What pre-Law course is best to take?

By now those students who will go to college must have already decided what course to take. I've been asking my students about their plans. As with the many Pinoys who answer a question with another question, a few of them ask me back so that the interviewer became the interviewee now.

"What's a good pre-Law course to take, Sir?"

Well, that question could be answered on two different levels.

First, law schools don't prescribe a particular pre-Law course. Whatever course will do, provided your pre-Law course complied with the required number of units in Math, English, and Social Science. But that depends on the university. For example, in the University of Mindanao College of Law, the requirements are: 6 units in Math, 12 units in English, and 9 units in Social Science (History, Psychology, or Sociology).

Second, if by a good pre-Law course means that what course will better prepare your for law school, the answer is there is none.

True some may say it should be AB English or Communication Arts since in law school what matters is not what answers you give, but how to give what you give. Other may say it should be Philosophy, for it trains you to be a critical thinker.

I think it depends on what kind of lawyer you want to be. I have Law professors whose pre-Law courses were varied. My teacher in Constitutional Law 2 took up an Engineering course. My Statutory Construction teacher used to be a MedTech before he took up law. My Persons and Family Relations teacher is a CPA and an MBA holder, then she proceeded to Law.

The field of law is vast. What matters is you have to think first what kind of lawyer you want to be. Then you can fairly determine what pre-Law course to take.

Thus, if you want to be a Commercial Lawyer, a background in Business Administration, Accounting, or Management might come in handy. If you want to enter the government service, a Political Science or a Public Administration course might be useful. Those who relish a courtroom drama and all that verbal brawl might take up AB English or Philosophy.

Alternative Lawyers – 'Conscience of the Legal Profession'

[caption id="attachment_2476" align="alignright" width="300"] Delegates and organizers of the Basic Orientation Seminar on Legal Aid.[/caption]

When you become lawyers, in what field of the law you want to be engaged?

On the second day of the two-day Basic Orientation Seminar on Legal Aid Atty. Neil Pacamalan, Cultural Affairs Specialist for Mindanao of the US Embassy, Manila, asked that question to the delegates from the University of Mindanao and Ateneo de Davao University College of Law.

The question drew a variety of response: commercial law, criminal law, international law, labor law, among others. Few mentioned about public interest lawyering, which others call alternative lawyering or developmental lawyering.

[caption id="attachment_2478" align="alignleft" width="144"] Atty. Neil Pacamalan[/caption]

This type of lawyering, according to Atty. Pacamalan, is devoted to lending legal assistance and empowering such marginalized groups as urban poor, farmers, or fishers. He said these are the groups that are historically, culturally, and economically marginalized.

Atty. Pacamalan is convinced that involvement in alternative lawyering is not detrimental to the law students’ studies. He surmises that while UP, ADMU, and San Beda excel in the Bar Exams, the three are able to maintain a robust legal aid centers.

He said that alternative lawyering should not be a second choice only, reiterating what former Chief Justice Hilario Davide, Jr. said.

“To me it is troubling that the lawyers who advocate such worthy causes are called the alternative,” said Davide at the First Alternative Law Conference on November 8, 1999. “An alternative is a second choice. You should be considered the mainstream, the first choice, the true and ideal lawyers. Better yet, the conscience of the legal profession.”

5 Law Student Must-Haves

There are people who use a lot of tools to do their work. And there are those who use nothing at all.

As for law students?

Well, there are lots of things a law student brings every day to class. But there are five things that I consider a law student list of must-haves. To be sure, law students could live without these things. But these things are so common a property among law students that they seemed to have become part of what a law student must have:

Blogging in 2012: A Review

Since I started my law studies in June, 2012, I thought 2012 would mean death for my blog. On the contrary, I became more active in blogging. I found a new source of material from studying law. Thus, most of the posts for 2012 have something to do with the law. How did my blogging activity fare in 2012? Here's a review the guys at Wordpress did:

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.



Here's an excerpt:

600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 7,300 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 12 years to get that many views.

Click here to see the complete report.

Nag-iisang Isagani A. Cruz

Reading Supreme Court decisions is dreary. The decisions are so long that after reading them, all you want to do is sleep. But rarely does one experience it if one were to read a decision written by former Associate Justice Isagani A. Cruz. They say Justice Cruz is one of those rare breed of lawyers who could both write and reason well. Here's a random sample and you be judge:

"Zeal in the pursuit of criminals cannot ennoble the use of arbitrary methods that the Constitution itself abhors." (Bagalihog vs. Fernandez, G.R. No. 96356 June 27, 1991)

"Laws must come out in the open in the clear light of the sun instead of skulking in the shadows with their dark, deep secrets...The furtive law is like a scabbarded saber that cannot feint, parry or cut unless the naked blade is drawn." (Tañada vs. Tuvera, G.R. No. L-63915 December 29, 1986).

