Republic of the Philippines

SUPREME COURT
Manila

United States market, and ultimately to insure its

continued existence notwithstanding the loss of that
market and the consequent necessity of meeting
competition in the free markets of the world;

EN BANC
G.R. No. L-7859

December 22, 1955

WALTER LUTZ, as Judicial Administrator of the

Intestate Estate of the deceased Antonio Jayme
Ledesma, plaintiff-appellant,
vs.
J. ANTONIO ARANETA, as the Collector of Internal
Revenue, defendant-appellee.
Ernesto J. Gonzaga for appellant.
Office of the Solicitor General Ambrosio Padilla, First Assistant
Solicitor General Guillermo E. Torres and Solicitor Felicisimo
R. Rosete for appellee.

REYES, J.B L., J.:

This case was initiated in the Court of First Instance of Negros
Occidental to test the legality of the taxes imposed by
Commonwealth Act No. 567, otherwise known as the Sugar
Adjustment Act.
Promulgated in 1940, the law in question opens (section 1)
with a declaration of emergency, due to the threat to our
industry by the imminent imposition of export taxes upon
sugar as provided in the Tydings-McDuffe Act, and the
"eventual loss of its preferential position in the United States
market"; wherefore, the national policy was expressed "to
obtain a readjustment of the benefits derived from the sugar
industry by the component elements thereof" and "to stabilize
the sugar industry so as to prepare it for the eventuality of
the loss of its preferential position in the United States market
and the imposition of the export taxes."
In section 2, Commonwealth Act 567 provides for an increase
of the existing tax on the manufacture of sugar, on a
graduated basis, on each picul of sugar manufactured; while
section 3 levies on owners or persons in control of lands
devoted to the cultivation of sugar cane and ceded to others
for a consideration, on lease or otherwise
a tax equivalent to the difference between the
money value of the rental or consideration collected
and the amount representing 12 per centum of the
assessed value of such land.
According to section 6 of the law
SEC. 6. All collections made under this Act shall
accrue to a special fund in the Philippine Treasury, to
be known as the 'Sugar Adjustment and Stabilization
Fund,' and shall be paid out only for any or all of the
following purposes or to attain any or all of the
following objectives, as may be provided by law.
First, to place the sugar industry in a position to
maintain itself, despite the gradual loss of the
preferntial position of the Philippine sugar in the

Second, to readjust the benefits derived from the

sugar industry by all of the component elements
thereof the mill, the landowner, the planter of the
sugar cane, and the laborers in the factory and in the
field so that all might continue profitably to
engage therein;lawphi1.net
Third, to limit the production of sugar to areas more
economically suited to the production thereof; and
Fourth, to afford labor employed in the industry a
living wage and to improve their living and working
conditions: Provided, That the President of the
Philippines may, until the adjourment of the next
regular session of the National Assembly, make the
necessary disbursements from the fund herein
created (1) for the establishment and operation of
sugar experiment station or stations and the
undertaking of researchers (a) to increase the
recoveries of the centrifugal sugar factories with the
view of reducing manufacturing costs, (b) to produce
and propagate higher yielding varieties of sugar cane
more adaptable to different district conditions in the
Philippines, (c) to lower the costs of raising sugar
cane, (d) to improve the buying quality of denatured
alcohol from molasses for motor fuel, (e) to
determine the possibility of utilizing the other byproducts of the industry, (f) to determine what crop
or crops are suitable for rotation and for the
utilization of excess cane lands, and (g) on other
problems the solution of which would help
rehabilitate and stabilize the industry, and (2) for the
improvement of living and working conditions in
sugar mills and sugar plantations, authorizing him to
organize the necessary agency or agencies to take
charge of the expenditure and allocation of said
funds to carry out the purpose hereinbefore
enumerated, and, likewise, authorizing the
disbursement from the fund herein created of the
necessary amount or amounts needed for salaries,
wages, travelling expenses, equipment, and other
sundry expenses of said agency or agencies.
Plaintiff, Walter Lutz, in his capacity as Judicial Administrator
of the Intestate Estate of Antonio Jayme Ledesma, seeks to
recover from the Collector of Internal Revenue the sum of
P14,666.40 paid by the estate as taxes, under section 3 of
the Act, for the crop years 1948-1949 and 1949-1950;
alleging that such tax is unconstitutional and void, being
levied for the aid and support of the sugar industry
exclusively, which in plaintiff's opinion is not a public purpose
for which a tax may be constitutioally levied. The action
having been dismissed by the Court of First Instance, the
plaintifs appealed the case directly to this Court (Judiciary
Act, section 17).
The basic defect in the plaintiff's position is his assumption
that the tax provided for in Commonwealth Act No. 567 is a
pure exercise of the taxing power. Analysis of the Act, and
particularly of section 6 (heretofore quoted in full), will show
that the tax is levied with a regulatory purpose, to provide
means for the rehabilitation and stabilization of the
threatened sugar industry. In other words, the act is primarily
an exercise of the police power.

