Legal basis and related issuance
- Commonwealth Act No. 601 is the legal basis under which Executive Order No. 326 was promulgated, authorizing regulation of places of amusement in chartered cities, municipalities, and municipal districts.
- Executive Order No. 326 classifies bars that allow music or dancing within their premises as night clubs, cabarets, dancing schools, or dance halls.
- Executive Order No. 326 provides that such music/dancing establishments are subject to Executive Order No. 319.
Definitions and core concept of “bar”
- A “bar” is any place or establishment whose principal business is the sale of alcoholic beverages or liquors of any kind to be used or consumed within its premises.
- A bar that allows music or dancing within its premises is considered a night club, cabaret, dancing school, or dance hall, as the case may be.
- Establishments classified as above are subject to the rules of Executive Order No. 319 rather than the bar provisions on music/dancing.
Location and operating environment limits
- A bar may not be established within two hundred lineal meters from any city hall or municipal building, provincial capitol or national capitol building, public plaza, public school, church, hospital, athletic stadium, public park, or any institution of learning or of charity.
- Bars must be well lighted at all times, leaving no dark corners.
- Bars must be maintained under good sanitary condition.
- Bars must not have private rooms nor separate compartments, except for those assigned for lavatories, dressing room for ladies, and kitchen.
Days, hours, and alcohol-sales timing
- A bar must be open only from nine o’clock a. m. to twelve o’clock midnight every day.
- Bars operate on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve with an exception to the ordinary day/time restriction.
- Bars must observe different closing rules for Saturdays and days preceding official holidays and town fiestas, when bars may open until two o’clock in the morning of the following day.
- A bar licensed as a regular restaurant, cafe or refreshment parlor may remain open before or after the bar hours to serve only meals, refreshments or nonintoxicating drinks.
- Any store, place, or establishment wherein alcoholic beverages or liquors of any kind are sold is treated as a bar for purposes of the days and hours limitations.
Restrictions on persons inside bars
- Minors under eighteen may not be admitted nor allowed to remain in any bar as customer, employee, or in any capacity.
- Intoxicated persons may not be admitted nor allowed to remain in any bar.
- Persons carrying deadly weapons or firearms of any description may not be admitted nor allowed to remain in any bar, except government officials performing their public functions.
- Minors under eighteen may be admitted only when they are in private parties and accompanied by their parents or guardians.
- Minors under fifteen years of age may not be admitted in any case.
- No woman may be employed as a professional hostess, waitress, or dancer in any bar unless she is at least twenty-one years of age and has obtained a written certificate from the District or City Health Officer that she is free from contagious or infectious disease.
- With the written consent of her parents or guardians, a woman eighteen years of age or more but below twenty-one may be employed as a professional hostess, waitress, or dancer.
- A professional hostess, waitress, dancer, or any other female employee of a bar may not continue working after the District or City Health Officer discovers she has a contagious or infectious disease, or after conviction for any disorderly, immodest or immoral conduct, or for violation of any provision of Executive Order No. 326 or Executive Order No. 319.
- The medical certificate required must be obtained once every three months.
- No professional hostess, waitress, dancer, or any other female employee of a bar may remain within its premises after its closing hours.
Supervision and enforcement authority
- Bars must be under the supervision of the Department of the Interior, which is charged with enforcing Executive Order No. 326.
- When public interest requires, or at the request of the operator or concessionaire, the mayor of the city, municipality or municipal district concerned may assign one or more policemen to maintain peace and order in or around the bar premises and enforce the provisions of Executive Order No. 326 and other municipal or sanitary regulations.
Permits, licenses, fees, and approvals
- A permit for the opening or operation of a bar is issued by the city or provincial treasurer or his duly designated representative.
- No permit is issued unless the applicant has complied with the provisions of Executive Order No. 326.
- Operators or concessionaires must also obtain a license for operation from the treasurer of the city, municipality or municipal district concerned.
- The license is issued upon payment of a license fee of not less than one hundred pesos annually or twenty-five pesos quarterly.
- Existing ordinances prescribing higher fees remain in force until otherwise prescribed by the President.
- A city or municipal council may impose a higher fee upon approval of the President.
Complaints, investigation, and cancellation
- Any person who believes a bar is established or located in a place not authorized by Executive Order No. 326 may file a protest with the Secretary of the Interior.
- The Secretary of the Interior is authorized, after proper investigation, to decide the case or cancel the permit and license.
Appeals from treasurer actions
- Any action of the city, provincial or municipal treasurer under the permit and license provisions may be appealed to the Secretary of the Interior.
- The Secretary of the Interior’s decision on appeal is final.
Gambling prohibition and revocation
- The Secretary of the Interior must revoke any permit or license granted under Executive Order No. 326 upon satisfactory evidence that gambling or playing of any prohibited game has taken place within the premises of a bar.
Penalties for violations and forfeiture
- Upon violation of any regulation in Executive Order No. 326, the Secretary of the Interior withdraws the bar’s permit and revokes the license.
- Revocation withdraws the permit and revokes the license.
- Such revocation operates to forfeit to the city or municipality concerned all sums paid therefor.
Transitory treatment for existing bars
- Bars operating on January 1, 1941 that are within the prohibited zones or distances in paragraph two or do not comply with the building requirements in paragraph three must be given one year’s notice to close, transfer, or otherwise comply.
- In special cases and for justifiable reasons, the Secretary of the Interior, with the approval of the President, may authorize continued operation in the present location.