foregoing discussions
would have been sufficient to dispose of it. 
The Court could have held that despite her apparent lack of
qualifications, her marriage to her co-petitioner made her a Filipina, without
her undergoing any naturalization proceedings, provided she could sustain her
claim that she is not disqualified under Section 4 of the law.  But as things stand now, with the Burca ruling, the question We have still to decide is, may
she be deemed a Filipina without submitting to a naturalization proceeding?

Naturally, if Burca is to be followed,
it is clear that the answer to this question must necessarily be in the
affirmative.  As already stated, however,
the deci­sion in Burca has not yet become final
because there is still pending with Us a motion for its reconsideration which
vigorously submits grounds worthy of serious consi­deration by this Court.  On this account, and for the reasons
expounded earlier in this opinion, this case is as good an occasion as any
other to re-examine the issue.

In the said decision, Justice Sanchez held for the Court:

“We accordingly rule that: 
(1) An alien woman married to a Filipino who desires to be a citizen of
this country must apply therefor by fil­ing a
petition for citizenship re­citing that she possesses all the qualifications
set forth in Section 2 and none of the disqualifications under Section 4, both
of the Re­vised Naturalization Law; (2) Said petition must be filed in the
Court of First Instance where petitioner has resided at least one year imme­diately
preceding the filing of the petition; and (3) Any action by any other office,
agency, board or official, administrative or other­wise – other than the
judgment of a competent court of justice – certifying or declaring that an
alien wife of the Filipino citizen is also a Filipino citizen, is hereby
declared null and void.

“3.  We treat the present pe­tition as one for
naturalization.  Or, in the words of law,
a ‘petition for citizenship’.  This is as
it should be.  Because a reading of the
petition will reveal at once that efforts were made to set forth therein, and
to prove afterwards, compliance with Sections 2 and 4 of the Revised
Naturalization Law.  The trial court
itself apparently considered the petition as one for naturalization, and, in
fact, declared petitioner ‘a citizen of the Philippines.’”

In other words, under this holding, in order for an alien woman
marrying a Filipino to be vested with Filipino citizenship, it is not enough
that she pos­sesses the qualifications prescribed by Section 2 of the law and
none of the disqualifications enumerated in its Section 4.  Over and above all these, she has to pass
thru the whole process of judicial naturali­zation, apparently from declaration
of intention to oath-taking, before she can become a Filipina.  In plain words, her marriage to a Filipino is
absolute­ly of no consequence to her nationality vis-a-vis
that of her Filipino husband; she remains to be the national of the country to
which she owed allegiance before her marriage, and if she desires to be of one
nationality with her husband, she has to wait for the same time that any other
applicant for naturali­zation needs to complete, the required period of ten
year residence, gain the knowledge of English or Spanish and one of the
principal local languages, make her children study in Filipino schools, acquire
real property or engage in some lawful occupation of her own independently of
her husband, file her declaration of intention and after one year her
application for natu­ralization, with the affidavits of two credible witnes­ses
of her good moral character and other qualifications, etc., etc. until a
decision is rendered in her favor, after which she has to undergo the two years
of probation, and only then, but not before she takes her oath as citizen, will
she begin to be considered and deemed to be a citizen of the Philippines.  Brief­ly, she can become a Filipino citizen
only by judicial declaration.

Such being the import of the Court’s ruling, and it being quite
obvious, on the other hand, upon a cursory reading of the provision in
question, that the law intends by it to spell out what is the “effect of
naturalization on (the) wife and children” of an alien, as plainly
indicated by its title, and inasmuch as the language of the provision itself
clearly conveys the thought that some effect beneficial to the wife is intended
by it, rather than that she is not in any manner to be benefited thereby, it
behooves Us to take a second hard look at the ruling, if only to see whether or
not the Court might have overlooked any relevant consideration warranting a conclusion
differ­ent from that contained therein. 
It is undeniable that the issue before Us is of grave importance,
considering its consequences upon tens of thousands of persons affected by the
ruling therein made by the Court, and surely, it is for Us to avoid, whenever
possible, that Our decision in any case should produce any adverse effect upon
them not contemplated either by the law or by the national policy it seeks to
enforce.

AMICI CURIAE in the Burca case,
respectable and im­pressive by their number and standing in the Bar and well
known for their reputation for intellectual integrity, legal acumen and
incisive and comprehensive resourcefulness, in research, truly evident in the
quality of the memorandum they have submitted in said case, invite Our at­tention
to the impact of the decision therein thus:

