Cecilia Muñoz-Palma Becomes Associate Justice

Today in Philippine History (Philatelic Edition Series 3):

October 29, 1973

Court of Appeals Judge Cecilia Muñoz Palma was appointed by President Ferdinand E. Marcos as the first female Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on October 29, 1973. She served until she reached the then-mandatory retirement age of 65. 

Cecilia Arreglado Muñoz-Palma (November 22, 1913 – January 2, 2006) was born on November 22, 1913 in Bauan, Batangas and was the daughter of Pedro P. Muñoz, a representative from the 2nd district of Batangas. 

She studied at St. Scholastica’s College in Manila and was high school valedictorian. She earned her law degree from the University of the Philippines College of Law, and a Master of Laws degree from Yale Law School. 

Muñoz-Palma was the first woman to be elected as president of the College of Law student council (1936-37), president of the Portia Club, first place in the first oratorical contest by the U.P. Debating Club (1934), and recipient of the Dr. Mendoza-Guanzon medal for excellence in oratory and the Justice Abad Santos medal for excellence in debating. 

She topped the 1937 Philippine Bar exams with a 92.6% rating and became the first woman prosecutor of Quezon City in 1947. 

Years later, she was the first female district judge for Negros Oriental. She served as a judge in Laguna and Rizal until her appointment to the Court of Appeals in 1968. 

Muñoz-Palma was married to Rodolfo C. Palma of Tagbilaran, Bohol and a fellow law graduate at the University of the Philippines. They have two sons and a daughter. 

She was one of the members of the 1986 Constitutional Commission appointed by President Corazon C. Aquino. President Fidel V. Ramos got her in 1992 as a member of the Council of Advisers of the Moral Recovery Progress. President Joseph Ejercito Estrada made her Chairperson of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office in 1998 and served until January 31, 2000. 

Cecilia Arreglado Muñoz-Palma died on January 2, 2006 at the age of 92.  In 2009, the International Women’s Forum inducted her into its International Hall of Fame while her family and friends formed the Justice Cecilia Muñoz Palma Foundation.

(Design, concept, stamps and research: Richard Allan B. Uy) All rights reserved

Photo credit: wikipedia.org