Prohibition Against Disturbance of the Philippine Commission, the Philippine Assembly, or of Any Provincial Board or Municipal or Township Council and Related Acts

October 9, 1907

ACT NO. 1755

AN ACT TO PROHIBIT THE DISTURBANCE OF THE PHILIPPINE COMMISSION, THE PHILIPPINE ASSEMBLY, OR OF ANY PROVINCIAL BOARD OR MUNICIPAL OR TOWNSHIP COUNCIL; TO PUNISH DISORDERLY CONDUCT IN THE IMMEDIATE VIEW OR PRESENCE OF SAID BODIES; TO PUNISH THE FRAUDULENT ALTERING OF THE DRAFT OF ANY BILL, RESOLUTION, ORDINANCE, OR ACT PENDING BEFORE OR ENACTED BY ANY SUCH BODY OR THE PHILIPPINE LEGISLATURE; TO COMPEL THE ATTENDANCE OF WITNESSES AND THE PRODUCTION OF EVIDENCE BEFORE THE PHILIPPINE COMMISSION OR PHILIPPINE ASSEMBLY, OR BEFORE ANY COMMITTEE OF EITHER OR BOTH SAID BODIES, AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES

SECTION 1. Any person who willfully or by force or fraud prevents or attempts to prevent the meeting of the Philippine Commission or the organizing or meeting of the Philippine Assembly or of any Insular legislative body of the Philippine Islands hereafter established, or the meeting or organizing of any provincial board or municipal or township council, and any person who willfully disturbs the Philippine Commission or the Philippine Assembly, or any Insular legislative body of the Philippine Islands hereafter established, or any provincial board or municipal or township council, while in session, or who is guilty of any disorderly conduct in the immediate view or presence of any such body tending to interrupt the proceedings of such body or to impair the respect due to its authority, shall be punished by a fine of not more than two thousand pesos or by imprisonment for not more than five years, or by both, in the discretion of the court. HTcADC

SECTION 2. Any person who fraudulently alters the draft of any bill, resolution, or Act or proposed Act pending before or enacted by the Philippine Commission, the Philippine Assembly, the Philippine Legislature, or any Insular legislative body of the Philippine Islands, hereafter established, or pending before or passed by any provincial board or municipal or township council, or who fraudulently alters any report, paper, or document presented to such Commission, Assembly, or other legislative body of the Philippine Islands, or of any such provincial board or municipal or township council, or under consideration by any such body, shall be punished by a fine of not more than five thousand pesos or by imprisonment for not more than five years, or by both, in the discretion of the court.

SECTION 3. Any person who, being summoned to attend as a witness before the Philippine Commission, the Philippine Assembly, or any Insular legislative body of the Philippine Islands hereafter established, or before any committee of either or any of said bodies, fails or refuses, without legal excuse, to attend pursuant to such summons, and any person who, being present before any such body or committee, willfully refuses to be sworn or to answer any legal inquiry or to produce, upon reasonable notice any material and proper books, papers, documents, records, or other evidence in his possession or under his control, required by any such body, shall be punished by a fine of not more than one thousand pesos, or by imprisonment for not more than one year, or by both, in the discretion of the court.

SECTION 4. The public good requiring the speedy enactment of this bill, the passage of the same is hereby expedited in accordance with section two of "An Act prescribing the order of procedure by the Commission in the enactment of laws," passed September twenty-sixth, nineteen hundred.

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect on its passage.

ENACTED, October 9, 1907.