“The doctrine announced by this Honor­able Court for the first
time in the pre­sent case – that an alien woman who marries a Philippine
citizen not only does not ipso facto herself become a citizen but
can acquire such citizenship only through ordinary naturalization proceed­ings
under the Revised Naturalization Law, and that all administrative actions
‘certifying or declaring’ such woman to be a Philippine citizen are ‘null and
void’ -has consequences that reach far beyond the confines of the present
case.  Con­siderably more people are
affected, and affected deeply, than simply Mrs. Zita
N. Burca.  The
newspapers report that as many as 15 thousand women married to Phi­lippine
citizens are affected by this de­cision of the Court.  These are women of many and diverse
nationalities, including Chinese, Spanish, British, American, Co­lumbian,
Finnish, Japanese, Chilean, and so on. 
These members of the community, some of whom have been married to
citizens for two or three decades, have all exercised rights and, privileges re­served
by law to Philippine citizens, They will have acquired, separately or in
conjugal partnership with their citizen husbands, real property, and they will,
have sold and transferred such property. 
Many of these women may be in professions membership in which is limited
to citizens.  Others are doubtless
stockholders or offi­cers or employees in companies engage in business
activities for which a certain percentage of Filipino equity content is
prescribed by law.  All these married
women are now faced with possible divestment of personal status and of rights
acquired and privileges exercised in reliance, in complete good faith, upon a
reading of the law that has been accepted as correct for more than two
decades by the very agencies of government charged with the administration of
that law.  We most respectfully sug­gest
that judicial doctrines which would visit such comprehensive and far-reaching
injury upon the wives and mothers of Philippine citizens deserve intensive
scrutiny and re-­examination.”

To be sure, this appeal can be no less
than what this Court attended to in Gan Tsitung vs. Republic, G. R. No. L-20819, Feb. 21, 1967, 19 SCRA 401 – when
Chief Justice Concepcion observed:

“The Court realizes, however, that the rulings in the Barretto and Delgado cases – although referring to
situations the equities of which are not identical to those obtaining in the
case at bar – may have con­tributed materially to the irregula­rities committed
therein and in other analogous cases, and induced the parties concerned to
believe, although erroneously, that the pro­cedure followed was valid under the
law.

“Accordingly, and in view of the implications of the issue
under consideration, the Solicitor Gene­ral was required, not only, to com­ment
thereon, but, also, to state ‘how many cases there are, like the one at bar, in
which certificates of naturalization have been issued after notice of the
filing of the petition for naturalization had been published in the Official
Gaz­ette only once, within the periods (a) from January 28, 1950’ (when the
decision in Delgado v. Republic was promulgated) ‘to May 29, 1957’ (when the Ong Son Cui was decided) ‘and (b) from May 29, 1957 to
Novem­ber 29, 1965’ (when the decision in the present case was rendered).

“After mature deliberation, and in the light of the reasons
adduced in appellant’s motion for reconsideration and in the reply thereto of
the Government, as well as of the data contained in the later, the Court holds
that the doctrine laid down in the Ong Son Cui case
shall apply and affect the validity of certificates of naturalization is­sued after,
not on or before May 29, 1957.”

Here We are met again by the same problem.  In Gan Tsitung, the Court had to expressly enjoin the prospec­tive
application of its construction of the law made in a previous decision24
which had already become final, to serve the ends of justice and equity.  In the case at bar, We do not have to go that
far.  As already ob­served, the decision
in Burca is still under reconsideration, while
the ruling in Lee Suau Ay, Lo San Tuang, Choy King Tee and others that followed
them have at the most become the law of the case only for the parties
thereto.  If there are good grounds therefor, all We have to do now is to re-examine the said
rulings and clarify or modify them.

For ready reference, We requote Section
15:

“Sec. 15.  Effect of
the naturaliza­tion on wife and children. 
– Any woman who is now or may hereafter be married to a citizen of the Philippines,
and who might herself be law­fully naturalized shall be deemed a citizen of the
Philippines.

“Minor children of persons natura­lized under this law who
have been born in the Philippines
shall be con­sidered citizens thereof.

“A foreign-born minor child, if dwelling in the Philippines at
the time of the naturalization of the parents, shall automatically become a
Philippine citizen, and a foreign-born minor child, who is not in the
Philippines at the time the parent is naturalized, shall be deemed a Philippine
citizen only during his minority, unless he begins to reside permanently in the
Philippines when still a minor, in which case, he will continue to be a
Philippine citizen even after becoming of age.

“A child born outside of the Phi­lippines
after the naturalization of his parent, Shall be considered a Philippine
citizen, unless within one year after reaching the age of majority, he fails to
register him­self as a Philippine citizen at the American Consulate of the
country where he resides, and to take the necessary oath of allegiance.”

It is obvious that the main subject-matter and purpose of the
statute, the Revised Naturalization Law or Common­wealth Act 473, as a whole,
is to establish a complete procedure for the judicial conferment of the status
of citizenship upon qualified aliens. 
After laying out such a procedure, remarkable for its elaborate and
careful inclusion of all safeguards against the possibility of any undesirable
persons becoming a part of our citizenry, it carefully but categorically states
the consequence of the naturalization of an alien undergoing such procedure it
prescribes upon the members of his immediate family, his wife and children,25
and, to that end, in no uncertain terms it ordains that: (a) all his minor
children who have been born in the Philippines shall be “considered
citizens” also; (b) all such minor children, if born outside the
Philippines but dwelling here at the time of such naturalization “shall
automatically be­come” Filipinos also, but those not born in the
Philippines, and not in the Philippines at the time of such naturaliza­tion,
are also “deemed citizens” of this country provided that they shall
lose said status if they transfer their per­manent residence to a foreign
country before becoming of age; (c) all such minor children, if born outside of
the Philippines after such naturalization, shall also be “consi­dered”
Filipino citizens, unless they expatriate themselves by failing to register as
Filipinos at the Philippine (Ame­rican) Consulate of the country where they
reside and take the necessary oath of allegiance; and (d) as to the wife, she
“shall be deemed a citizen of the Philippines” if she is one
“who might herself be lawfully naturalized”.26