"The possible exception is the lawyer whose income is derived from teaching ballroom dancing or escorting wrinkled ladies with pubescent pretensions." (Dissenting, Cayetano vs. Monsod, G.R. No. 100113 September 3, 1991)

"[S]ocial justice –– or any justice for that matter –– is for the deserving, whether he be a millionaire in his mansion or a pauper in his hovel. It is true that, in case of reasonable doubt, we are called upon to tilt the balance in favor of the poor, to whom the Constitution fittingly extends its sympathy and compassion. But never is it justified to prefer the poor simply because they are poor, or to reject the rich simply because they are rich, for justice must always be served, for poor and rich alike, according to the mandate of the law." (Gelos vs. CA, G.R. No. 86186 May 8, 1992)

"Unless we are vigilant of our rights, we may find ourselves back to the dark era of the truncheon and the barbed wire, with the Court itself a captive of its own complaisance and sitting at the death-bed of liberty." (Dissenting, Valmonte vs. De Villa,G.R. No. 83988 September 29, 1989)

Update: See Justice Cruz's concurring opinion in Adiong vs. COMELEC, G.R. No. 103956 March 31, 1992 and dissenting in National Press Club vs. COMELEC, G.R. No. 102653 March 5, 1992.

Strive for Simplicity, Not Legal Pugnacity

Justices, judges, lawyers, and law students are a brilliant lot. Too often, however, their brilliance is lost when they start writing down their ideas. The case of Leonor vs. CA  drives home this point.

The decision of the Trial Court regarding the merits of the case is as repugnant as the manner by which the decision was written. This is the first paragraph of the judge's decision, quoted in Footnote 13:

This is an action for “Cancellation of Entry in the Civil Registry” particularly on the marriage contract of one Mauricio Leonor, Jr. and Virginia Amor supposedly to have taken place in a long distance past on March 13, 1960 and after a Rip Van Winkle sleep and dormancy liken to a Mt. Pinatubo explosion that rocked the peace and quiet in the lives of the supposedly participants to this drama in Calatrava and San Carlos City, Negros Occidental when out of the blue one party in the person of an aggrieved left-behind spouse revived and revealed an ancient piece of marital bond between her and a reluctant spouse.

What's wrong with the paragraph? Everything, except perhaps for the spelling.

No less than the Supreme Court, through Justice Panganiban, called the language of the decision "convoluted," "painfully a sophomoric and pathetic portrayal" of Virginia, the petitioner in this case.

Further, the Court tersely remarked, "The said decision’s crude attempt at literary sophistication is matched only by its jarring syntax and grammatical incongruencies."

In his essay "On Developing My Decision-Writing Style," former Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban, this time not writing for the Court, shared the motive behind every decision he wrote.

"Even though my decisions are written primarily to resolve legal issues and are thus emblazoned with a considerable amount of legalese," he said, "I have endeavored to write in simple English, comprehensible as much as possible to a high school graduate.  I want to be understood not only by the legal profession but also by the parties themselves, especially by persons accused of crimes, and by the public at large as regards cases involving interpretation of the Constitution."

"More than lingual elegance and even legal pugnacity," he further said, "I strive for simplicity, clarity and precision in nuances and shades of meanings.  I believe the trend in all professions and occupations -- be they medicine, theology, science or music -- is to be understood not just by the members of that particular discipline but by the public at large."

Thus, lawyers and law students alike should strive for the same simplicity, clarity, and precision. After all, writing aims to reveal rather than conceal.

Sakses!

[caption id="attachment_2366" align="aligncenter" width="510"] The book is published by Central Bookstore.[/caption]

A law student's life is filled with drudgery. But, as Blas Ople said, "Every one of us has his proud moments that seem to recapitulate all past struggles---that lift us from our plain and humdrum lives to an exalted state."

I just recently have one such moment. In August this year, the Philippine Association of Law Schools (PALS) organized a nationwide essay writing contest for law students.

Out of the participants from Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao, ten finalists would be chosen. Of the ten, three would be declared winners.

Why I said I recently have my proud moment? Lest you be misled, I didn't win. Here are the winners:

• 1st Place: Archimedes D. Suganob of St. Mary's College of Law, Tagum City.


• 2nd Place: Julius Caesar Domingo of St. Mary's University, Bayombong Nueva Vizcaya.


• 3rd Place: Euangeli P. Doromal of Cor Jesu College, Digos City.

