Short answer. Usually no. The Code punishes a proposal only where a specific article provides a penalty for proposing that particular felony, and most felonies have no such provision. Where it does apply, the offence is complete when the proposal is made, and refusal does not undo it.
What the law says
There is proposal when the person who has decided to commit a felony proposes its execution to some other person or persons.
Revised Penal Code, Article 8 — Conspiracy And Proposal. Read the full provision →
What the law says
Conspiracy and proposal to commit felony are punishable only in the cases in which the law specially provides a penalty therefor.
Revised Penal Code, Article 8 — Conspiracy And Proposal. Read the full provision →
What the Code actually calls a proposal
The wording is narrower than the everyday sense of asking someone to do something: there is proposal when the person who has decided to commit a felony proposes its execution to some other person or persons. Two elements sit inside that sentence. The person proposing must himself have decided on the felony, not merely be exploring an idea, and he must put its execution to somebody else. A remark made in anger, a hypothetical floated to see how a friend reacts, or a complaint that somebody ought to be dealt with does not by itself satisfy either element.
Why the refusal is not what decides it
Refusal feels decisive to the person who was turned down, but the provision looks at the proposer's own act. Where a proposal is punishable at all, it is complete when it is made, and the other person's answer does not reach back and undo it. What the answer does change is the label. Had he accepted, and had both then decided to go through with it, what existed would be a conspiracy rather than a proposal. So a refusal keeps the matter at the proposal stage; it does not by itself take it outside the Code.
The provisions that do punish proposing
The special provisions are few and they concern the security of the State. Art. 136 punishes both the conspiracy and the proposal to commit coup d'etat, rebellion or insurrection, and treason has an equivalent provision. The contrast with sedition is worth noticing: Art. 141 reaches persons conspiring to commit sedition and says nothing of a proposal, which is exactly the kind of difference the opening limit of the general provision is there to enforce. The penalties and fines carried by those articles were revised by later legislation, so the amounts printed in older copies should not be relied on.
What a matter like this turns on in practice
Everything depends on what was said, to whom, and against what background, so the record matters more than the recollection. Messages, call logs and the account of anyone else present are the material a lawyer will ask for, together with the sequence: what preceded the request, and what if anything happened afterwards. Being questioned is not the same as being charged, and nothing here tells you how a particular set of facts will be assessed. If a complaint has been made or threatened, take the actual words and their context to counsel rather than explaining them yourself.
Related provisions
- Revised Penal Code, Article 8 — Conspiracy And Proposal
- Revised Penal Code, Article 136 — Conspiracy To Commit Rebellion