Thank you very much, Vice-President Manny Pelaez. May I also greet you distinguished founder, Vice-President Doy Laurel; Senate President Ed Angara; Speaker Joe de Venecia; president of CLASP, Ave Cruz; my favorite law professor, Dean Vicente Abad Santos; Doctor Syquia; RR dela Cruz; your excellencies; other distinguished legal personalities; compañeros; fellow lawyers; ladies and gentlemen.

Therein lies a story. But I think we should stop accusing Dean Abad Santos of being the terror of the UP Law School because indeed I must admit, I enrolled in one of his classes, in the early months of 1954 and this was after I had just come back from Korea and had just gotten married. But at a certain point, after several weeks of extensive and intensive assignments from Dean Abad Santos in the UP Law proper, first year — plus increasing duties in General Headquarters, Armed Forces of the Philippines in then Camp Murphy, I had to make a choice.

My wife gave me the ultimatum. She said, “what’s this you’re wanting to be a lawyer and spending so many hours after work until you come back late in the evening and then you still have to crack your law books. Don’t you have more time for me?” So, the choice had to be with Mrs. Ramos and I would therefore like to mention here that my brief stint as a law drop-out is not the fault of Dean Abad Santos, but of my own wanting to become a lawyer, just like my father. But finally, I call you compañeros because I have become a lawyer honoris causa three times over, starting with the Lyceum of the Philippines of the Laurel family.

I am supposed to set the tone for this occasion which is really to launch the fund-raising campaign of CLASP. And as I have done in other occasions of a similar nature, I’d begin by pledging my one-month salary to the CLASP. And I ask all of you, in a position to do so starting with the Senate President and the Speaker of the House to do likewise.

But let me welcome you to Heroes Hall, which is being reactivated as the real Heroes Hall. We have been able to gather some 45 little portraits of our revolutionary heroes and placed them in this hall. And at the same time, have changed the nature of Malacañang from that of a show window for shoes and other fashion items, into a real presidential museum starting with general Aguinaldo.

Let me also congratulate all of you, especially Doctor Doy laurel, for reactivating the CLASP through this renewed fund campaign drive.

My friends, just a few hours ago, as many of you know because you were there, I spoke before the Fourth National Convention of Lawyers of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines. This is an important convention, fraught with urgency and concern.

And the message I brought to them cannot be too different from what I will tell you now. That, faced with the gravest crisis of confidence in our judiciary in recent history, we Filipinos now must do our utmost to preserve the rule of law, promote the delivery of justice, and protect the poorest and the weakest in our society. We must find practical and imaginative means of helping the judiciary do its work, unhampered by extraneous personal, partisan and economic factors.

I do not need to explain to you the dimensions and the implications of the crisis I refer to. Indeed, I should be listening to you for the specifics of this problem and its possible solutions.

I am told that about three weeks from now or four weeks from now, on the 16th of July, the revitalized clasp will be hosting, as its first major project, a multi-sectoral “citizens’ crisis forum” on the judicial system. This forum will include most of the country’s finest legal minds, and I expect it to do much to clear the air towards restoring public confidence in our judicial administration.

But without meaning to pre-empt the issues that might be raised in that forum, and anywhere else, these matters are surely being discussed today. Let me say this: that I will brook no corruption, no gross inefficiency or negligence of duty in this administration. I have applied this to the Philippine National Police, and I will apply it within the executive branch, to the other pillars of the justice system, in any and every proven case of wrongdoing, let the ax fall where it will.

But at the same time, I must hasten to caution the critics of our judiciary against hysteria and wholesome condemnation. I am concerned that the recent emergence of a spate of complaints and charges against some members of the judiciary might turn all too easily — and tragically — into a mindless feeding frenzy, with no ultimate victim but justice itself.

Whoever presumes to judge our judges, as it were, takes it upon himself to employ the most exacting standards of probity and responsibility, because the punishment, where it falls due, cannot be any less severe. This so-called crisis of confidence must be taken more seriously than it being just a passing matter of media or political interest.

Where there are accusations, they must be proved; where there is proof, there must be punishment. But we must act with prudence because we cannot afford to undermine or let others undermine the foundations of our people’s faith in the integrity and the wisdom of the judiciary as a whole.

