THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. JOVITA V. BUENVIAJE, DEFENDANT AND APPELLANT.

The defendant is accused of the violation of the Medical Act, the
information alleging “that on or about the first day of June, 1923, and
for some time prior to said date, the said accused without having
obtained from the Board of Medical Examiners the corresponding
certificate of registration for the practice of medicine in the
Philippine Islands, voluntarily, illegally and criminally and for
compensation, practiced medicine in the City of Manila, Philippine
Islands, assisting, treating and manipulating the head and body of
Regino Noble for the purpose of curing him of the ailments, diseases,
pains and physical defects from which he pretended to suffer, and
advertising and offering her services as a physician, by means of cards
which she distributed and by letterheads and signs which she exposed on
the door of her office, situated at No. 712 Calle Asuncion, and in
newspapers which are published and circulated in the City of Manila, in
which cards, letterheads, signs and advertising she added and prefixed
to her name the letters ‘Dra.,’ which is the abbreviation of the word
‘doctor,’ for the purpose of causing the public to believe that she,
the said defendant, had received the corresponding title of doctor.”

To this information the defendant demurred in the court below on the
grounds: (1) That it stated more than one offense, and (2) that it was
not drawn in accordance with the form prescribed by law. The demurrer
was overruled and the defendant pleaded not guilty.

At the
trial of the case the defendant made the following admissions: “That on
the first of June, 1923, she had no certificate from the Board of
Medical Examiners authorizing her to practice medicine in the
Philippine Islands; that on that day she treated and manipulated the
head and body of Regino Noble in order to cure him of ailments from
which he pretended to suffer, the treatment consisting in a ‘thrust’ by
means of the application of the hand to the spinal column; that she for
such treatment received and collected from said Regino Noble the sum of
P1; that the said treatment took place in her office situated at No.
712 Calle Asuncion, District of Binondo, City of Manila, Philippine
Islands; that she on or about the first day of June, 1923, and for some
time prior to that date, advertised herself as a ‘doctor of
chiropractic,’ in said City of Manila, said advertisement appearing
upon her business cards and in the newspaper ‘El Debate,’ in its issue
of April 29, 1923, edited and published in Manila and in which cards
and newspaper advertisement the defendant prefixed the abbreviation
‘Dra.’ to her name; that she was graduated a doctor in chiropractic on
the 13th day of August, 1919, as evidenced by a certificate marked
Exhibit I and issued by the American University School of Chiropractic
of Chicago, Illinois.”

Upon this admission .and some other
evidence to the same effect, the trial court found the defendant guilty
as charged in the information and, in accordance with section 2678 of
the Administrative Code, sentenced her to pay a fine of P300, with
subsidiary imprisonment in case of insolvency and to pay the costs.
From this judgment the defendant appeals to this court and presents
four assignments of error.

1. In the first
   assignment of error counsel contends that the demurrer to the
   information should have been sustained on the ground that said
   information charged more than one offense. The Medical Law is contained
   in sections 758 to 783 of the Administrative Code and it is argued that
   inasmuch as some of the illegal acts with which the defendant is
   charged are prohibited by section 770 of the Code and others by section
   783, the defendant is in reality accused of two separate and distinct
   offenses, namely, illegal practice of medicine and illegally
   representing oneself as a doctor.

   We cannot accept this
   view. It may be noted that the Medical Law itself, as it appears in the
   Administrative Code, does not declare any of the therein prohibited
   acts penal offenses. The penal provisions relating thereto are
   contained in section 2678 of the Code, which reads as follows:

   “Sec. 2678. Violation of Medical Law.—A person
   violating any provision of the Medical Law shall, upon conviction, be
   punished by a fine of not more than three hundred pesos or by
   imprisonment for not more than ninety days, or both, in the discretion
   of the court.”

   The offense here penalized is “violation of
   the Medical Law.” The statute makes no distinction between illegal
   practice of medicine and illegally advertising oneself as a doctor.
   Both are in violation of the Medical Law and carry the same penalty.
   They are merely different ways or means of committing the same offense
   and both of these means are closely related to each other and usually
   employed together.

   In these circumstances and where, as
   alleged in the information in the present case, the various violations
   have taken place simultaneously, we do not think it was the intention
   of the legislator that each single act should be regarded as a separate
   offense and separate informations presented for ea6h. The language of
   this court in the case of United States vs. Poh Chi (20 Phil., 140), in regard to the Opium Law, is opposite to the present case.

   “It
   is true that the Commission has provided a certain punishment for the
   possession of a pipe used in the smoking of opium, for the smoking of
   opium, as well as a punishment for the illegal possession of opium, but
   it is not believed that it was the intention of the legislature to have
   separate complaints filed against a person who was found in the illegal
   possession of opium and a pipe at the same time. If that were true then
   every person who was found to be smoking opium could be charged in
   three different complaints: First, with the illegal possession of the pipe; second, the illegal possession of the opium; and third, for smoking the opium. Certainly the legislature did not intend any such consequences.”

   In the case of United States vs. Douglass (2 Phil., 461), the court said:

   “It
   is not objectionable, when a single offense may be committed by the use
   of different means, to charge, in the alternative, the various means by
   which the crime may have been committed. (U. S. vs. Potter, 27 Fed. Cases, 604; Bishop’s New Criminal Procedure, sec. 434.)”

