First word
BEFORE discussing the appointment of Associate Justice Teresita de Castro as the new Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, I want to highlight first another significant distinction of the Philippine judicial system: the firm avoidance by Philippine jurisprudence of the use of the word “pled” as the past tense or past participle of the verb “plead.”
BEFORE discussing the appointment of Associate Justice Teresita de Castro as the new Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, I want to highlight first another significant distinction of the Philippine judicial system: the firm avoidance by Philippine jurisprudence of the use of the word “pled” as the past tense or past participle of the verb “plead.”
Philippine law and jurisprudence, and for that matter, the journalism that covers our court system, frowns on the use of pled as the past tense for plead. In my research, this is one more proof that we Filipinos are truly an English-speaking people, in the seminal sense that Winston Churchill used the term in his famous book, History of the English-speaking Peoples. We observe the rules of English grammar and usage all the way to our courts.
There is a “pled” epidemic in US media today because of the explosive decision of President Trump’s lawyer, Michael Cohen, to plead guilty to eight counts of campaign finance violations and financial abuses. Most media are saying that Cohen pled guilty.
ABA Journal, the journal of the American Bar Association, said in a short report: “President Donald Trump’s longtime personal attorney, Michael Cohen, pleaded guilty to eight counts related to campaign-finance and financial abuses. In doing so, he admitted in court that he made payments to silence two women — adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal — at Trump’s behest to affect the 2016 presidential campaign.”
What is the proper or grammatical usage?
According to the Grammarist, a usage guide online: “Pleaded is the standard past tense and past participle of the verb plea. Pled has always been considered incorrect by people who make such judgments, but it is so common that we have to accept it as an alternative form. And pled is not just an Americanism, as some have claimed. It appears just as often (about one pled for every twenty pleadeds) in current British and Canadian news publications. Australians are the exception; they still seem to shun pled almost completely.”
What about legal usage?
Bryan Garner, author of the book, A Dictionary of Modern Legal Usage, and current editor of Black’s Law Dictionary, has stated: “The best course is to treat plead as a weak verb, so that the correct past tense, as well as past participle, is pleaded.”
I think the Filipino aversion to “pled” is a cultural thing. Filipinos, especially public officials, never plead guilty or accept responsibility for wrongdoing or a mistake; they never resign. With such a mindset, Filipinos have no use for “pled” in their vocabulary.
A felicitous appointment
That said, I now turn to the de Castro appointment.
That said, I now turn to the de Castro appointment.
I find the appointment of Justice de Castro, who accedes to her new office today, gratifying and felicitous for two reasons:
First, President Duterte‘s decision returns the appointment of our highest magistrate to the presidential practice of observing seniority in the selection of the chief justice.
This tradition was bypassed by former president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo when she appointed Renato Corona as chief justice. She picked him on top of the more senior Antonio Carpio.
More spectacularly, then President Benigno Aquino 3rd buried tradition when he forced the impeachment of CJ Corona in 2012, by bribing the Senate through the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP). With Corona out, he picked from the bottom of the SC barrel his former classmate and untested lawyer Maria Lourdes Sereno, and made her the first female chief justice of the Philippine Supreme Court.
In the present transition in the high court, President Duterte could, in all likelihood, have selected Senior Justice Antonio Carpio as the new chief justice, had Carpio not taken himself out of the selection process, for reasons of delicadeza. For a second time, Carpio as the most senior member of the court cannot accede to the highest magistracy of the land.
True caliber of our female jurists
The second reason I consider the de Castro appointment felicitous is that it will enable Philippine law and jurisprudence to show the true worth and caliber of Filipino women lawyers and jurists. The nation and the world will discover that some of our best legal minds and wisest judges are female. It is consistent with the fact that for decades now, women have been topping the bar examinations to the chagrin of our machistic culture.