I'm proud that two of the winners come from Mindanao. I think they all deserve to win, for how can a lowly man like me beat a mathematician/physicist, a Roman Emperor, and an angel?

Seriously, though, I'm proud because PALS has this little book called "In The Eyes of Law Students: The Secret Formula of Teaching Law," which contains, among others, the essays of the winners and ten other finalists.

What of it?

Nothing, except that I'm one of the finalists and my essay is in the book. If you're someone who has a literary pretensions, seeing your work published  is like releasing the feces that have been inside your stomach for quite a while.

No wonder, people say "Sakses!" after defecating.

1st Sem of Law School, kumusta?

I passed my Persons. I got 2.8 (82). I'm proud of it. I thought I'm going to get a 75 or below. My only concern now is Consti Law and Crim Law. The grades are not yet in.

Now that the semester is over, and another semester is about to begin, maybe I should share, albeit very briefly, what I've been through for the past five months by answering the most frequently asked questions people asked me about studying law.

1. Is law like any other course?

No, it's not. The study of law is like a jealous mistress. It demands so much from you---time, energy, resources---that you wouldn't even notice that you're giving more than what you have. Of course, that's what our professors told us in the beginning. But I must say, it depends on how you take it. If you take it too seriously and impose unnecessary pressures, then you will most likely be unnecessarily pressured. The opposite is just as fatal. If you take it too lightly and do not discipline yourself, then you will most likely fail.

The most important thing is to strike a balance among your many-faceted life. Study hard. Party harder. Go out if you can. Watch a movie. Hangout with your friends. Talk to people. Read newspapers, not just some antiquated cases dating back to the time when our country is still called the Government of the Philippine Islands.

2. Do you memorize all those laws, articles and Republic Acts?

You can if you want. But so far no professor of mine has yet required us to memorize all the laws we discussed. Why? Because that's plainly impossible. And don't tell me about Mike Ross of Suits----he's a figment of someone else's imagination. But there are times when our professor would let us memorize VIP (Very Important Provisions) of the law.

3. Did you join a fraternity?

No, I didn't, and neither did most of my classmates. And we see no reason to change our decision. And the frat is no guarantee that you would pass all your subjects although they say that the frat's a big help. Your "Ka Brod" would provide the materials your subjects required, saving you a lot of time. Still, nothing beats studying, for what good are the materials your frat provides if you don't bother studying them.

4. Is it true that it's a plus if you have a good penmanship?

I think so. The professors are full-time practicing lawyers themselves. They don't have the luxury of time to decipher every student's handwriting, for it's a double burden----first, the prof needs to decipher your handwriting; and second, the prof needs to understand the meaning of what you've written. Yet make no mistake---it's still substance over form. Many of my classmates have some damn good answers but still scored low. And I submit it's because they have a penmanship that looks like a scribbling of a toddler. The good news is that it can still be remedied. How? There's no easy formula for this. My classmates does so by making notes using cursive.

5. How do you manage it?

Studying law while working full-time is really hard, especially during the first few months. I was so stressed out I thought of quitting. But I figured I was so hard on myself. As the months went by, though, I was able to find my learning style and establish my rhythm. Here's my daily routine.

7:30-4:30 - Work, but I sometimes study in-between my classes.

5:30-8:30 - Attend classes.

10:30 -11:30 - Study for the next day's class. I normally don't stay so late at night. If I go beyond 11 or 11:30, my brain absorbs nothing, and it's just a waste of time for time to be awake. So I sleep, and the next day my brain is again ready to work.

Thus far, that's 1st sem. And I'm pretty sure the 2nd sem will be twice difficult. Oblicon is every day. God bless us all.

No courtroom drama

According to my professor in Stat Con, there are lawyers who have never really gone inside the courtroom, either to argue for the defense or the prosecution. That is why he required us to attend one court session, and see for ourselves what goes on inside the courtroom. Lucky for us because Judge Pelagio Paguican of RTC  Branch 12 is the first cousin of our classmate. So we were accommodated easily.

Yesterday was our scheduled courtroom visit. There are nine cases slated for the morning session. All are criminal cases. Some are for trial. Others are for arraignment.

When I knew that the cases we were about to witness were for trial, I for one expected to witness a cross-examination of witnesses because it is sometimes the most combative part of the trial process, and it's the part that is often portrayed in films and Pinoy Soap Opera. It's when we often hear the counsels' "Objection Your Honor!"

But I was not able to witness what I expected. Most of the cases up for trial were rescheduled because either the complainant or the witnesses did not show up. There was no courtroom drama.

