Adolfo S. Azcuna - Lux in Domino
Adolfo Azcuna remembers one clear day in 1958. He was lying on a field of grass in the Ateneo campus, looking at the sky, thinking about God, the universe, his life, and things an introspective young man like him would ponder. Then, he felt as if things just fell into place and all at once, he understood his purpose in life, his place in the universe. “I sort of found myself there, and I carry that with me up to now,” Adolf said.
Adolf came to the Ateneo de Manila University in 1955 –– a 16-year-old high school graduate from Zamboanga del Norte who wanted to be a lawyer, just like his father. The first year proved to be challenging for the young man from the south, for he had a lot of catching up to do academically, having come from a school that did not have the standards of the Ateneo High School, where most of his classmates came from.
But he enjoyed student life on campus and living in the university dormitory, for he had friendly schoolmates who made it easy for boys like him from the provinces to blend in. There were also the kindly Jesuits living on campus who found time to play basketball or badminton with the students and with whom Adolf would have many conversations on philosophy, literature, and other matters, outside the classroom. A special privilege was an evening with Fr Horacio De La Costa –– his brilliant history teacher whom he deeply admired –– who would sometimes take them out to a steak dinner.
His Jesuit mentors and Ateneo education would have a profound influence on Adolf. He referred to his time in Ateneo as his formative years and his worldview would be shaped, to a considerable extent, by his philosophical readings and discussions with his teachers and classmates.
After a period of adjustment, Adolf overcame his initial difficulties –– he was, after all, very bright and hard-working –– and in no time, he was doing better than some of his Manila-bred classmates. In 1959, he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree, with academic honors, and on the same year, entered the Ateneo law school. In 1962, he obtained his Bachelor of Laws degree, cum laude.
The young law graduate had prepared well and success came easy. Adolf Azcuna was admitted to the Philippine Bar in 1963, placing fourth in the 1962 bar examinations. Shortly after the results came out, he worked in his father’s law office; that was cut short by an offer to work in government, as assistant private secretary of then presiding justice Jose P. Bengzon of the Court of Appeals in 1963, and, thereafter, as private secretary when Jose Bengzon was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1964.
When Justice Bengzon retired from the Supreme Court in 1968, Azcuna joined him in his private law practice. He also taught International Law in Ateneo de Manila, from 1967 to 1986, taking a break in the early 1980s to go to Austria, where he completed postgraduate studies in International Law and Jurisprudence at the McGeorge School of Law in 1982.
In 1971, Azcuna ran and won as a member of the 1971 Constitutional Convention, representing Zamboanga Del Norte. After the ouster of President Ferdinand Marcos in 1986, he was appointed by the new administration of Corazon Aquino as a member of the Constitutional Commission to draft the 1987 Constitution of the Philippines.
During the term of President Corazon Aquino, Azcuna was appointed presidential legal counsel. Concurrently, he held the positions of press secretary and then presidential spokesperson at certain points in the administration. After his stint in the Corazon Aquino administration, we went back to law practice and put up a law office with Haydee Yorac, Felicidad Aquino, Dodo Sarmiento, and William Chua.
On October 17, 2002, Azcuna was appointed associate justice of the Supreme Court by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Justice Azcuna’s stint at the Supreme Court became noted for a string of decisions that included the nullification of the Arroyo administration’s calibrated preemptive response and an opinion which ordered the Department of Foreign Affairs to renegotiate some provisions of the Visiting Forces Agreement in the wake of a rape case in Subic Bay involving an American serviceman.
His most enduring legacy in the country’s jurisprudence was the writ of amparo, a remedy to protect the right to life, liberty, and security of every person issued by the High Court in 2007. Justice Azcuna had long studied this legal remedy long before it became part of mainstream legal thought. While taking up post-graduate studies in Salzburg, Austria, he realized the necessity of such a writ in the Philippines, which was then under martial law. Two decades later, he traveled to South America to observe how the writ functioned in the continent. The writ became a lifeline to those seeking reprieve from the courts at the height of extra-judicial killings during the Arroyo administration.
