EDITORIAL – The trouble with the constitution

The trouble with the constitution is that it cannot speak up. Its eloquence is confined to what its body of provisions says. The constitution cannot even defend itself against any Tom, Dick and Harry who comes along with a different take on what those provisions say.

Of course there is the Supreme Court, the final arbiter of all legal questions arising from constitutional disagreements. But you have to push your beef across the table so it can see what causes your legal bellyache. Like a jukebox, there is a process for it to sing.

But given the natural abhorrence of Filipinos for anything that requires a process, and the fact that going to the Supreme Court entails some doing, trust the Filipino to eventually do his own interpreting.

Interpreting is no stranger to the Philippine scene. It is in our culture to see signs on the backs of spiders as invitations to bet on gambling games, just as it is in our culture to weave our own meanings into more important things like constitutional provisions.

But while the former may enrich conventional wisdom, the latter takes off in a more dangerous direction. Laws that are meant for the preservation of order in society cannot be left to the discretion of just any interpreter.

We may have given this little serious thought. But the fact is, there have already been a number of instances when the application of laws failed because personal interpretations of what they meant were left to the individuals concerned.

We have all seen high-profile spectacles of search and arrest warrants against public officials failing to be served because the subject of the warrants, often powerful politicians, resisted by force, apparently interpreting the law to be inapplicable to their majestic selves.

In such situations, often developing rapidly in moments, there is no time to go to the Supreme Court to seek its enlightenment. It is every Tom, Dick and Harry for himself, and woe unto those who blink.

Right now, even away from scenes of confrontation and mayhem, all sorts of meanings are being woven into constitutional provisions like freedom of expression and freedom of the press, each interpreter an expert in his own approximation. The seeds of anarchy have been sown.