No doubt whatever is entertained, so Burca
holds very correctly, as to the point that the minor children, falling within
the conditions of place and time of birth and resi­dence prescribed in the
provision, are vested with Philip­pine citizenship directly by legislative fiat
or by force of the law itself and without the need for any judicial pro­ceeding
or declaration.  (At p. 192, 19 SCRA.)
Indeed, the language of the provision is not susceptible of any other
interpretation.  But it is claimed that
the same expression “shall be deemed a citizen of the Philippines” in
reference to the wife, does not necessarily connote the vesting of citizenship
status upon her by legislative fiat because the antecedent phrase requiring
that she must be one “who might herself be lawfully naturalized”
implies that such status is intended to attach only after she has undergone the
whole process of judicial naturalization required of any person desiring to
become a Filipino.  Stated otherwise, the
ruling in Burca is that while Section 15
envisages and in­tends legislative naturalization as to the minor children, the
same section deliberately treats the wife differently and leaves her out for
the ordinary judicial naturalization.

Of course, it goes without saying that it is perfectly within the
constitutional authority of the Congress of the Philippines
to confer or vest citizenship status by legisla­tive fiat. (U.S. v. Wong Kim
Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 42 L ed. 890 [1898]; See, 1 Tañada
& Carreon, Political Law of the Philippines 152
[1961 ed.]) In fact, it has done so for par­ticular individuals, like two
foreign religious prelates,27 hence there is no reason it cannot
do it for classes or groups of persons under general conditions applicable to
all of the members of such class or group, like women who marry Filipinos,
whether native-born or naturalized.  The
issue before Us in this case is whether or not the legislature has done so in
the disputed provisions of Section 15 of the Na­turalization Law.  And Dr. Vicente G. Sinco,
one of the most respected authorities on political law in the Philippines28
observes in this connection thus: 
“A special form of natura­lization is often observed by some states
with respect to wo­men. Thus in the Philippines a foreign woman married to a
Filipino citizen becomes ipso facto naturalized, if she be­longs
to any of the classes who may apply for naturalization under the
Philippine Laws.” (Sinco, Phil. Political Law
498­499 [10th ed. 1954]; emphasis ours; this comment is substan­tially
reiterated in the 1962 edition, citing Ly Giok Ha and
Ricardo Cua, supra.)

More importantly, it may be stated, at this juncture, that in
construing the provision of the United States
statutes from which our law has been copied,28-a the American courts have held
that the alien wife does not acquire Ameri­can citizenship by choice but by
operation of law. “In the Revised Statutes the words ‘and taken’ are
omitted.  The ef­fect of this statute is
that every alien woman who marries a citizen of the United States becomes
perforce a citizen her­self, without the formality of naturalization, and
regard­less of her wish in that respect.” (USCA 8, p. 601,[1970 ed.],
citing Mackenzie v. Hare, 1913, 134 P. 713, 165 Cal. 766, affirmed 36 S. Ct.
106, 239 U.S. 299, 60 L ed. 297.)

We need not recount here again how this provision in question was
first enacted as paragraph (a) of Section 13, by way of an insertion into Act
2927 by Act 3448 of Novem­ber 30, 1928, and that, in turn, said paragraph was
copied verbatim, from Section 1994 of the Revised Statutes of the United
States, which by that time already had a long ac­cepted construction among the
courts and administrative authorities in that country holding that under such
provi­sion an alien woman who married a citizen became, upon such marriage,
likewise a citizen by force of law and as a consequence of the marriage itself
without having to under­go any naturalization proceedings, provided that it
could be shown that at the time of such marriage, she was not disqualified to
be naturalized under the laws then in force. 
To repeat the discussion We already made of these undenia­ble facts
would unnecessarily make this decision doubly ex­tensive.  The only point which might be reiterated for
em­phasis at this juncture is that whereas in the United States, the American
Congress, recognizing the uniform construction of Section 1994 of the Revised
Statutes to be as stated a­bove, and finding it desirable to avoid the effects
of such construction, approved the Act of September 22, 1922 explicitly
requiring all such alien wives to submit to judicial naturalization, albeit
under more liberal terms than those for other applicants for citizenship, on
the other hand, the Philippine Legislature, instead of following suit and adopt­ing
such a requirement, enacted Act 3448 on November 30, 1928 which copied verbatim
the aforementioned Section 1994 of the Revised Statutes, thereby indicating its
preference to adopt the latter law and its settled construction ra­ther than
the reform introduced by the Act of 1922.

