CAGAYAN de Oro City— When the Senate impeachment court asked what the Constitution means by “two-thirds of all the Members of the Senate,” it also opened a larger question: How much weight should be given to the people who helped write the provision?
Retired Supreme Court Associate Justice Adolfo Azcuna, a member of the 1986 Constitutional Commission and vice chair of its committee on accountability of public officers, appeared before the Senate impeachment court on Sept. 16 as an amicus curiae, or “friend of the court.”
His position was direct: all 24 senators should remain in the denominator.
Under that interpretation, conviction would continue to require 16 votes, regardless of whether some senators are absent or otherwise unable to participate.
Azcuna argued that the word “all” should be given its ordinary meaning and that the voting threshold should remain fixed rather than change depending on how many senators are available to vote.
But his being a constitutional framer does not, by itself, settle the dispute.
That distinction matters.
A constitution, once ratified, becomes the fundamental law of the country.
Its meaning is not simply whatever one of its framers later says it means.
Courts, lawmakers and citizens can examine the actual text, the constitutional structure, the debates surrounding its adoption and subsequent legal interpretations.
At the same time, a framer's explanation is not something that can simply be brushed aside.
Azcuna was not an outsider commenting decades later.
He participated in the drafting process and served in the committee responsible for accountability of public officers—the same area of the Constitution now at the center of the Senate's dispute.
That gives his account historical value.
But historical evidence is not the same as an automatic veto over other interpretations.
That became clear when the other retired magistrates invited by the Senate offered different approaches.
Retired Chief Justices Reynato Puno and Artemio Panganiban, along with former Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. through a written memorandum, took positions that the number required for conviction need not necessarily remain fixed at 16, depending on which senators can legally be counted.
So the Senate is not choosing between “the Constitution” and “Azcuna.”
It is weighing competing ways of understanding the same constitutional provision.
And that is where the public interest comes in.
The issue is not simply whether 16 is a bigger number than 13 or 14.
The decision could determine how a constitutional supermajority requirement operates when some members of the Senate cannot participate.
Azcuna warned that allowing the denominator to change with attendance could make the threshold variable.
He argued that this could weaken the purpose of requiring a two-thirds vote of all Senate members.
The opposing view raises a different concern: whether senators who are legally unable to participate should nevertheless remain part of the mathematical denominator.
Both questions go beyond arithmetic.
They concern the balance between a fixed constitutional safeguard and the practical ability of an impeachment court to function.
That is why the Senate's eventual interpretation deserves close public scrutiny.
The senator-judges—not the former magistrates appearing as amici curiae—will ultimately have to decide the issue within the impeachment proceeding.
The four former justices were invited to provide legal guidance and do not represent either the prosecution or the defense.
There is also a useful lesson here about constitutional interpretation.
The framers' intentions matter.
But they are part of the evidence, not necessarily the entire answer.
Azcuna can explain why certain words were chosen.
Other framers and later courts can offer different readings.
The actual constitutional text remains the starting point, while the institutional consequences of each interpretation also matter.
The public, meanwhile, deserves to see the reasoning—not merely the result.
If the Senate maintains the 16-vote threshold, it should explain why the text, history and constitutional structure support that reading.
If it adopts a different computation, it should likewise explain why.
Either way, the important question is not simply: Who wrote the words?
It is: What do those words legally mean, and why?
Azcuna's testimony deserves to be heard because he helped draft the constitutional provisions now under examination.
But listening to the drafter does not mean surrendering interpretation to the drafter.
And disagreeing with him does not mean ignoring history.
For an impeachment proceeding with consequences extending beyond the immediate case, the public interest lies in seeing the Senate confront both sides of that constitutional question openly, carefully and on the record.
