Congress of the Philippines

Also known as: Kongreso ng Pilipinas — the Filipino styling in official usage · The Legislative Branch — the Constitution's designation of the department · Batasang Pambansa — the Filipino term for the legislature, retained today as the name of the House's seat, the Batasang Pambansa Complex in Quezon City · 20th Congress — the numbering, continuing the 1935 count, by which each three-year legislature is known

Government

Definition

The Congress of the Philippines (Filipino: Kongreso ng Pilipinas) is the national legislature of the Philippines, the bicameral body established by Article VI of the 1987 Constitution consisting of the Senate of the Philippines — the 24-member upper chamber elected nationwide whose separate entry this wiki carries — and the House of Representatives, the lower chamber elected from legislative districts and through the party-list system. Restored by the Constitution ratified in the plebiscite of February 2, 1987 — the event this wiki’s entry on the 1987 Constitutional Plebiscite records — the revived legislature first convened in 1987 and was numbered the 8th Congress, continuing the count begun under the 1935 Constitution; the current 20th Congress (2025–2028) is led by Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian and Speaker of the House Bojie Dy. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines, LawPhil — 1987 Constitution of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines)

The House of Representatives of the 20th Congress counts 318 members — 254 district representatives and 64 party-list representatives — against the 200 districts of 1987, a growth the Supreme Court has held permissible beyond the Constitution’s 250-seat ceiling when increased by law. Congress’s powers run from taxation and appropriation — the annual General Appropriations Act this wiki’s entry on it documents — to the impeachment process, which the House alone initiates and the Senate alone tries, as in the ongoing trial of Vice President Sara Duterte before the Senate impeachment court. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines, Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Second impeachment of Sara Duterte)

Identities

Source Type	Identity
Wikipedia	Congress of the Philippines
Wikidata	Congress of the Philippines (Q1542985)
DBpedia	Congress_of_the_Philippines
ProductOntology	N/A
Wiktionary	N/A
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)	N/A
MeSH	N/A
NCBI Taxonomy	N/A
AGROVOC	N/A
Google Scholar	Congress of the Philippines bicameral legislature 1987 Constitution Senate House of Representatives party-list impeachment appropriations 8th Congress 20th Congress
ConceptNet	N/A
OpenCyc	N/A

Also Known As

Kongreso ng Pilipinas — the Filipino styling in official usage
The Legislative Branch — the Constitution’s designation of the department
Batasang Pambansa — the Filipino term for the legislature, retained today as the name of the House’s seat, the Batasang Pambansa Complex in Quezon City
20th Congress — the numbering, continuing the 1935 count, by which each three-year legislature is known

Examples and Analogies

Two chambers, two electoral logics: Congress works like a belt-and-braces system — the Senate’s nationwide, staggered six-year elections give continuity and a national mandate, while the House’s district and party-list contests renew the whole chamber every three years, making the lower house the faster-moving barometer of public mood. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines)
A prosecutor and a jury under one roof: impeachment splits the work between the chambers — the House, like a grand jury, files the articles by a vote of one-third of its members; the Senate, like a trial jury, convicts only by two-thirds of all its members, at least sixteen of twenty-four. (LawPhil — 1987 Constitution of the Philippines)
Verified foundational data:
Charter: Article VI of the 1987 Constitution — ratified February 2, 1987; restored Congress first convened in 1987 as the 8th Congress, its members chosen in the legislative elections of May 1987
Senate: 24 senators elected at large, six-year terms, half the chamber renewed every three years — the chamber this wiki’s Senate entry documents
House (20th Congress): 318 representatives — 254 congressional districts (up from 200 in 1987) plus 64 party-list representatives; the Constitution’s 250-member ceiling may be increased piecemeal by statute, as the Supreme Court has clarified
Party-list system: sectoral representation of at least 20 percent of House membership; nationwide vote with a 2 percent threshold and a three-seat maximum per party; the first party-list election was held in 1998, sectoral seats having been filled by appointment from 1987 to 1998
House terms: three years, a limit of three consecutive terms; district representatives elected first-past-the-post in single-member districts
Sessions: regular sessions open annually on the fourth Monday of July; the 20th Congress’s session opened July 28, 2025; next congressional elections May 8, 2028
20th Congress leadership: Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian (since June 17, 2026), with Vicente Sotto III President pro tempore, Juan Miguel Zubiri Majority Leader, and Alan Peter Cayetano Minority Leader; Speaker Bojie Dy (since September 17, 2025, following the resignation of Martin Romualdez), with Ferdinand Hernandez Senior Deputy Speaker, Sandro Marcos Majority Floor Leader, and Marcelino Libanan Minority Floor Leader
House blocs: majority bloc of 287 (Lakas 75, NUP 54, PFP 51 among others), a 27-member minority, and 4 independents
Impeachment: sole initiation in the House (one-third to affirm articles); sole trial in the Senate (two-thirds of all members to convict); the Chief Justice presides when the President is on trial
Shared and separate powers: treaty concurrence by two-thirds of the Senate alone; the joint Commission on Appointments; electoral protests decided by each chamber’s Electoral Tribunal; declaration of war in joint session voting separately; constituent-assembly amendment by three-fourths of all members

Usage Scenarios

1. Legislating the National Budget

Congress’s appropriation power — exercised through the annual General Appropriations Act examined in this wiki’s entry on it — is the single largest recurring task of the calendar, with appropriations bills originating in the House and both chambers agreeing on the final text. (LawPhil — 1987 Constitution of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines)

2. Initiating and Trying Impeachments

The division of the impeachment labor defines modern accountability politics: the House impeached Vice President Sara Duterte a second time on May 11, 2026, and the Senate convened its court on May 18, 2026, opening trial proceedings on July 6, 2026 — the sequence this wiki’s Senate entry documents. (Wikipedia — Second impeachment of Sara Duterte, Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines)