Obviously, these considerations leave Us no choice.  Much as this Court may feel that as the
United States her­self has evidently found it to be an improvement of her na­tional
policy vis-a-vis the alien wives of her citizens to
discontinue their automatic incorporation into the body of her citizenry
without passing through the judicial scrutiny of a naturalization proceeding,
as it used to be before 1922, it seems but proper, without evidencing any bit
of colonial mentality, that as a developing country, the Philippines should
adopt a similar policy, unfortunately; the manner in which our own legislature
has enacted our laws on the sub­ject, as recounted above, provides no basis for
Us to cons­true said law along the line of the 1922 modification of the
American Law.  For Us to do so would be
to indulge in judi­cial legislation which it is not constitutionally
permissible for this Court to do.  Worse,
this Court would be going precisely against the grain of the implicit
Legislative intent.

There is at least one decision of this Court before Burca wherein it seems it is quite clearly implied
that this Court is of the view that under Section 16 of the Naturali­zation
Law, the widow and children of an applicant for na­turalization who dies during
the proceedings do not have to submit themselves to another naturalization
proceeding in or­der to avail of the benefits of the proceedings involving the
husband.  Section 16 provides:

“SEC. 16.  Right of
widow and children of petitioners who have died.  – In case a petitioner should die before the
final decision has been rendered, his widow and minor children may continue the
proceed­ings.  The decision rendered in
the case shall, so far as the widow and minor child­ren are concerned, produce
the same legal effect as if it had been rendered during the life of the
petitioner.”

In Tan Lin v. Republic, G. R. No. L-13706, May 31, 1961, 2 SCRA 383, this Court held:

“Invoking the above provisions in their favor,
petitioners-appellants argue (1) that under said Sec. 16, the widow and minor
children are allowed to conti­nue the same proceedings and are not subs­tituted
for the original petitioner; (2) that the qualifications of the original
petitioner remain to be in issue and not those of the widow and minor children,
and (3) that said Section 16 applies whether the petitioner dies before or
after final decision is rendered, but be­fore the judgment becomes executory.

“There is force in the first and se­cond arguments.  Even the second sentence of said Section 16 contemplates
the fact that the qualifications of the original petitioner remains the subject
of inquiry, for the simple reason that it states that ‘The decision rendered in
the case shall, so far as the widow and minor children are concerned, produce
the same legal ef­fect as if it had been rendered during the life of the
petitioner.’ This phrase­ology emphasizes the intent of the law to continue the
proceedings with the deceased as the theoretical petitioner, for if it were
otherwise, it would have been unneces­sary to consider the decision rendered,
as far as it affected the widow and the minor children.

x        x          x          x          x

“The Chua Chian case (supra), cited
by the appellee, declared that a dead per­son can not
be bound to do things stipulat­ed in the oath of allegiance, because an oath is
a personal matter.  Therein, the widow
prayed that she be allowed to take the oath of allegiance for the
deceased.  In the case at bar, petitioner
Tan Lin merely asked that she be allowed to take the oath of allegiance and the
proper cer­tificate of naturalization, once the natu­ralization proceedings of
her deceased husband, shall have been completed, not on behalf of the deceased,
but on her own behalf and of her children, as recipients of the benefits of his
naturalization.  I other words, the
herein petitioner proposed to take the oath of allegiance, as a citizen of the
Philippines, by virtue of the legal provision that ‘any woman who is now or may
here­after be married to a citizen of the Philippines and who might herself be
lawfully naturalized shall be deem­ed a citizen of the Philippines.  Minor children of persons naturaliz­ed under
this law who have been born in the Philippines
shall be consider­ed citizens thereof.’ (Section 15, Commonwealth Act No.
473).  The deci­sion granting citizenship
to Lee Pa and the record of the case at bar, do not show that the petitioning
widow could not have been lawfully naturalized, at the time Lee Pa filed his
petition, apart from the fact that his 9 minor children were all born in the
Philippines.  (Decision, In the Matter of
the Petition of Lee Pa to be admitted a citizen of the Philippines, Civil Case
No. 16287, CFI, Manila, Annex A; Record on Appeal, pp. 8-11).  The reference to Chua Chian
case is, therefore, pre­mature.”

Section 16, as may be seen, is a parallel provision to Section
13.  If the widow of an applicant for
naturali­zation as Filipino, who dies during the proceedings, is not required
to go through a naturalization proceeding, in order to be considered as a
Filipino citizen hereof, it should follow that the wife of a living Filipino
can­not be denied the same privilege. This is plain common sense and there is
absolutely no evidence that the Legis­lature intended to treat them
differently.

