Cruz and Europa v. Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources

(1886), p.2; BIGELOW, p. 2. [73] WARVELLE, ABSTRACTS AND EXAMINATION OF TITLE TO REAL PROPERTY (1907), p.18. [74] 1 DICTIONARY OF ENGLISH LAW (Jowitt, ed.), p. 797. [75] 41 Phil. 935, 212 U.S. 449, 53 L Ed. 594 (1909). [76] Cariño vs. Insular Government, 7 Phil. 132 (1906). The Philippine Supreme Court in this case held that in the Philippines, there is no conclusive presumption of a grant of title to land from the Government founded merely upon long possession of the same by the applicant. [77] Cariño vs. Insular Government, supra note 75, at 941. [78] Section 10, Philippine Bill of 1902. [79] 75 Phil 890 (1946). [80] Id., at 892. [81] Memorandum of Petitioners, Rollo, p. 861. [82] Section 3, Article XII, CONSTITUTION. [83] Under the Treaty of Tordesillas, the world was divided between Spain and Portugal, with the former having exclusive power to claim all lands and territories west of the Atlantic Ocean demarcation line (Lynch, The Legal Bases of Philippine Colonial Sovereignty, 62 Phil L J 279, 283 [1987]). [84] See AKEHURST, A MODERN INTRODUCTION TO INTERNATIONAL LAW, 5th ed., 142-143. [85] See CRUZ, INTERNATIONAL LAW, 1996 ed., pp. 106-107. [86] Cariño v. Insular Government, supra note 75, at 939. This point finds significance in light of the distinction between sovereignty and dominion. Sovereignty is the right to exercise the functions of a State to the exclusion of any other State (Case Concerning the Island of Las Palmas [1928], UNRIAA II 829, 838). It is often referred to as the power of imperium, which is defined as the government authority possessed by the State (BERNAS, THE CONSTITUTION OF THE REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES: A COMMENTARY Vol. 2, p. 419). On the other hand, dominion, or dominium, is the capacity of the State to own or acquire property such as lands and natural resources. Dominium was the basis for the early Spanish decrees embracing the theory of jura regalia. The declaration in Section 2, Article XII of the 1987 Constitution that all lands of the public domain are owned by the State is likewise founded on dominium (Ibid.). If dominium, not imperium, is the basis of the theory of jura regalia, then the lands which Spain acquired in the 16th century were limited to non-private lands, because it could only acquire lands which were not yet privately-owned or occupied by the Filipinos. Hence, Spain acquired title only over lands which were unoccupied and unclaimed, i.e., public lands. [87] PHELAN, THE HISPANIZATION OF THE PHILIPPINES: SPANISH AIMS AND FILIPINOS RESPONSES, 1565-1700 (1959), pp. 8-9.