This Court can take judicial notice of the fact that sugar
production is one of the great industries of our nation, sugar
occupying a leading position among its export products; that
it gives employment to thousands of laborers in fields and
factories; that it is a great source of the state's wealth, is one
of the important sources of foreign exchange needed by our
government, and is thus pivotal in the plans of a regime
committed to a policy of currency stability. Its promotion,
protection and advancement, therefore redounds greatly to
the general welfare. Hence it was competent for the
legislature to find that the general welfare demanded that the
sugar industry should be stabilized in turn; and in the wide
field of its police power, the lawmaking body could provide
that the distribution of benefits therefrom be readjusted
among its components to enable it to resist the added strain
of the increase in taxes that it had to sustain (Sligh vs.
Kirkwood, 237 U. S. 52, 59 L. Ed. 835; Johnson vs. State ex
rel. Marey, 99 Fla. 1311, 128 So. 853; Maxcy Inc. vs. Mayo,
103 Fla. 552, 139 So. 121).

instances to which it might have been applied;" and that "the

legislative authority, exerted within its proper field, need not
embrace all the evils within its reach" (N. L. R. B. vs. Jones &
Laughlin Steel Corp. 301 U. S. 1, 81 L. Ed. 893).

As stated in Johnson vs. State ex rel. Marey, with reference to

the citrus industry in Florida

Paras, C. J., Bengzon, Padilla, Reyes, A., Jugo, Bautista

Angelo, Labrador, and Concepcion, JJ., concur.

Even from the standpoint that the Act is a pure tax measure,
it cannot be said that the devotion of tax money to
experimental stations to seek increase of efficiency in sugar
production, utilization of by-products and solution of allied
problems, as well as to the improvements of living and
working conditions in sugar mills or plantations, without any
part of such money being channeled directly to private
persons, constitutes expenditure of tax money for private
purposes, (compare Everson vs. Board of Education, 91 L. Ed.
472, 168 ALR 1392, 1400).
The decision appealed from is affirmed, with costs against
appellant. So ordered.

The protection of a large industry constituting one of

the great sources of the state's wealth and therefore
directly or indirectly affecting the welfare of so great
a portion of the population of the State is affected to
such an extent by public interests as to be within the
police power of the sovereign. (128 Sp. 857).
Once it is conceded, as it must, that the protection and
promotion of the sugar industry is a matter of public concern,
it follows that the Legislature may determine within
reasonable bounds what is necessary for its protection and
expedient for its promotion. Here, the legislative discretion
must be allowed fully play, subject only to the test of
reasonableness; and it is not contended that the means
provided in section 6 of the law (above quoted) bear no
relation to the objective pursued or are oppressive in
character. If objective and methods are alike constitutionally
valid, no reason is seen why the state may not levy taxes to
raise funds for their prosecution and attainment. Taxation
may be made the implement of the state's police power
(Great Atl. & Pac. Tea Co. vs. Grosjean, 301 U. S. 412, 81 L.
Ed. 1193; U. S. vs. Butler, 297 U. S. 1, 80 L. Ed. 477;
M'Culloch vs. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 4 L. Ed. 579).
That the tax to be levied should burden the sugar producers
themselves can hardly be a ground of complaint; indeed, it
appears rational that the tax be obtained precisely from those
who are to be benefited from the expenditure of the funds
derived from it. At any rate, it is inherent in the power to tax
that a state be free to select the subjects of taxation, and it
has been repeatedly held that "inequalities which result from
a singling out of one particular class for taxation, or
exemption infringe no constitutional limitation" (Carmichael
vs. Southern Coal & Coke Co., 301 U. S. 495, 81 L. Ed. 1245,
citing numerous authorities, at p. 1251).
From the point of view we have taken it appears of no
moment that the funds raised under the Sugar Stabilization
Act, now in question, should be exclusively spent in aid of the
sugar industry, since it is that very enterprise that is being
protected. It may be that other industries are also in need of
similar protection; that the legislature is not required by the
Constitution to adhere to a policy of "all or none." As ruled in
Minnesota ex rel. Pearson vs. Probate Court, 309 U. S. 270,
84 L. Ed. 744, "if the law presumably hits the evil where it is
most felt, it is not to be overthrown because there are other