   The same rule was followed in the case of United States vs. Dorr (2 Phil., 332); United States vs. Tolentino (5 Phil., 682); and United States vs.
   Gustilo (19 Phil., 208) and is in harmony with the views of the courts
   in other jurisdictions. That the various means of committing the
   offense is described in more than one section of the statute does not
   necessarily effect the general principle involved; the subdivision of a
   statute into section is merely a matter of convenience and while it
   sometimes may be of some aid in ascertaining the legislative intent, it
   is, of course, not conclusive thereof.

2. Under the
   second assignment of error the appellant argues in substance that
   chiropractic has nothing to do with medicine and that the practice of
   that profession can therefore not be regarded as practice of medicine.
   There is no merit whatever in this contention. Assuming without
   conceding that chiropractic does not fall within the term “practice of
   medicine” in its ordinary acceptation, we have the statutory definition
   contained in section 770 of the Administrative Code and which clearly
   includes the manipulations employed in chiropractic. The statutory
   definition necessarily prevails over the ordinary one.

   Under the same assignment of error the defendant also
   argues that the examination prescribed by section 776 of the
   Administrative Code for admission to the practice of medicine, embraces
   subjects which have no connection with chiropractic and that to require
   chiropractors to take that examination is unreasonable and, in effect
   amounts to prohibition of the practice of their profession and
   therefore violates the constitutional principle that all men have the
   right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and are entitled to
   the equal protection of the law.

   There
   is very little force in this argument. The subjects in which an
   examination is required by section 778 of the Administrative Code, as
   amended by Act No. 3111, relate to matters of which a thorough
   knowledge seems necessary for the proper diagnosis of diseases of the
   human body and it is within the police power of the State to require
   that persons who devote themselves to the curing of human ills should
   possess such knowledge. (State vs. Edmunds, 127 Iowa, 333; 69 L. R. A., 504; Underwood vs. Scott, 43 Kan., 714; People vs. Blue Mountain Joe, 129 111., 370; State vs. Mylod, 20 R. I., 632; 41 L. R. A., 428; Stewart vs. Raab, 55 Minn., 20; Matthei vs. Wooley, 69 111. App., 654; State vs. Buswell, 40 Neb., 158; 24 L. R. A., 68; O’Connor vs. State, 46 Neb., 157; U. S. vs. Gomez Jesus, 31 Phil., 218.)

3. The third assignment of error is closely related to the foregoing. The
   appellant contends that the prohibition in section 783 against the
   unauthorized use of the title “doctor” must be understood to refer to
   “Doctor of Medicine” and has no application to doctors of chiropractic.
   Under different circumstances that might possibly be so, but where, as
   here, chiropractic is by statute made a form of the practice of
   medicine, it necessarily follows that a person holding himself out as a
   doctor of chiropractic in legal effect represents himself as a doctor
   of medicine.

4. In her fourth assignment of
   error the appellant attacks the constitutionality of Act No. 3111,
   amending section 770 of the Administrative Code, on the ground that the
   subject of the Act is not sufficiently expressed in its title and that
   it embraces more than one subject. There is no merit in this
   contention. The title of Act No. 3111 reads as follows:

   “An Act to amend sections seven hundred and fifty-nine,
   seven hundred and sixty, seven hundred and sixty-one, seven hundred and
   sixty-two, seven hundred and sixty-five, seven hundred and sixty-seven,
   seven hundred and seventy, seven hundred and seventy-four, seven
   hundred and seventy-five, seven hundred and seventy-six, seven hundred
   and seventy-eight, seven hundred and eighty, seven hundred and
   eighty-two, seven hundred and eighty-three, and twenty-six hundred and
   seventy-eight of Act Numbered Twenty-seven hundred and eleven, known as
   the Administrative Code, increasing the number of the members of the
   Board of Medical Examiners, conferring upon the same certain additional
   powers and responsibilities and for other purposes.”

   All
   of the sections enumerated in the title quoted relate to the same
   general subject, namely, defining and regulating the practice of
   medicine, and section 770 is expressly mentioned as one of the sections
   amended.

   This is sufficient. Under constitutional
   provisions similar to ours the general rule is that a title which
   declares the amendatory statute to be an act to amend a designated
   section or the like of a specified Code is sufficient and the precise
   nature of the amendatory Act need not be further stated. (Ross vs. Aguirre, 191 U. S., 60; Udell vs. Citizens Street R. Co., 152 Ind., 507; McGuire vs. Chicago, etc., R. Co., 131 Iowa, 340; Lankford vs. County Commissioners of Somerset County, 73 Md., 105; Tabor vs. State, 34 Tex. Crim., 631; Com. vs. Brown, 91 Va., 762.) For a full and authoritative discussion of this subject, see Note to Lewis vs. Dunne, 55 L. R. A., 833. See also Government of the Philippine Islands vs. Municipality of Binalonan and Roman Catholic Bishop of Nueva Segovia (32 Phil., 634) and Yu Cong Eng vs. Trinidad (p. 385, ante).

We find no error in the judgment appealed from and the same is
therefore affirmed, with the costs against the appellant. So ordered.

Malcolm, Villamor, and Johns, JJ., concur.

Romualdez, J.,
dissenting: I believe that the complaint charges more than one offense,
and that the demurrer interposed on that ground should have been
sustained. For that reason I dissent from the opinion of the majority.