Name: Lyka Angelique M.
Cisneros Year: LLB I
Subject: Constitutional Law II Professor: Atty. Gonzalo Malig-on Jr.
Topic: Taxation – License Fees
Title/Citation/Date: Physical Therapy Organization vs. Municipal Board of Manila; G.R. No. L-10448,
August 30, 1957
FACTS:
The petitioner-appellant, an association of registered massagists and licensed operators of
massage clinics in the City of Manila and other parts of the country, filed an action in the Court of First
Instance (CFI) of Manila for declaratory judgment regarding the validity of Municipal Ordinance 3659,
promulgated by the Municipal Board and approved by the City Mayor (Enacted 27 August 1954, and
approved and effective 7 September 1954). To stop the City from enforcing said ordinance, the
Organization secured an injunction upon filing of a bond in the sum of P1,000.00. A hearing was held,
but the parties without introducing any evidence submitted the case for decision on the pleadings,
although they submitted written memoranda. Thereafter, the trial court dismissed the petition and later
dissolved the writ of injunction previously issued. The association appealed said order of dismissal
directly to the Supreme Court.
The main contention of the appellant in its appeal and the principal ground of its petition for
declaratory judgment is that the City of Manila is without authority to regulate the operation of
massagists and the operation of massage clinics within its jurisdiction; that whereas under the Old City
Charter, particularly, Section 2444 (e) of the Revised Administrative Code, the Municipal Board was
expressly granted the power to regulate and fix the license fee for the occupation of massagists, under
the New Charter of Manila, Republic Act 409, said power has been withdrawn or omitted and that now
the Director of Health, pursuant to authority conferred by Section 938 of the Revised Administrative
Code and Executive Order No. 317, series of 1941, as amended by Executive Order No. 392, series, 1951,
is the one who exercises supervision over the practice of massage and over massage clinics in the
Philippines; that the Director of Health has issued Administrative Order No. 10, dated May 5, 1953,
prescribing "rules and regulations governing the examination for admission to the practice of massage,
and the operation of massage clinics, offices, or establishments in the Philippines", which order was
approved by the Secretary of Health and duly published in the Official Gazette; that Section 1 (a) of
Ordinance No. 3659 has restricted the practice of massage to only hygienic and aesthetic massage
prohibits or does not allow qualified massagists to practice therapeutic massage in their massage clinics.
Appellant also contends that the license fee of P100.00 for operator in Section 2 of the Ordinance is
unreasonable, nay, unconscionable
ISSUE:
Whether the license fees imposed by the Ordinance against massage clinic operators is
unreasonable.
HELD:
NO.
The purpose of the Ordinance is not to regulate the practice of massage, much less to restrict
the practice of licensed and qualified massagists of therapeutic massage in the Philippines. The end
sought to be attained in the Ordinance is to prevent the commission of immorality and the practice of
prostitution in an establishment masquerading as a massage clinic where the operators thereof offer to
massage or manipulate superficial parts of the bodies of customers for hygienic and aesthetic purposes.
The permit fee is made payable not by the masseur or massagist, but by the operator of a massage clinic
who may not be a massagist himself. Compared to permit fees required in other operations, P100.00
may appear to be too large and rather unreasonable, but much discretion is given to municipal
corporations in determining the amount of said fee without considering it as a tax for revenue purposes.
There is a marked distinction between license fees imposed upon useful and beneficial occupations
which the sovereign wishes to regulate but not restrict, and those which are inimical and dangerous to
public health, morals or safety. In the latter case the fee may be very large without necessarily being a
tax. Evidently, the Manila Municipal Board considered the practice of hygienic and aesthetic massage
not as a useful and beneficial occupation which will promote and is conducive to public morals, and
consequently, imposed the said permit fee for its regulation.