Nevertheless I'm happy with the outcome of our visit because, at the very least, I understand now why P-noy want to appoint someone who can institute real reforms in the judiciary. Just look around the Benigno S. Aquino Jr. Hall of Justice and notice the facilities and equipment there.

Whether the new Chief Justice is up for the challenge I don't know.

Memorable Decisions

Since Christopher Columbus Langdell pioneered the method in Harvard Law School, the Casebook method has been a fixture of any law school, especially in the Philippines whose system of legal education is largely based on the American system.

The Casebook method goes like this (at least, as it is practiced in UM College of Law): A professor assigns several cases, landmark or otherwise, to the students. These cases are chosen because they illustrate how a usually vague  provision of the law is applied and given meaning by the Supreme Court. The case is then discussed together with the provision of the law. The professor asks a hapless student about the case's facts, the issues it brought before the court, and the court's ruling.

A professor, however, assigns so many cases that a student finds himself in a quagmire. For example, a professor assigns five to ten cases for the next meeting's discussion. And that's just for one subject. Then another professor in another subject assigns the same number of cases. Then a third does the same.

No wonder students like me hold the casebook method both deplorable and lovable. Indeed, what has emerged is a love-hate relationship between the student and the method.

There are, however, few cases that I couldn't just forget because I find them queer or interesting:

Chi Ming Tsoi vs. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 119190 January 16, 1997

This is a case where the wife filed a petition to have her marriage annulled on the ground of psychological incapacity under Article 36 of the Family Code. What did the wife say that constituted psychological incapacity? In the short period of time that they lived together as husband and wife, the wife couldn't stand anymore the "senseless and protracted" refusal of the husband to have sex. How the Supreme Court ruled. Go read the case.

Silverio vs. Republic of the Philippines G.R. No. 174689 October 22, 2007

Petitioner Rommel Jacinto Silverio is a well-educated man. He has an M.A. and PhD in Sociology from University of Hawaii, in Manoa. Then he went to Bangkok, Thailand, and had his penis removed, and in lieu of it is a vagina---a procedure commonly called as sex reassignment. Now because of her sex reassignment, she petitioned to have his name changed from "Rommel" to "Melai," and his sex as well, from "male" to "female." Why? Because he wanted to be married with his American boyfriend here in the Philippines.

Question: May a person successfully petition for a change of name and sex appearing in the birth certificate to reflect the result of a sex reassignment surgery? The RTC where Silverio filed his petition said yes. "The court is of the opinion that granting the petition would be more in consonance with the principles of justice and equity. With his sexual [re-assignment], petitioner, who has always felt, thought and acted like a woman, now possesses the physique of a female. Petitioner’s misfortune to be trapped in a man’s body is not his own doing and should not be in any way taken against him."

The Supreme Court was, however, not impressed, and overruled the decision of the lower court.

Republic of the Philippines vs. Cagandahan G.R. No. 166676, September 12, 2008

In this case, Cagandahan was Christened as Jennifer. Problem was she diagnosed with Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH), "a condition where persons thus afflicted possess both male and female characteristics." Cagandahan also seemed to have two sex organs. Growing up, however, she thinks, feels, and acts as a male person. Thus, she prayed that her birth certificate be corrected such that her gender be changed from female to male and her first name be changed from Jennifer to Jeff.

The lower court granted her petition, and the Supreme Court concurred. It said: "In so ruling we do no more than give respect to (1) the diversity of nature; and (2) how an individual deals with what nature has handed out. In other words, we respect respondent's congenital condition and his mature decision to be a male. Life is already difficult for the ordinary person. We cannot but respect how respondent deals with his unordinary state and thus help make his life easier, considering the unique circumstances in this case."

Project Law School relaunched

Two years ago, I launched a project here called Project Law School. In that project, I plan to document my experience while studying law. Of course, it didn't materialize. Instead of proceeding to law, I went to teach at Stella Maris.

Now, since I have actually started my law studies in University of Mindanao, I'm relaunching the Project. I cannot assure, however, that blog posts will be more frequent, considering the tedious work in school and the equally stressful demands of law studies.

Almost all of my law professors warned us that Law is like a jealous mistress. It demands so much of your time, talent, and treasure. One week into law school, I know now whereof they speak. Indeed, it isn't easy. In one subject, as many as ten cases will be assigned for you to digest (make a brief). Every day is a recitation day. And sometimes, just when you thought a provision won't be discussed because it's insignificant, you are suddenly called by your teacher to recite in toto that insignificant article.

But why continue if we are not compelled to endure all those things?

I don't know about them, but for me, my only consolation is that I know this won't take long. As Ma'am G used to tell us, "Better suffer for four years than suffer for the rest of your life."