CIVIL LAW REVIEW I LECTURE SERIES
Articles 37 to 51, New Civil Code
Articles 1 to 26, Family Code of the Philippines
For: University of San Agustin
School of Law
General Luna Street, Iloilo City
SY 2016-2017, 1st Semester
By: Atty. Eduardo T. Reyes, III
Article 37.
II. Juridical Capacity v.
Capacity to Act
Juridical Capacity- the FITNESS to be the subject of
legal relations, is inherent in every natural person and is lost only through
death.
Capacity to Act- which is the POWER to do acts
with legal effect, is acquired and may be lost.
Restrictions on Capacity to Act.
1) Minority
2) Insanity or imbecility
3) The state of being a deaf-mute;
4) Prodigality; and,
5) Civil Interdiction
Circumstances that MODIFY or
LIMIT Capacity to Act
1) Age
2) Insanity
3) Imbecility
4) The state of being a deaf-mute
5) Penalty
6) Prodigality
7) Family relations
8) Alienage
9) Absence
10) Insolvency; and
11) Trusteeship
PERSONS
1.
Persons. Article 44, NCC
Hydrological jurisprudence.
“try me a river”[1].
The new law that declares the Whanganui river, New Zealand’s third longest, a
legal person, in the sense that it can own property, incur debts and petition
the courts, is not unprecedented. Te, Urewara, an area of forested hills in the
north-east that used to be a national park, became a person for legal purposes
in 2014. X x xTwo guardians will act for the river, and one by the iwi tribe. X
x x India then followed suit when an Indian court declared two of the biggest
and most sacred rivers in India, the Ganges and Yamuna, to be people too. X x x Making explicit reference to the
Whanganui settlement, the court assigned legal “parents” to protect and
conserve their waters. Local lawyers think the ruling might help fight sever
pollution: the rivers’ defenders will no longer have to prove that discharges
into them harm anyone, since sullying the waters will now be a crime against
the river itself. There is no doubt that of the 1.3 bn-odd people in India, the
Ganges and the Yamuna are the most downtrodden
Natural Persons. Birth determines
personality.
Exception: Presumptive
personality. A conceived child shall be considered born for all purposes that
are favorable to it provided it be born alive.
For civil purposes, the fetus
(with intra-uterine life of at least seven months) is considered born if it is
alive at the time it is completely delivered from the mother’s womb.
.
However, if the fetus had an
intra-uterine life of less than seven months- it is not deemed born if it dies
within twenty-four hours after its complete delivery from the maternal womb.
BAR QUESTION (1999)- A donation is made in favor of a
fetus inside the mother’s womb. Is the donation valid? Discuss.
- Quimiguing v. Icao, 34
SCRA 132- Suit was filed for support of an unborn child which resulted
from seduction.
NEW FAMILY CODE (R.A. No. 6809,
December 18, 1989).
Article 1. Marriage is a special
contract of permanent union between a man and a woman entered into in
accordance with the law for the establishment of conjugal and family life. It
is the foundation of the family and an inviolable social institution whose
nature, consequences, and incidents are governed by law and not subject to
stipulation, except that marriage settlements may fix the property relations
during the marriage within the limits provided by this Code.
- No union is more profound than
marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, and
family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than
once they were.”(Justice Anthony Kennedy (On Decision upholding same-sex
marriage in the United States).
· Marriage as a civil contract
· Petitioner filed for annulment of
marriage on ground of “failure of consideration” because he only wanted to give
a name to the child in respondent’s womb, which however was never born.
· “It is not possible to have
a marriage for one purpose and no marriage at all for other purposes, for
marriage is not only a contract but a status and a kind of fealty to the State
as well x x x”.[1]
· Thus, rules governing rescission
of civil contracts do not obtain in the annulment of marriage conundrum
· The reservations kept in the deep
recesses of the heart of the spouse at the time of entering into marriage are
of no consequence for as long as he knows that what he is entering into is a
marriage
· Art. 1351, NCC- “The
particular motives of the parties in entering into a contract are different
from the cause thereof”.
· Marriage in jest v. Marriage for
financial consideration
· Republic v. Albios[2].
“limited-purpose marriage”. Marriage for convenience. For Immigration purposes
· “Motives for entering into a
marriage are varied and complex. The State does not and cannot dictate on the
kind of life that a couple chooses to lead. Any attempt to regulate their lifestyle
would go into the realm of their right to privacy and would raise serious
constitutional questions. The right to marital privacy allows married couples
to structure their marriages in almost any way they see fit, to live together
or live apart, to have children or no children, to love one another or not, and
so on. Thus, marriages entered into for other purposes, limited or
otherwise, such as convenience, companionship. Money, status and title provided
that they comply with all the legal requisites are equally valid. Love, though
the ideal consideration in a marriage contract, is not the only valid cause for
marriage.
Marriage is insulated against:
Ø Discriminatory policies such as:
(1)terminating a female employee who contracts marriage (PT&T v. NLRC, 272
SCRA 596) (2) PAL cases on female flight attendants becoming pregnant
Ø Jealous wife rummages through
office files of husband and discovers damning evidence of infidelity. (Zulueta
v. Court of Appeals, 253SCRA 699).
Ø BUT, is there something in the
Constitution that prohibits Absolute divorce?
Ø In Sta. Barbara, California, USA,
a website was put-up for struggling college students who can barely make it
through college where they could post their profiles and find a “sugar-daddy”
who will finance their tuition in exchange for companionship and sex.
Ø “States that attempt to close
that loophole fail, says Scott Cunningham, an Economics professor at Baylor
University in Texas who has studied prostitution markets. Proposed legislation
against the practice might, he says, inadvertently prohibit marriage- which
could, after all, be defined as intercourse for financial support”[3].
