His name is inscribed on the wall of the Philippines' Bantayog ng mga Bayani, which honors the heroes and martyrs who fought authoritarian rule.

His prize-winning oration, "In Defense of the Tao", (the Common Man), capped extraordinary scholastic achievements which earned him the respect of President Manuel L. Quezon who attended the contest for the sole purpose of hearing Manglapus speak.

His compositions, distinctive for their martial lilt, included, besides, a college rallying march, Blue Eagle the King, whose music were later borrowed and adapted by a Jesuit school in the United States.

A linguist and a snappy dresser, he sometimes conveyed the persona of an upstart elitist, further highlighted by his fluent American-tinged accent hallmarked by his education at the Ateneo de Manila, which awarded him an honorary doctor of laws degree in 1965.

He also did not have plenty of allies, often distancing himself from other senators due to his elitist personality, though this did not prevent him from cooperating with them in his post-Martial Law career.

Marcos refused to allow his wife and children to join him in exile, and they were forced to flee the country by through a complicated route, leapfrogging even by small raft to freedom.

Even in exile, Manglapus remained as one of the Filipino opposition leaders after Benigno Aquino Jr., Jovito Salonga and Jose W. Diokno.

In an interview in March 1981, he voiced his strong revulsion of Marcos' violation of the Constitution and his manipulation of the political scene as a ploy to the declaration of martial law as a means to entrench himself and his cronies: "Martial law pure and simple has been a facade masking the exploitation of our people and their natural resources by Marcos, his family and close friends.

[7][8] He also courted controversy after a remark he made during a Senate hearing on the rape of Filipina domestic workers during the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

Commenting on his unsuccessful bid for the presidency, a writer wrote: "Raúl Manglapus was one of the leading Filipino intellectuals of his generation and a politician with wide appeal.