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Whether or not the petitioners and intervenors must be reinstated and paid of their back
wages.
The Supreme Court ruled that herein petitioners are reinstated immediately to
their former positions without loss of seniority rights and with back salaries computed
under new staffing pattern from the dates of their invalid dismissal at rates not lower than
their former salaries but not to exceed a period of 5 years with several provisions. Having
found out that the Executive Order is unconstitutional, thus dismissal of the employees is
also unconstitutional. The courts declared its total nullity. An unconstitutional act is not a
law, it confers no rights, imposes no duties and affords no protection. In legal
contemplation, it is inoperative as if it had not been passed. It is therefore stricken from
the statute books and considered never to have existed at all. All persons are bound by the
declaration of unconstitutionality which means that no one may thereafter invoke it nor
may the courts be permitted to apply it in subsequent cases. It is as if the intervenors were
never served their termination orders and, consequently, were never separated from the
service. Whenever the courts declared an administrative official to have acted in unlawful
manner, that official must undo the harmful effects of his illegal act and to accord to the
aggrieved parties restoration or restitution in good faith to make up for the deprivations
which may have suffered because of his act.