Additionally, We have carefully considered the ar­guments
advanced in the motion for reconsideration in Burca,
and We see no reason to disagree with the follow­ing views of counsel:

“It is obvious that the provision it­self is a legislative
declaration of who may be considered citizens of the Philip­pines.  It is a proposition too plain to be disputed
that Congress has the power not only to prescribe the mode or manner under
which foreigners may acquire citizenship, but also the very power of conferring
citizenship by legislative fiat.  (U.
S. v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U. S. 649, 42 L. Ed. 890 [1898]; see 1 Tañada & Carreon, Political
Law of the Philippines 152 [1961 ed.]). 
The Constitution itself recognizes as Philippine citizens ‘Those who are
naturalized in accordance with law’ (Section 1[5], Article IV, Philip­pine
Constitution).  Citizens by na­turalization,
under this provision, include not only those who are natu­ralized in accordance
with legal proceedings for the acquisition of citizenship, but also those who
ac­quire citizenship by ‘derivative na­turalization’ or by operation of law,
as for example, the ‘naturalization’ of an alien wife through the natura­lization
of her husband, or by marriage of an alien woman to a citizen.  (See Tañada & Carreon, 22. op cit. supra, at 152,
172; Velayo, Philippine citi­zenship and
Naturalization 2 [1965 ed.]; 1 Paras, Civil Code 186
[1967 ed.]; see also 3 Hackworth, Digest of International Law 3).

“The phrase ‘shall be deemed a ci­tizen of the Philippines’
found in Section 15 of the Revised Naturaliza­tion Law clearly manifests an
intent to confer citizenship. 
Construing a similar phrase found in the old U. S. naturalization law
(Revised Statutes,  1994), American
courts have uniform­ly taken it to mean that upon her mar­riage, the alien
woman becomes by operation of law a citizen of the United States as fully as if
she had complied with all the provisions of the statutes upon the subject of na­turalization.  (U. S. v. Keller, 13 F. 82; U.S. Ex rel. Sejnensky v. Tod, 225 F. 523, 26 A.L.R. 1316; see also Opinions of the
US Attorney General dated June 4, 1874 [14 Op. 402], July 20, 1909 [27 Op.
507], December 1, 1910 [28 Op. 508], Jan. 15, 1920 [32 Op. 209] and Jan. 12,
1923 [33 Op. 398]).

‘The phrase, “shall be deemed a citizen”, in Section 1994
Revised Statute (U.S. Comp. Stat. 1091, 1268) or as it was in the Act of 1855
(10 Stat. at L. 604, Chapter 71, Sec. 2), “shall be deemed and taken to be
a citizen”, while it may imply that the person to whom it relates has not
actually be­come a citizen by the ordinary means or in the usual way, as by the
judgment of a competent court, upon a pro­per application and proof, yet it
does not follow that such person is on that account practically any the less a
citizen.  The word “deemed”
is the equivalent of “considered” or “judged”, and
therefore, whatever an Act of Congress requires to be “deemed” or
“taken” as true of any person or thing must, in law, be considered as
having been duly adjudged or established concerning such person or thing, and
have force and effect accordingly.  When,
therefore, Congress declares that an alien woman shall, under, certain
circumstances, be “deemed” an American citizen, the effect when the
contingency occurs, is equivalent to, her being naturalized directly by an Act
of Congress or in the usual mode thereby prescribed.’ (Van Dyne, Citi­zenship
of the United States 239, cited in Velayo, Philippine
Citizen­ship and Naturalization 146-147 [1965 ed.]; emphasis ours).

“That this was likewise the intent of the Philippine legislature
when it enacted the first paragraph of Section 15 of the Re­vised
Naturalization Law is shown by a tex­tual analysis of the entire statutory pro­vision.  In its entirety, Section 15 reads:

(See supra)

The phrases ‘shall be deemed,’ ‘shall be
con­sidered,’ and ‘shall automatically become,’ as used in the above provision,
are undoubt­edly synonymous.  The leading
idea or pur­pose of the provision was to confer Philippine citizenship by
operation of law upon certain classes of aliens as a legal consequence,
of their relation­ship, by blood or by affinity, to persons who are already
citizens of the Philippines.  Whenever the fact of relationship of
the persons enumerated in the provision concurs with the fact of citizenship
of the person to whom they are related, the effect is for said persons to
become ‘ipso facto’ citizens of the Philippines.
‘Ipso facto’ as here used does not mean that all alien wives and all
minor children of Philippine citizens, from the mere fact of relationship,
necessarily become such citizens al­so. 
Those who do not meet the statu­tory requirements do not ipso facto
become citizens; they must apply for naturalization in order to acquire such
status.  What it does mean, how­ever, is
that in respect of those persons enumerated in Section 15, the
relationship to a citizen of the Phi­lippines
is the operative fact which establishes the acquisition of Philip­pine
citizenship by them.  Necessarily, it
also determines the point of time at which such citizenship
commences.  Thus, under the second
paragraph of Section 15, a minor child of a Fili­pino naturalized under the
law, who was born in the Philippines, becomes ipso facto a
citizen of the Philip­pines from the time the fact of rela­tionship
concurs with the fact of ci­tizenship of his parent, and the time when the
child became a citizen does not depend upon the time that he is able to
prove that he was born in the Philippines. 
The child may prove some 25 years after the naturalization of his father
that he was born in the Philippines
and should, therefore, be ‘considered’ a citizen thereof.  It does not mean that he became a Philip­pine
citizen only at that later time. 
Similarly, an alien woman who married a Philippine citizen may be able
to prove only some 25 years after her marriage (perhaps, because it was only 25
years after the marriage that her citizenship status became in question), that
she is one who ‘might herself be lawfully naturalized.’ It is not rea­sonable
to conclude that she acquired Philippine citizenship only after she had
proven that she ‘might herself be lawfully naturalized.’

