Constitutional duty over realpolitik

The temporary procedural pause in the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, which is set to resume on November 9, gives us time to reflect on two seemingly opposing views. I think this discussion must continue through the 2028 polls because it concerns the very survival of our imperfect democracy.

Discussing whether enough senators would vote to convict the vice president, political strategist Malou Tiquia pointed to the 32 million people who elected her. Speaking on DZYT Radyo 765, she asked: “Paano mo masisikmura na i-convict sa isang charge ang bise presidente na nahalal ng 32 million? Paano?... And yet, yung survey tumataas.”

I take her remarks to mean that removing the vice president could carry a heavy political cost, given her electoral mandate and what Tiquia described as the vice president’s rising survey ratings.

The other view comes from impeachment prosecutor Amando Virgil Ligutan. Asked early on why he had joined the prosecution team, he gave an answer that struck me as simple yet powerful. He recalled the case of a school principal in Virac, Catanduanes, who was sentenced to 11 years in prison for pocketing P5,000.

“If we can send to jail somebody for pocketing ?5,000, why can’t we remove from office the sitting vice president for misusing millions of pesos of public funds?” Ligutan said.

Tiquia’s view belongs to realpolitik and is valid in that respect. Serious political consequences and the real pressures surrounding a decision cannot simply be brushed aside.

On the other hand, Ligutan’s argument carries equal, if not greater, weight because accountability, even on the sole remaining charge of unexplained wealth, comes with being elected to office. An electoral mandate operates within constitutional limits. That is a lesson Ligutan and I, like other lawyers, took to heart in Law school.

Neither of us comes from the political elite. We are mere lawyers who have little to lose politically in this battle.

The two views can therefore be acknowledged without being placed on equal footing. Political consequences, on the one hand, must be understood and effectively addressed. Constitutional mandates, on the other hand, must be fulfilled through a fair proceeding whose outcome rests on evidence and constitutional grounds, even when doing so carries a heavy political cost.

This priority matters because the Constitution binds us as a republic despite our different backgrounds, interests, and political loyalties. I highly doubt we can survive for long as a republic if the impeachment trial turns up strong evidence of the vice president’s culpability, yet the senator-judges acquit her because realpolitik dictates it.

When we studied the Constitution in Law school, we were taught that it restrains the exercise of power, including power backed by a majority. Constitutional historian Charles McIlwain identified legal limits on government as an essential feature of constitutionalism. A government remains subject to those limits even when its decisions enjoy popular support.

There is nothing strange about a people at a saner and more peaceful time imposing restraints on themselves. Political theorists call this arrangement precommitment, a sort of safety measure that shall save us from our future impassioned selves or our transient impulses.

James Madison, an American statesman and Founding Father, understood the difficulty. In The Federalist Papers, a series of essays arguing for the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, Madison warned that appeals to the people over constitutional disputes could become contests of partisan passion. He explained why dependence on the people needed additional safeguards. Those elected to govern must themselves be controlled. Without constitutional restraints, democratic government cannot survive the excesses of its own mob.

And with today’s information ecosystem easily made murky by sophisticated disinformation networks and targeted propaganda, it is much easier to manipulate electoral choices and turn the system against itself. This can happen without the kind of genuine revolution that once overturned systems that no longer served the people.

Yes, constitutions are open to criticism and lawful reform, even revolutions. We don’t pretend that their authors possessed wisdom beyond their generation. What we cannot accept is that just because a leader is popular he or she is already exempted from the constitutional rules governing his or her office.

Ligutan understands that upholding the Constitution may be all that stands between the republic’s survival and its destruction by an electoral mob caught in a murky information ecosystem. Its restraints must hold even when survey polls seem to demand that they be set aside to protect a popular political brand.