CONCEPT OF

CONSTITUTION
Prepared by:
Ma. Elena K. Parayno
Meaning of constitution

Itrefers to the body of rules

according to which the
powers of sovereignty are
exercised.
Importance, nature and purpose
of function of constitution
 The people exercise control of their
government primarily through the
Constitution which protects from unjust
exercise of governmental power and
through periodic elections by means of
which they choose the officers to
represent them.
 A constitution is the supreme or
fundamental law creating the government,
having been enacted by the people
themselves.
 The purpose of the constitution is to
draw the framework or general outline
of the system of the government and
to specify the respective powers and
functions of the various branches of
government comprising this
framework.
Constitution distinguished from
statute
A Constitution is a law given directly
by the people, while a statute is a law
enacted by the people’s
representative
 A constitution is the fundamental law
of the state on which all other laws or
statute are based
Basic principles underlying our
constitution
 Recognition of the Almighty God’
 Sovereignty of the people
 Supremacy of civilian authority over the military
 Separation of Church and State
 Guarantee of human rights
 Government through suffrage
 Separation of powers
 Independence of the judiciary
 Rule of the majority
 Government of laws and not of men
Meaning of Constitutional Law
 Itmay be defined as that
branch of public law which
treats of constitutions, their
nature, formation,
amendments, and
interpretation.
Kinds of Constitution
 as to their origin and history
 conventional or enacted-one which is
enacted by a constituent assembly or
granted by a monarch to his subjects
 cumulative or evolved-one which is the
product of growth or a long period of
development originating in customs,
traditions, judicial decisions rather than
from deliberate and formal enactment
 as to their form
 written-one which has been given definite
written form at a particular time, usually by a
specially constituted authority called
constitutional convention
 unwritten-one which is entirely the product of
political evolution, consisting largely of a
mass of customs, usages and judicial
decisions together with a smaller body of
statutory enactments of a fundamental
character, usually bearing different dates
 as to manner of amending them
 rigid or inelastic-one regarded as a
document of a special sanctity which cannot
be amended or altered except by some
special machinery more cumbrous than the
ordinary legislative process
 flexible or elastic-one which possess no
higher legal authority than ordinary laws and
which may be altered in the same way as
other laws
Requisites of a good written
constitution
 as to form
 brief
 broad
 definite
 as to contents
 constitution of government
 constitution of liberty
 constitution of sovereignty