271059/271347/E-02472/E-04036 Concurrence and Dissent Justice Amy C. Lazaro-Javier — Official PDF

Concurrence and Dissent 6 G.R. Nos. 271059, 271347, E-02472, and Es04036 For these reasons; I c0ncttr that the identified provisions of the 2024, 2025, and 2026 GAAs in rdation to unprogrammed appropriations and SAGF-insofar as they permitted mi increase beyond the ceiling recommended by the president and insofar as they diluted the conditions for the release of such funds---are void for being repugnant to Sections 25(1), 25(5), and 29(1), Article VI of the Constitution. Dissent: The Application of the Opc,;ative Fact Doctrine is Premature The doctrine is an equitable exception, not an automatic consequence of invalidity The general rule is elementary:. an unconstitutional act is not a law, confers no rights, imposes no duties, and affords no protection. It is, in legal contemplation, as inoperative as though it had never been passed. 8 The doctrine of op('.rative fad is the exception to this rule, articulated in De Agbayani v. Philippin? National Bank,9 and refined in later decisions such as Hacienda Luisita fnc. V. Presidential Agrarian Reform Counci!, 10 Planters Products Inc. V, Fe;tiphil Corporation, 11 and even Araullo V. Aquino JJJ1 2 itself. • • This doctrine recognizes that a law or official act, prior to being adjudged void, may have produced factual consequences on which persons reasonably relied, such that an unqualified retroactive nullification would itself work an injustice. , But the Court has been careful, in every: one of these decisions, to describe the doctrine as an equitable exception applied only upon a showing that the consequences of undoing what has been done would be more unjust than allowing them to stand-not as a rule that automatically attaches the moment a statute is declared.unconstitutional. Because the doctrme• restsI on eqmty,• 1ts• app 1·1cat10n• cannotb e d.1vorced from the specific facts to w*ch it is applied. A court asked to invoke it must, at a minimum, have before' it: first, a reasonably definite understanding of which acts or provisions are void and the scope of that invalidity; second, a picture of what was actua! 1Iy done pursuant to the void provisions: what s Chavez v. Judicial and Bar Coundl, 709 Phil. 478,495 (2013) [Per J. Mendoz~ En Banc]. 9 148 Phil. 443 (1971) [Per J .. Femando, En.Banc]. 10 668 Phil. 365 (201 !) [Per J. Velasco, Jr., En Banc]. 11 572 Phil. 270 (2008) [Per J. Reyes, R.T., Third Division]. 12 737 Phil. 457 (2014) [Per J. Bersamin, En Banc]. I