The second reason I consider the de Castro appointment felicitous is that it will enable Philippine law and jurisprudence to show the true worth and caliber of Filipino women lawyers and jurists. The nation and the world will discover that some of our best legal minds and wisest judges are female. It is consistent with the fact that for decades now, women have been topping the bar examinations to the chagrin of our machistic culture.
The ousted CJ Sereno was supposed to show us that our female lawyers have the right stuff. But to our shock, we discovered that Aquino brazenly forced Sereno down the nation’s throat to the distress of our judiciary and jurisprudence. She was never qualified to sit in the high court. Aquino picked her because he thought madly that Sereno as CJ could force the tribunal to render a higher valuation and order a bigger payment by the government for his family’s Hacienda Luisita.
Sereno‘s incompetence and lack of qualifications for the job, especially for the charge of chief justice, was totally exposed when the House of Representatives held its hearings on the impeachment complaint lodged against Sereno by lawyer Larry Gadon. Current and former justices and SC officials went to the House inquiry to testify.
Then Solicitor General Jose Calida got the idea for a faster process of Sereno’s removal, by filing a quo warranto case against her right to hold office in the high court on the ground that she did not fulfill a fundamental requirement for her appointment to the tribunal — the filing of SALNS (statements of assets, liabilities and net worth) during her years in the government service.
An aberration and a corrective
Sereno was an aberration in presidential appointments to the high court. De Castro is a corrective and a return to stability.
Sereno was an aberration in presidential appointments to the high court. De Castro is a corrective and a return to stability.
Despite the limited stint that de Castro will have as chief justice — only 41 days — there is a high probability that she will acquit herself with distinction in the top job. She will revive the nation ‘s confidence in the quality of our women magistrates and female lawyers.
De Lima and Sereno will enter the dustbin of memory and history.
Opposition vs de Castro
The fiercest opposition against CJ de Castro will be waged by members of the opposition and the Yellow cult, who are bracing to make a comeback in the midterm elections next year.
The fiercest opposition against CJ de Castro will be waged by members of the opposition and the Yellow cult, who are bracing to make a comeback in the midterm elections next year.
Some congressmen say that de Castro is being rewarded for her part in the ouster of Sereno, as though she were part of a hatchet job.
Seven legislators have filed an impeachment complaint against de Castro and six other SC associate justices for voting to oust Sereno from the high court.
They wildly contend that de Castro should have declined her nomination and refused her appointment as chief justice because of the seriousness of the impeachment complaint against her for “culpable violation of the Constitution and betrayal of public trust.”
The delusions of the opposition today are never more clearly revealed than in this impeachment project.
It has absolutely no chance of succeeding in the administration-dominated Congress. It will never get the required number of signatures of representatives to receive serious consideration by the House.
The opposition will persist because the opposition — the Liberals, the Yellows and the militants taken together — have a long experience of fighting the Duterte administration on many issues and losing.
They fought the administration on the burial of President Ferdinand Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani and lost.
They fought the proclamation of martial law in Mindanao and lost.
They fought the ouster of ex- CJ Sereno through the quo warranto proceeding and lost.
New lady justice at the helm
This reminds me of something said of perennially losing politicians and commanders. Behind the fog of failure, they somehow perceived the glimmer of victory.
This reminds me of something said of perennially losing politicians and commanders. Behind the fog of failure, they somehow perceived the glimmer of victory.
With its current struggle, the prospects of the opposition do not improve one bit. Chief Justice de Castro will prove them spectacularly wrong. Her lengthy years of service and experience in the law and jurisprudence say so.
This is a new lady justice at the helm of our highest tribunal. She will not be at a loss for words on the law and the facts. I used to remark in this column on ex-CJ Sereno‘s constantly fluttering and blinking eyes.
Watch CJ de Castro in action. I thought I saw her eyes twinkle with intelligence and confidence during the hearings at the House.
yenmakabenta@yahoo.com
https://www.manilatimes.net/de-castros-appointment-as-chief-justice-is-felicitous/435419/
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