“The point that bears emphasis in this regard is that in
adopting the very phraseology of the law, the legislature could not have
intended that an alien wife should not be deemed a Philippine citizen unless
and until she proves that she might herself be lawfully naturalized.  Far from it, the law states in plain terms
that she shall be deemed a citizen of the Philippines
if she is one ‘who might her­self be lawfully naturalized.’ The proviso that
she must be one ‘who might herself be lawfully naturalized’ is not a condition
precedent to the vesting or acquisition of citizenship; it is only a
condition or a state of fact necessary to establish her citi­zenship as a factum probandum, i. e., as a fact established and proved in evidence.  The word ‘might; as used in that phrase,
precisely implies that at the time of her marriage to a Philippine citizen, the
alien woman ‘had (the) power’ to become such a citizen herself under the laws
then in force.  (Owen v. Kelly, 6 DC 191
[1867], aff’d Kelly v. Owen, 76 US 496, 7 Wall 496,
19 L ed 283 [1869]).  That she
establishes such power long after her marriage does not alter the fact that at
her marriage, she became a citizen.

“(This Court has held) that ‘an alien wife of a Filipino
citizen may not acquire the status of a citizen of the Philippines
unless there is proof that she herself may be lawful­ly naturalized’
(Decision, pp. 3-4).  Under this view,
the ‘acquisition’ of citizenship by the alien wife depends on her having
proven her qualifications for citizenship, that is, she is not a citizen unless
and until she proves that she may herself be lawfully naturalized.  It is clear from the words of the law that
the proviso does not mean that she must first prove that she ‘might
herself be lawfully naturalized’ before she shall be deemed (by Congress, not
by the courts) a citizen.  Even the
‘uniform’ decisions cited by this Court (at fn. 2) to support its holding did
not rule that the alien wife becomes a citizen only after she has proven
her qualifications for citizenship.  What
those decisions ruled was that the alien wives in those cases failed to prove
their qualifications and there­fore they failed to establish their claim to
citizenship.  Thus in Ly Giok Ha v. Galang, 101 Phil.
459 [1957] the case was remanded to the lower court for determination of
whether petitioner, whose claim to citizenship by marriage to a Filipino was
disputed by the Go­vernment, ‘might herself be lawfully naturalized,’ for the
purpose ‘of proving her alleged change of political status from alien to
citizen‘ (at 464).  In Cua v. Board, 101 Phil. 521 [1957], the alien
wife who was being deported, claimed that she was a Philippine citi­zen by
marriage to a Filipino.  This Court
finding that there was no proof that she was not disqualified under Section 4
of the Revised Naturalization Law, ruled that: 
‘No such evidence appearing on record, the claim of as­sumption of
Philippine citizenship by Tijoe Wu Suan, upon her marriage to pe­titioner, is untenable.’ (at
523) It will be observed that in these decisions cited by this Court, the lack
of proof that the alien wives ‘might (themselves) be lawfully naturalized’ did
not necessarily imply that they did not become, in truth and in fact, citizens
upon their marriage to Fili­pinos.  What
the decisions merely held was that these wives failed to estab­lish their claim
to that status as a proven fact.

“In all instances where citi­zenship is conferred by operation
of law, the time when citizenship is conferred should not be confused with the
time when citizen­ship status is established as a proven fact.  Thus, even a natural-born citizen of the Philippines,
whose citizenship status is put in issue in any proceeding, would be required
to prove, for instance, that his father is a citizen of the Philippines
in order to factually establish his claim to citizenship.# His citizenship status commences from the
time of birth, although his claim thereto is established as a fact only at a
subsequent time.  Likewise, an alien
woman who might herself be lawfully naturalized be­comes a Philippine citizen
at the time of her marriage to a Filipino husband, not at the time she is able
to establish that status as a proven fact by showing that she might herself be
lawfully naturalized.  Indeed, there is
no differ­ence between a statutory declaration that a person is deemed a
citizen of the Philippines
provided his father is such citizen from a declaration that an alien
woman married to a Filipino is a citizen of the Phi­lippines
provided she might herself be lawfully naturalized.  Both be­come citizens by operation of law;
the former becomes a citizen ipso facto upon birth; the later ipso
facto upon marriage.