3. Confirming Appointments

Through the Commission on Appointments — members drawn from both chambers — Congress checks the executive’s appointing power over cabinet secretaries, ambassadors, and senior officers, the confirmation function exercised alongside its Electoral Tribunals’ adjudication of members’ election protests. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines)

4. Studying Restoration and Institutional Continuity

The 1987 restoration — Constitution ratified February 2, 1987, legislative elections in May 1987, first convening as the 8th Congress — reconnected the legislature to the 1935 line interrupted by the 1972 closure and the Batasang Pambansa era, the arc this wiki’s entries on the 1987 Constitutional Plebiscite and the Senate trace. (Wikipedia — 1987 Philippine legislative election, Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines)

5. Analyzing Party-List Representation

The House’s sectoral tier — at least 20 percent of membership, elected nationwide since 1998 on a 2 percent threshold with a three-seat cap — is the standing laboratory for Philippine debates over proportional and sectoral representation. (Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines)

Strategies

Bicameralism as review: requiring identical text from two differently-elected chambers — national-staggered Senate, district-renewed House — builds a second reading into every statute, the design inherited from the 1940 and 1987 restorations. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines)
The staggered Senate as ballast: renewing only half the Senate every three years keeps a permanent quorum of experienced legislators across House-wide turnovers and presidential changes. (Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines)
Dividing impeachment to cool it: the one-third House gate and the two-thirds Senate wall make removal a two-stage, supermajority process — the constitutional strategy against impeachment as routine opposition. (LawPhil — 1987 Constitution of the Philippines)
Sectoral seats as inclusion: the party-list tier writes marginalized and sectoral representation into the chamber’s composition itself, rather than leaving it to district politics. (Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines)
Calendar discipline: the fixed fourth-Monday-of-July opening and the three-year Congress numbering give the legislature a rhythm that survives leadership turnover within any given Congress. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines)

Security and Safety Measures

Appropriations policed by the chambers: the budget power includes the rule that appropriations bills originate in the House, with the no-transfer and augmentation limits this wiki’s General Appropriations Act entry documents — the legislature’s own shield against executive rewriting of the budget. (LawPhil — 1987 Constitution of the Philippines)
Oath-bound senator-judges: senators sitting as the impeachment court serve on oath or affirmation, with the Chief Justice presiding when the President is tried — safeguards the Estrada and Duterte courts have administered. (Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines)
Electoral disputes kept in-house but judicially chaired: each chamber’s Electoral Tribunal decides its members’ election protests, mixing legislative self-regulation with judicial participation. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines)
War powers split: declaring war requires both chambers in joint session voting separately — the constitutional firewall against a single chamber committing the state to war. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines)
For researchers: leadership coalitions and bloc counts shift within a Congress — Speaker Dy’s September 17, 2025 election followed a resignation, and the Senate presidency changed hands on June 17, 2026 — so composition figures should be dated to a specific Congress and quarter. (Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines)

Historical Context

Congress is the fourth legislature of the Philippine state and the third to bear the name. The 1935 Constitution opened with a unicameral National Assembly; the 1940 amendment restored a bicameral Congress, elected in November 1941, that could convene only in 1945 after the Japanese occupation. Martial law closed Congress in 1972, and the 1973 Constitution substituted the Batasang Pambansa, legislating unicamerally from 1978 until the EDSA restoration. The 1987 Constitution — ratified on February 2, 1987 in the plebiscite this wiki’s entry records — recreated the bicameral Congress, and the elections of May 1987 filled the restored chambers, which convened as the 8th Congress, continuing the 1935 numbering. (Wikipedia — Congress of the Philippines, Wikipedia — 1987 Philippine legislative election)

Since 1987 the institution has grown with the country it represents: districts have multiplied from 200 to 254, the party-list tier elected since 1998 has filled the constitutional 20 percent, and the Congress count has reached the 20th (2025–2028), whose session opened July 28, 2025 under Senate President Gatchalian — elected to the presidency on June 17, 2026 after a period of leadership turnover — and Speaker Dy, elected September 17, 2025 following Martin Romualdez’s resignation. Its calendar is presently dominated by the Senate’s impeachment trial of Vice President Duterte, the chamber’s role this wiki’s Senate and Second Impeachment entries document. (Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Second impeachment of Sara Duterte)

Challenges and Controversies

Growth Beyond the Constitutional Ceiling

The Constitution set the House at not more than 250 members except by law, and Congress has repeatedly legislated past the figure — 254 districts plus 64 party-list seats in the 20th Congress — a growth critics tie to gerrymandering and dynasty entrenchment and defenders to representation for growing populations, with the Supreme Court’s piecemeal-increase doctrine as the referee. (Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines)

The Party-List System’s Capture Debate

Designed for marginalized and sectoral representation, the party-list system has been persistently criticized as occupied by major-party satellites and entrenched organizations — the standing controversy over whether the 20 percent tier fulfills its constitutional purpose. (Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines)

Impeachment as Political Arena

Every impeachment has tested the two-chamber design — the Estrada trial of 2000–2001, the nullified first Duterte impeachment of 2025, and the second Duterte trial under way since July 2026 — controversies that follow from Congress acting simultaneously as party and judge. (Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Second impeachment of Sara Duterte)

Leadership Turnover in the 20th Congress

The current Congress has already changed leadership in both chambers — the speakership changing hands on September 17, 2025 and the Senate presidency on June 17, 2026 — the churn critics cite as coalition instability, answered by the continuity of the institution’s staggered and fixed-term structure. (Wikipedia — House of Representatives of the Philippines, Wikipedia — Senate of the Philippines)