Our judges, by their very station, are exemplary men and women who have willingly forgone more leisurely options in the legal professions to devote their lives to a job with terrible demands and challenges, and no promised reward but the honor of public service. So honorable indeed were judges in our society that sometime ago, we privileged them with special income tax exemptions but with some since then been withdrawn.

It may be a sorry fact that a few members of the bench have strayed from their mission as far as the known performance of general humanity is concerned while that’s par for the course.

But while they are as human as the rest of us, judges are not exactly just “general humanity.” somehow, we expect them to be wiser, stronger, fairer, and certainly, more honest than the human lot.

This is, I think the most perplexing and agonizing aspect of these issues: if a judge cannot be fair, then who can?

But because of their special status and the high esteem in which we hold their offices, we must take equally special care that they are not maliciously and irresponsibly impugned.

As I told the IBP, I have no doubt that the vast majority of the members of our judiciary are the honest, hardworking and dedicated public servants that they have taken an oath to be. Indeed, if we must apply the presumption of innocence to the lowliest criminal suspect and even hard-core recidivist, our judges, the very embodiment of our ideals, cannot be any less deserving of the protection from that same principle.

These matters concern us gravely because our restored democracy, beset as it is by ancient conflicts and deep social divisions, is held together by a common faith in the availability of justice, of the same, one kind of justice for all citizens — as vice-president laurel has mentioned — rich or poor.

It is this faith that has brought back thousands of our disaffected countrymen down from the hills of insurgency and rebellion back to our common fold of the law, which is the mainstream of Philippine society.

They expect to find in our society viable alternatives to the armed struggle such as clean and free elections, adequate livelihood opportunities and justice on demand.

We have come a long way in providing the first two. But for reasons that go beyond human fallibility, the administration of justice in this country still lives much to be desired.

In my view, the most critical problem in the judiciary really isn’t the reported graft and corruption we hear so much about. To me, it is the fact that, as of this moment, we have well over 300,000 unresolved cases clogging the dockets in our regional trial courts alone.

And if you thought that was bad enough, listen to this, while the old cases are being resolved at the rate of some 20,000 per month, new cases are also being filed at the rate of 32,000 for the same period.

Clearly, something has to be done about this horrendous backlog which has created untold opportunities for bribery and extortion among litigants and unscrupulous lawyers and judges just to get a case resolved quickly and favorably.

Again, at the IBP meeting, I proposed that we consider the idea of some senior lawyers to create small committees of qualified volunteer lawyers to assist our overburdened judges in studying and deciding backlogged cases. According to some estimates, 500 such three-man committees could clear the dockets of some 30,000 cases in just three months.

I will leave it to the experts to study the feasibility and the mechanics of this plan. It is one of several schemes we will be seriously looking into very shortly.

What attracts me about this particular idea, however, is the reliance on the voluntary cooperation between bench and bar to achieve an urgent and practical public good.

It is that same spirit of selflessness and public service that I find and admire in your organization, the CLASP. Since its first founding 26 years ago, CLASP has become synonymous with free legal aid for those in direct need.

Your voice has spoken loudly for those silenced by poverty, by fear, and by oppression in our society. For such countrymen as these, you reaffirm the promise of our democracy. Have faith, you say, do not despair, for indeed the truth shall set you free.

And since your founding, you have brought the gift of your talents and the protection of our laws, to over 50,000 poor Filipinos and their families. But I understand the figure is closer to 100,000 winning four out of every five such cases involving indigents.

I can think of nothing nobler for a lawyer than to do what you have already been doing with little fanfare and certainly no pecuniary gain all these years. I’m also glad to note that you have expanded your horizon of concerns, to include such pressing issues as judicial reform, which can only improve the reach and the quality of the justice that you seek.

I find it especially fitting and auspicious that clasp was founded and continues to be guided by an exemplar of public service, a man of impeccable integrity and superlative intellect and I am talking about Vice-President Dr. Salvador Laurel.

Let me assure you that I will fully support your aims and activities. Your mission is a vital form of people empowerment, your CLASP is a firm and friendly hand across the breach.

For all that and more, please accept my deepest thanks and congratulations which I extend to all of you in behalf of our people. But before I sit down, may I remind all of you that this is a fund-raising activity.

Mabuhay ang CLASP. Maraming salamat po sa inyong lahat.