[ G. R. No. 42300. January 31, 1936 ] 62 Phil. 945
[ G. R. No. 42300. January 31, 1936 ]
THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, PLAINTIFF AND AP- PELLEE, VS. AMADEO CORRAL, DEFENDANT AND APPELLANT. D E C I S I O N
ABAD SANTOS, J.:
Appellant was charged with having voted illegally at the general elections held on June 5,1934. After due trial, he was convicted on the ground that he had voted while laboring under a legal disqualification. The judgment of conviction was based on section 2642, in connection with section 432, of the Revised Administrative Code. Said section 432 reads as follows:
“The following persons shall be disqualified from voting:
“(a) Any person who, since the thirteenth day of August, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, has been sentenced by final judgment to suffer not less than eighteen months of imprisonment, such disability not having been removed by plenary pardon. “(b) Any person who has violated an oath of allegiance taken by him to the United States. “(c) Insane or feeble-minded persons. “(d) Deaf-mutes who cannot read and write. “(e) Electors registered under subsection (c) of the next preceding section who, after failing to make a sworn statement to the satisfaction of the board of inspectors at any of its two meetings for registration and revision, that they are incapacitated for preparing their ballots due to permanent physical disability, present themselves at the hour of voting as incapacitated, irrespective of whether such incapacity be real or feigned.”
And section 2642 provides:
“Whoever at any election votes or attempts to vote knowing that he is not entitled so to do, * * * shall be punished by imprisonment for not less than one month nor more than one year and by a fine of not less than one hundred pesos nor more than one thousand pesos, and in all cases by deprivation of the right of suffrage and disqualification from public office for a period of not more than four years.”
It is undisputed that appellant was sentenced by final judgment of this court promulgated on March 3, 1910,1 to suffer eight years and one day of presidio mayor. No evidence was presented to show that prior to June 5, 1934, he had been granted a plenary pardon. It is likewise undisputed that at the general elections held on June 5, 1934, he voted in election precinct No. 18 of the municipality of Davao, Province of Davao. The modern conception of the suffrage is that voting is a function of government. The right to vote is not a natural right but it is a right created by law. Suffrage is a privilege granted by the State to such persons or classes as are most likely to exercise it for the public good; In the early stages of the evolution of the representative system of government, the exercise of the right of suffrage was limited to a small portion of the inhabitants. But with the spread of democratic ideas, the enjoyment of the franchise in the modern states has come to embrace the mass of the adult male population. For reasons of public policy, certain classes of persons are excluded from the franchise. Among the generally excluded classes are minors, idiots, paupers, and convicts. The right of the State to deprive persons of the right of suffrage by reason of their having been convicted of crime, is beyond question. “The manifest purpose of such restrictions upon this right is to preserve the purity of elections. The presumption is that one rendered infamous by conviction of felony, or other base offense indicative of moral turpitude, is unfit to exercise the privilege of suffrage or to hold office. The exclusion must for this reason be adjudged a mere disqualification, imposed for protection and not for punishment, the withholding of a privilege and not the denial of a personal right. Upon the facts established in this case, it seems dear that the appellant was not entitled to vote on June 5, 1934, because of section 432 of the Revised Administrative Code which disqualified from voting any person who, since the 13th day of August, 1898, has been sentenced by final judgment to suffer not less than eighteen months of imprisonment, such disability not having been removed by plenary pardon. As above stated, the appellant had been sentenced by final judgment to suffer eight years and one day of presidio mayor, and had not been granted a plenary pardon. Counsel for the appellant contend that inasmuch as the latter voted in 1928 his offense had already prescribed, and he could no longer be prosecuted for illegal voting at the general election held on June 5, 1934. This contention is clearly without merit. The disqualification for crime imposed under section 432 of the Revised Administrative Code having once attached on the appellant and not having been subsequently removed by a plenary pardon, continued and rendered it illegal for the appellant to vote at the general elections of 1934. Neither is there any merit in the contention advanced by counsel for the appellant that the disqualification imposed on the latter must be considered as having been removed at the expiration of his sentence. This claim is based upon an erroneous theory of the nature of the disqualification. It regards it as a punishment when, as already indicated, the correct view is that it is imposed “for protection and not for punishment, the withholding of a privilege and not the denial of a personal right.” Judicial interpretation and long established administrative practice are against such a view. The judgment appealed from is affirmed with costs against the appellant. So ordered. Villa-Real, Vickers, Imperial, Butte, and Goddard, JJ., concur.