When Justice Azcuna retired as Supreme Court justice in February 2009, then Chief Justice Reynato Puno acknowledged his contributions to the judiciary, particularly his bold initiatives in laying the constitutional foundation for the adoption by the Supreme Court of the writ of amparo.
The former chief justice Reynato S. Puno said, “In 1987, Justice Adolfo Azcuna, then one of the commissioners tasked by President Corazon Aquino to draft the 1987 Constitution, embedded in its backbone a provision giving the Supreme Court the extra power to promulgate rules which would give life to the writ of amparo to protect the constitutional rights of our people. Through his initiative, the rule-making power of the Supreme Court was expanded to complement the awesome power of Congress to make laws. Historically, it is the parliament that protects the rights of people through its lawmaking power. Justice Azcuna allowed the Supreme Court to have a share in the exercise of this power by expanding its rule-making power."
On September 25, 2007, Chief Justice Reynato Puno officially announced the approval or promulgation of the all-important writ of amparo:
"Today, the Supreme Court promulgated the rule that will place the constitutional right to life, liberty and security above violation and threats of violation. This rule will provide the victims of extralegal killings and enforced disappearances the protection they need and the promise of vindication for their rights. This rule empowers our courts to issue reliefs that may be granted through judicial orders of protection, production, inspection and other relief to safeguard one's life and liberty. The writ of amparo shall hold public authorities, those who took their oath to defend the constitution and enforce our laws, to a high standard of official conduct and hold them accountable to our people. The sovereign Filipino people should be assured that if their right to life and liberty is threatened or violated, they will find vindication in our courts of justice.”
Justice Azcuna’s other initiatives in the Supreme Court championed the ideas of a justice system that is efficient and accessible to all, especially to the most marginalized. He promoted the High Court’s Justice on Wheels Program to reduce the backlog of cases.
As chairperson of the Supreme Court Committee on Computerization and Library, he spearheaded efforts to make the the e-library accessible to judges, legal researchers, and other court personnel for easy research and information dissemination.
After his retirement in 2009, Justice Azcuna became the chancellor of the Philippine Judicial Academy, the training school for judges, justices, court personnel, lawyers, and aspirants to judicial posts.
In 2014, the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) elected Justice Azcuna as one of its five new commissioners for a term of five years. The ICJ is dedicated to ensuring respect for international human rights standards through the law. One of its missions is to ensure that international law, especially human rights and humanitarian law, is utilized effectively for protection, particularly for the most vulnerable and is implemented through effective national and international procedures. Commissioners are known for their experience, knowledge, and fundamental commitment to human rights. The ICJ is composed of 60 judges and lawyers from all over the world.
Adolfo Azcuna may have retired from the highest post he held in government, but he remains committed to the cause of human rights and the administration of justice, not only for his countrymen but for all.
In Justice Azcuna’s life, one sees constancy in the way he upholds the values he has committed himself to. He continues to be faithful to the values of honesty, integrity, and service to country –– a rare government worker with an untainted reputation. In spite of being in the corridors of power and the highest offices of the land, he never once donned the trappings of power and continues to live a simple life dedicated to his family. His simplicity is a virtue he learned from his father –– a lawyer and longtime public official, who lived a simple life and died a poor man –– and from his mother who was a school teacher.
At his retirement ceremony, Justice Azcuna was asked what his secret was in “negotiating the difficult passes in life.” “Love is the secret. You can pass through any barrier through love,” he said. “In the evening of life, we will be judged by love,” he added, quoting St John of the Cross.
For living the noblest ideals of the Ateneo de Manila as a selfless public servant who puts country before self and as a man of deep faith whose devotion to his family is unchanging; for devoting more than 50 years of his life to judicial work, driven by a commitment to the delivery of justice; for ensuring the protection of every Filipino’s constitutional right to life, liberty and security through the writ of amparo; for lighting a path of excellence, service, and probity that young Filipinos and Ateneans may follow, the Ateneo de Manila confers on Adolfo S Azcuna the 2016 Lux-in-Domino Award.