Article 2. No marriage shall be valid,
unless these essential requisites are present:
1)Legal capacity of the
contracting parties who must be a male and a female; and
2)Consent freely given in the
presence of the solemnizing officer.
Article 3. The formal requisites
of marriage are:
1)Authority of the solemnizing
officer;
2)A valid marriage license except
in the cases provided for in Chapter 2 of this Title; and
3)A marriage ceremony which takes
place with the appearance of the contracting parties before the solemnizing
officer and their personal declaration that they take each other as husband and
wife in the presence of not less than two witnesses of legal age.
Article 4. The absence of any of
the essential or formal requisites shall render the marriage void ab
initio, except as stated in Article 35 (2).
A defect in any of the essential or formal requisites shall render the marriage
voidable as provided in Article 45.
An irregularity in the formal requisites shall not affect the validity of the
marriage but the party or parties responsible for the irregularity shall be
civilly, criminally and administratively liable.
Article 5. Any male or female of
the age of eighteen years or upwards not under any of the impediments mentioned
in Articles 37 and 38, may contract marriage.
Article 6. No prescribed form or
religious rite for the solemnization of the marriage is required. It shall be
necessary, however, for the contracting parties to personally appear before the
solemnizing officer and declare in the presence of not less than two witnesses
of legal age that they take each other as husband and wife. This declaration
shall be contained in the marriage certificate which shall be signed by the
contracting parties and their witnesses and attested by the solemnizing
officer.
In case of a marriage in articulo mortis, when the party at the
point of death is unable to sign the marriage certificate, it shall be
sufficient for one of the witnesses to the marriage to write the name of said
party, which facts shall be attested by the solemnizing officer.
Article 7. Marriage may be
solemnized by:
1) Any incumbent member of the
judiciary within the court’s jurisdiction;
x x x”
- Marriage must be between male and
female. This is a statutory requirement, not Constitutional
- Effect of Sex Change
Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH)
· Navarro v. Domagtoy, A.M. No. MTJ
06-1088, July 19, 1996
· “Where judge solemnizes a
marriage outside his court’s jurisdiction, there is a resultant irregularity in
the formal requisite laid down in Article 3 which while it may not affect the
validity of the marriage may subject the officiating official to administrative
liability.”
· “Just an obiter-dictum. Non
observance of this rule is not a mere irregularity because it generally makes
the marriage void”.
Article 22. The marriage
certificate, x x x”
-Proof of Marriage. Circado-Belison
v. Circado, Jr. (2015)[6]
-Contrato Matrimonial issued by
Church of Filipino Independiente, Sec. 20, Rule 132- Is a private document
-Earlier baptismal certificate v.
Later Certificate of Marriage from Local Civil Registrar
Article 26. All marriages solemnized outside
the Philippines, in accordance with the laws in force in the country where they
were solemnized, and valid there as such, shall also be valid in this country,
except those prohibited under Articles 35 (1), (4), (5) and (6), 36, 37 and 38.
Where a marriage between a Filipino citizen and a foreigner is validly
celebrated and a divorce is thereafter validly obtained abroad by the alien
spouse capacitating him or her to remarry, the Filipino spouse shall likewise
have capacity to remarry under Philippine law.
Gen. Rule- Lex Loci Celebrationes
Exception: nationality
principle & Article 17 on Prohibitive Laws, and Articles 35 (1),
(4), (5) and (6), 36, 37 and 38.
- minor, bigamous marriage,
mistake in identity, subsequent void marriage, psychological incapacity,
bigamous, incestuous marriages and contrary to public policy.
- Mixed-Marriage
- RECKONING POINT. “For purposes of
Article 26 therefore, the DETERMINATIVE POINTwhen the foreigner is at
THE TIME OF THE DIVORCE and not at the time of marriage”[7].
- Dual Citizen. “In the event that
the former Filipino spouse who has been naturalized as a foreign citizen
decides to return to the Philippines and reacquire Philippine citizenship, the
divorce decree will still be recognized here because at the time of the
issuance of the decree of divorce and at the time of the issuance of the decree
of divorce, he or she was not a citizen of the Philippines”[8].
- May the foreigner spouse avail of
the benefits of the 2nd paragraph of Article 26?
- Hypotheticals:
1) X, an American; and Y, a Filipino,
got married. If X obtains a divorce decree abroad which capacities him to
remarry. May X file a petition to dissolve his marriage in the Philippine
courts?
2) A and B, both Filipinos, are
spouses. They emigrated to the US, embraced US citizenship and there obtained a
Divorce decree. A, the husband, returns to the Philippines and meets and
falls in love with a Filipino. When he wanted to marry the Filipina, he
presented the divorce decree to the local civil registrar who refused to accept
it and required him to present a court order from a Philippine court which
dissolves his marriage with B before a marriage license will be issued. Is the
Local Civil Registrar correct?
3) In question No. 1, if it is Y,
the Filipino spouse, who will file the petition, what legal provision should
she invoke? In which court should she file her petition?
4) In question No. 2, where will A
file his petition? And what procedure will be applied by the court once such
petition is filed?
[1] Prof. Sta. Maria, pp. 99-100 PERSONS
AND FAMILY RELATIONS 2015 citing Bove v. Pinciotti, 46 Pa D & C [C.P.
1942])
[2] G.R. No. 198780, October 16, 2013
[3] “Paying for College, A teaspoon of
sugar”, See pp. 38-39, The Economist June 20th 2015
[4] G.R. No. 174689, October 19, 2007
[5] G.R. No. 166676, September 12, 2008
[6] G.R. No. 185374, March 11, 2015
[7] P. 181, Prof. Sta Maria, Id. , citing
Republic v. Orbecido III, G.R. No. 154380, October 5, 2005
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