Carpio vs. Executive Secretary PDF
Carpio vs. Executive Secretary PDF
Executive Secretary
FACTS:
Petitioner Antonio Carpio as citizen, taxpayer and member of the Philippine Bar, filed
this petition, questioning the constitutionality of RA 6975 with a prayer for TRO.
ISSUEs:
HELD:
SC held that the President has control of all executive departments, bureaus, and offices.
This presidential power of control over the executive branch of government extends over
all executive officers from Cabinet Secretary to the lowliest clerk. In the landmark case
of Mondano vs. Silvosa, the power of control means “the power of the President to alter
or modify or nullify or set aside what a subordinate officer had done in the performance
of his duties and to substitute the judgment of the former with that of the latter.” It is said
to be at the very “heart of the meaning of Chief Executive.”
As a corollary rule to the control powers of the President is the “Doctrine of Qualified
Political Agency.” As the President cannot be expected to exercise his control powers all
at the same time and in person, he will have to delegate some of them to his Cabinet
members.
Under this doctrine, which recognizes the establishment of a single executive, “all
executive and administrative organizations are adjuncts of the Executive Department, the
heads of the various executive departments are assistants and agents of the Chief
Executive, and, except in cases where the Chief Executive is required by the Constitution
or law to act in person or the exigencies of the situation demand that he act personally,
the multifarious executive and administrative functions of the Chief Executive are
performed by and through the executive departments, and the acts of the Secretaries of
such departments, performed and promulgated in the regular course of business, unless
disapproved or reprobated by the Chief Executive, are presumptively the acts of the Chief
Executive.
Thus, “the President’s power of control is directly exercised by him over the members of
the Cabinet who, in turn, and by his authority, control the bureaus and other offices under
their respective jurisdictions in the executive department.”
The placing of NAPOLCOM and PNP under the reorganized DILG is merely an
administrative realignment that would bolster a system of coordination and cooperation
among the citizenry, local executives and the integrated law enforcement agencies and
public safety agencies.