“It is true that unless and un­til the alien wife proves that
she might herself be lawfully naturalized, it cannot be said that she has estab­lished
her status as a proven fact.  But
neither can it be said that on that account, she did not become a citizen of
the Philippines.  If her citizenship status is not ques­tioned
in any legal proceeding, she obviously has no obligation to establish her
status as a fact.  In such a case, the
presumption of law should be that she is what she claims to be.  (U. S. v. Roxas, S
Phil. 375 [1905]; Hila­do v. Assad,
51 O.G. 4527 [1955]).  There is a
presumption that a representation shown to have been made is true.  (Aetna In­demnity Co. v. George A. Fuller,
Co., 73 A. 738, 74 A. 369, 111 ME. 321).”

The question that keeps bouncing back as a con­sequence of the
foregoing views is, what substitute is there for naturalization proceedings to
enable the alien wife of a Philippine citizen to have the matter of her own
citizenship settled and established so that she may not have to be called upon
to prove it everytime she has to perform an act or
enter into a trans­action or business or exercise a right reserved only to
Filipinos?  The ready answer to such,
question is that as the laws of our country, both substantive and procedural,
stand today, there is no such procedure, but such paucity is no proof that the
citizenship un­der discussion is not vested as of the date of mar­riage or the
husband’s acquisition of citizenship, as the case may be, for the truth is that
the same situa­tion obtains even as to native-born Filipinos.  Every-time the citizenship of A person is
material or indis­pensable in a judicial or administrative case, what­ever the
corresponding Court or administrative autho­rity decides therein as to such
citizenship is gene­rally not considered as res
adjudicata, hence it has to be threshed out
again and again as the occasion may demand. 
This, as we view it, is the sense in which Justice Dizon
referred to “appropriate proceed­ing” in Brito
v. Commissioner, supra.  Indeed,
only the good sense and judgment of those subsequently in­quiring into the
matter May make the effort easier or simpler for the persons concerned by
relying somehow on the antecedent official findings, even if these are not
really binding.

It may not be amiss to suggest, however, that in order to have a
good starting point and so that the most immediate relevant public records may
be kept in order, the following observations in Opinion No. 38, series of 1958,
of then Acting Secretary of Justice Jesus C. Barrera, may be considered as the
most appropriate initial step by the interested par­ties:

“Regarding the steps that should be taken by an alien wo­man
married to a Filipino citizen in order to acquire Philip­pine citizenship, the
procedure followed in the Bureau of Immi­gration is as follows:  The alien woman must file a peti­tion for the
cancellation of he alien certificate of registra­tion alleging, among other
things, that she is married to a Filipino citizen and that she is not
disqualified from acquiring her husband’s citizenship pursuant to section 4 of
Common wealth Act No. 473, as amended. 
Upon the filing of said petition which should be accompanied or
supported by the joint affidavit of the petitioner and her Fili­pino husband to
the effect that the petitioner does not belong to any of the groups disquali­fied
by the cited section from becoming naturalized Filipino citizen (please see
attached CEB Form 1), the Bureau of Immigra­tion conducts an investigation and
thereafter promulgates its order or decision granting or denying the petition.”

Once the Commissioner of Immigration
cancels the sub­ject’s registration as an alien, there will probably be less
difficulty in establishing her Filipino citi­zenship in any other proceeding,
depending naturally on the substance and vigor of the opposition.

Before closing, it is perhaps best to clarify that this third
issue We have passed upon was not touched by the trial court, but as the point
is de­cisive in this case, the Court prefers the matter be settled once and for
all now.

IN VIEW OF ALL THE FOREGOING, the judgment of the Court a
quo dismissing appellants’ petition for injunction is hereby reversed
and the Commissioner of Immigration and/or his authorized representative is
permanently enjoined from causing the arrest and deportation and the confisca­tion
of the bond of appellant Lau Yuen Yeung, who is here­by
declared to have become a Filipino citizen from and by virtue of her marriage
to her co-appellant Moy Ya
Lim Yao alias Edilberto
Aguinaldo Lim, a Filipino citizen on Jan­uary 25,
1962.  No costs.

Concepcion, C.J., Zaldivar,
and Makasiar,
JJ., concur in the dissenting opinion of
Justice Reyes.

Reyes, J.B.L., J., dissents in
separate opinion.

Dizon, Castro, Teehankee,
and Villamor,
JJ., concur.

Makalintal, J., reserves his separate concurring opinion.

Fernando, J., concurs except as
to the interpretation accorded some American decision as to which he is not
fully persuaded.

---

^[1]
Followed in Kua Suy, etc.,
et al. vs. The Commission­er of Immigration, G. R. No. L-13790,
promulgated Oct. 31, 1963,
9 SCRA 300; Lu Choy Fa vs. Commissioner, G. R.
No. L-20597, Nov. 29, 1963,
9 SCRA 604; the other cases are discussed in the opinion.

^[2]
Justices Makalintal and Castro concurred only in the
result.

