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By William B. Depasupil, Reporter
Every year, law graduates take the Bar
examinations as a screening device to determine who among the
examinees are fit to practice law in the Philippines. For all the
controversies that have hounded the institution of lawyering in the
Philippines, nothing compares to the exhilaration of passing the
rigorous Bar exams.
The first Philippine Bar Examination was held in
1901 with 13 examinees. The Supreme Court (SC) has no record though
on the identities of the first batch of Bar examinees and those who
took the exam 11 years thereafter.
The 2007 Bar exam was the 106th year the test
had been conducted. Starting in 1913, there were a total of 94
examinations, interrupted only by Japanese occupation in 1942 and
1943.
The 94 Bar examinations, from 1913-2007,
produced a total of 96 Bar topnotchers. There were two first placers
in 1944 (former Senate President Jovito Salonga and former Senator
Jose Diokno, tied at 95.3 percent) and also in 1999 (Deputy
Executive Secretary Edwin Enrile and law professor Florin Hilbay,
tied at 88.5 percent).
Of the 96 Bar topnochers, 47 were graduates of
the University of the Philippines; 19 were from Ateneo de Manila
University; six from San Beda College; five from Philippine Law
School; four from the University of Manila; and three each came from
the University of Sto. Tomas and Far Eastern University.
Manuel L. Quezon University had two topnotchers;
and one topnotcher each came from the University of the East,
Escuela de Derecho, University of Bohol, University of the
Cordilleras and Baguio Colleges Foundation.
Two took the Bar in what could be considered
special cases. They did not finish law, but were allowed to take the
exam during the few years that even non-law graduates were allowed
to take it.
All 96 Bar topnothcers are veritable superstars
in their own right. Some rose to extraordinary prominence following
their entry into politics, and by what they had done, whether good
or bad, as well as their contributions to the country while in
government service.
Three Bar first placers made history as
President of the Philippines. One become a vice president, and
several others became senators, congressmen, chief justices or
associate justices, or were appointed to important government posts.
Manuel Roxas, grandfather of Sen. Mar Roxas of
Capiz, made history in 1913 when he topped the 1913 exam with a
grade of 92 percent. Roxas, a UP law graduate, was the first
president of an independent Philippine Republic.
Roxas was elected president on April 23, 1946.
The Philippines achieved its independence from the United Sates on
July 4, 1946. Prior to his election to presidency, Roxas was also
House Speaker and Senate President.
Following Roxas’ footsteps was Diosdado
Macapagal, father of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. He was
elected as 9th president of the Philippines in 1961.
Macapagal, a graduate of University of Sto.
Tomas, topped the Bar in 1936. His dedication to public service
earned him the monicker “The Incorruptible.”
Macapagal, however, failed in his reelection bid
in 1965, losing to Ferdinand Marcos, who topped the Bar in 1939 with
a rating of 92.35 pecent. He graduated cum laude from the UP College
of Law. He was also a former congressman and Senate President.
As a law student in UP, Marcos was indicted and
convicted for the murder of Julio Nalundasan, who twice defeated his
father for a seat in the then National Assembly.
He reviewed for the Bar in detention. He
appealed and defended his case before the Supreme Court, and later
got an acquittal for murder.
Arguably, Marcos is the most famous among the
Bar topnotchers to date. President for 20 years (1965-1986), he was
ignominiously removed from office in 1986 through the EDSA People
Power for alleged abuse of power and corruption.
Emmanuel Pelaez, the Bar’s superstar of 1938
with a rating of 91.3 percent. He was elected vice president in
1961, with fellow Bar topnotcher, Macapagal, as president. He
concurrently served as secretary of the Department of Foreign
Affairs from 1961 to 1963.
Pelaez received his law degree from the
University of Manila in 1938. He was congressman in his home
province of Misamis Oriental from 1949 to 1953, and senator from
1953 to 1960.
Pelaez was again elected as congressman in 1965
and two years later as senator, a post he held till the declaration
of martial law in 1972.
San Juan Rep. Ronaldo Zamora, who served as the
executive secretary of former President Joseph Estrada, and Defense
Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr., a former three-term congressman from
Tarlac, also topped the Bar in 1969 and 1989 respectively.
Others who became senators were Jovito Salonga
and Jose Diokno, both topnotchers in 1944 who later became among the
country’s staunchest human rights advocates, and Lorenzo Sumulong
(1929).
Retired Supreme Court Justice Florenz Regalado,
a 1954 examinee, holds the highest score of 96.7 percent in the
106-year history of the Bar examination, while Adolfo Brillantes
obtained in 1920 the lowest score for a Bar topnocher at 84.1
percent. He was a member of the 1986 Constitutional Commission that
drafted the 1987 Constitution.
On the other hand, the first woman to break
men’s dominance of the Bar exam was former Senator Tecla San
Andres-Ziga. She took the exam in 1930 with a score of 89.4 percent.
The second woman to top the Bar and the first to
be appointed as Supreme Court justice was Cecilia Muñoz-Palma. She
took the Bar in 1937 with an average rating of 92.6 percent. She was
appointed to the High Court by Marcos on October 29, 1973, but later
became a leading force in the opposition against the martial law
regime. Prior to her appointment at the SC, Muñoz also served at
the Court of Appeals.
After her retirement, she was elected
assemblywoman in the defunct Batasang Pambansa and later appointed
by former President Aquino as president of the 1986 Constitutional
Commission that drafted the 1987 Constitution.
Ameurfina Melencio Herrera, the 1947 Bar
topnocher, was the second woman associate justice elevated to the
SC. She filled the seat vacated by Justice Palma.
Carolina Grino-Aquino followed Herrera at the
High Court as associate justice in 1988. She topped the Bar in 1950
with a 92.05 percent rating.
Since then, 11 women have topped the Bar,
including the 2007 topnotcher, Mercedita Lara Ona, 27, of Ateneo de
Manila University, with a score of 83.55 percent.
Three Bar topnochers also made their way to
chief justice. They were Roberto Concepcion (1924), Claudio
Teehankee (1940) and Pedro Yap (1946).
The 1974 Bar topnocher, Arturo Brion, is also an
incumbent justice of the SC. He was also a former CA justice and was
secretary of the Department of Labor and Employment before President
Arroyo appointed him last month to fill SC’s last vacancy.
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