^[3] Kua Suy v. Commissioner,
G.R. No. L-13790, Oct. 31, 1963,
9 SCRA 300; Lo San Tuang v. Galang, G.R. No. L-18775, Nov. 30, 1963, 9 SCRA 638; Sun Peck Yong v.
Commissioner, G.R. No. L-20784, Dec.
27, 1963, 9 SCRA 874; Tong Siok Sy v. Vivo, G.R. No. L-21136, Dec. 27, 1963, 9 SCRA 876; Choy King
Tee v. Galang, G.R. No. L-18351, March 26, 1965, 13 SCRA 402; Austria
v. Con­chu, G.R. No. L-20716, June 22, 1965 14 SCRA 336; Brito v. Commissioner, G.R. No. L-16829, June 30, 1965, 14 SCRA 539; Ly Giok Ha v. Galang (2nd),
G.R. No. L-­21332, March 18, 1966,
16 SCRA 414; Go Im Ty v.
Rep., G.R. No. L-17919, July 30, 1966,
17 SCRA 797.

^[4] Supra,
(101 Phil. 459)

# See, also
Ops., Sec. of Justice, No. 28, s. 1950; No. 96, a. 1949; Nos. 43, 58, 98 and
281, s. 1948; No. 95, s. 1941; Nos. 79 and 168, s. 1940.

^[5]
In the deliberations, Chief Justice Concepcion ex­plained
that his opinion was not meant to give that impression.

^[6]
Justice Barrera penned the decision in Sun Peck Yong, supra, and
Tong Siok v. Vivo, supra.

# Section 15,
Commonwealth Act No. 473; Ly Giok Ha @ Wy Giok Ha v. Galang, 54 Off. Gaz. 356.

^[7]
To avoid repetition, the pertinent portions of the opi­nion will be quoted in a
more appropriate place la in this decision.

^[8]
G. R. No. L-21332, March 18, 1966,
16 SCRA 414.

^[9]
Pertinent portions of the opinion of Justice Reyes will be quoted later in a
more appropriate place in this decision.

^[10]
17 SCRA 797.

^[11] See
id., pp. 801-804.

12 One can easily perceive from the language of
Justice Makalintal in Choy King Tee that he was
expressing the consensus of the Court’s membership then rather than his own
personal views.

13 The law firms PAREDES, POBLADOR & NAZARENO;
LICHUACO, PICAZO & AGCAOILI; MEER, MEER & MEER; PONCE ENRILE, SIGUION
REYNA, MONTECILLO & BELO; RAMIREZ & ORTIGAS; SALVA, CHUA & ASSO.; and
SYCIP, SALAZAR, LUNA, MANALO & FELICIANO.

14 See quotation from Lo San Tuang earlier on pp. 27-32 of this opinion.

15 See opinion of the Secretary of Justice, No. 79, s.
1940.

16 For ready reference, attached as an appendix
of this decision is a brief study of all the naturalization laws of the United
States from 1790 to 1970 showing how the matter of qualifications and
disqualifica­tions, whether racial or otherwise, have been treat­ed in the said
statutes, from which it can be readily seen that the disqualification of alien
wives from becoming citizens has not been always exclusively on racial grounds
during the period that the Act of Feb. 10, 1855 and, later, section 1994 of the
Revised Statutes were in force.

17 The statement in Sinco’s
book cited by Justice Regala in Lo San Tuang does not indicate any authoritative source.  In any event, for the reasons already stated
the racial motive could at most be only one of the reasons for the elimination
of Section 1.

18 A more extensive discussion of the relevance of
this repeal of 1922 is made further in this opinion.

19 Decided, April
15, 1869, next to Burton
v. Burton, 40 N. Y. 373.

20 More accurately, the phrase “free white
persons”, does not only refer to people of the white race but also to
non-slaves.

21 In this connection, it is to be noted that all the
na­turalization laws of the United States
from 1790 pro­vided for such qualifications of residence, good moral character,
adherence to the Constitution.

22 (f) Persons who, during the period of their residence
in the Philippines,
have not mingled socially with the Filipinos, or who have not evinced a sincere
desire to learn and embrace the customs, tradi­tions, and ideals of the
Filipinos;

 (h) Citizens
or subjects of a foreign country other than the United States, whose laws do
not grant Filipinos the right to become naturalized citizens or subjects
thereof.

23 After Ly Giok Ha and Cua, the Secretary of Justice found more reason to sustain
the previous view of the Department on the matter.  See opinions already cited.

24 Ong Sun Cui v.
Republic, G. R. No. L-9858, May 29,
1957, 101 Phil. 649.

25 Somehow, the language of the whole law conveys the
idea that only male aliens are contemplated for judicial naturalization.

26 Three possible situations are contemplated,
namely:  (a) the woman is already married
to the alien before the latter’s naturalization; (b) she marries him af­ter
such naturalization; or (c) she marries a native-born Filipino; in all these
instances, the effect of marriage is the same.

27 Brother Connon of La
Salle College and
Father Moran of Ateneo
University.

28 Former Dean of the College
of Law, U.P. and later President of
the University, now delegate to the Cons. Convention of 1971.

28-a Sec. 1994 Revised Statutes

#
It should be observed, parenthetically, that by its very nature, citizenship is
one of the most difficult facts to prove.

---

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