Pfr

• Civil Code


  Collection of laws which regulate the private relations of the members of the civil society, determining their respective rights and obligations with reference to persons, things, and civil acts
• History of Civil Code


  • Civil Code of Spain of 1889 extended to the Philippines by Royal Decree on July 31, 1889
  • Republic Act No. 386 approved on June 18, 1949
• Sources of Civil Code

  • Spanish Civil Code of 1889
  • Codes, laws, and judicial decisions, and work of jurist of other countries
  • Doctrines laid down by Philippine Supreme Court
  • Filipino customs and traditions
  • Philippines statutes
  • Code Commission itself
• Composition of Civil Code

  • Consists of 2270 articles
  • Four books: Persons, Property, Ownership, and its Modifications, Different Modes of Acquiring Ownership, Obligations and Contracts
  • Family Code repeals certain articles of Book I
• Effectivity of Civil Code: August 30, 1950
• Laws taking effect


  Laws shall take effect after 15 days following the completion of their publication either in the Official Gazette or in a newspaper of general circulation in the Philippines, unless it is otherwise provided
• Publication of laws is mandatory to give public adequate notice
• "unless it is otherwise provided"

  Refers only to a law that has been duly published pursuant to the basic constitutional requirements of due process, and refers to the date of effectivity and not the requirement of publication
• Where to publish laws

  • Pursuant to EO 200, publication of laws may either be in the Official Gazette or in a newspaper of general circulation in the Philippines
  • Publication must be in full or it is no publication at all
• Newspaper of General Circulation

  • Published for the dissemination of local news and general publication
  • Has bona fide subscription list of paying subscribers
  • Published at regular intervals
• Effective Immediately Upon Approval

  Follow Art. 2, which is after 15 days following its complete publication
• Laws that should be published include Presidential Decrees, Executive Orders, Administrative Rules and Regulations, Monetary Board Circulars, and Municipal Ordinances
• Ignorance of the law


  Excuses no one from compliance therewith
• Everyone is conclusively presumed to know the law
• Actual notice vs Constructive notice

  Actual notice: a person being directly given notice<|>Constructive notice: 'legal fiction'; open and accessible to all
• Art. 3 covers Philippine laws, all kinds of domestic law, but limited to mandatory and prohibitory laws
• Ignorance of fact may excuse a party from the legal consequence of his conduct, but ignorance of law is not a defense
• Prospective Law


  Provides for, and regulates the future acts of men, and does not interfere in any way with what has passed
• Retroactive Law


  Intended to affect transactions which occurred, or rights which accrued, before it became operative, and which ascribes to them effects not inherent in their nature, in view of the law in force at the time of their occurrence
• Exceptions to General Rule of Prospective Application

  • If the law itself provides for its retroactivity
  • Penal laws favorable to the accused
  • If the law is procedural
  • When the law is curative
  • When the law creates new substantive rights
• Mandatory Law


  Something be done
• Prohibitory Law


  Something should not be done
• Permissive/Directory Law


  What is permits to be done should be tolerated or respected
• Exceptions to the general rule that acts executed against mandatory or prohibitory laws are void

  • When the law itself authorizes its validity
  • When the law makes the act valid, but punishes the violate
  • Where the law merely makes the act voidable
  • Where the law declares the act void, but recognizes legal effects as arising from it
• Rights


  May be waived, unless the waiver is contrary to law, public order, public policy, morals, or good customs, or prejudicial to a third person with a right recognized by law
• Elements of rights


  • Subject: persons (active and passive)
  • Object: things and services
  • Efficient cause: fact that gives rise to the legal relation
• Kinds of rights


  • Political
  • Civil (rights of personality, family rights, and patrimonial rights)
• Patrimonial Rights


  Real rights: power belonging to a person over a specific thing, enforceable to the whole world<|>Personal rights: power belonging to one person to demand of another the fulfillment of a prestation to give, to do, or not to do
• Waiver


  Voluntary and intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known existing legal right, advantage, benefit, claim or privilege
• Requisites of a Valid Waiver

  • He must actually have the right which he renounces
  • He must have knowledge of its existence
  • He must have the capacity to make the renunciation
  • The renunciation must be made in a clear and unequivocal manner
• Repeal of laws


  Laws are repealed only by subsequent ones, and their violation or non-observance shall not be excused by disuse, or custom or practice to the contrary
• Ways of repealing laws

  • Express repeal
  • Implied repeal
• Implied repeals


  • Not to be favored
  • There must be a plain, unavoidable and irreconcilable repugnancy between the two that they cannot be made to stand together
  • All efforts must be exerted in order to harmonize and give effect to all laws on the subject
• Requisites of implied repeal


  • There is an old and new law
  • Both laws cover the same subject matter
  • The new law is repugnant to the old law
• Conflict of Implied Repeals

  • Between old and new law: follow new law
  • Between general and special law: special statute should prevail
• Effect of Repeal of Repealing Law

  Express Repeal: When a law which expressly repeals a prior law is itself repealed, the law first repealed shall not be thereby revived unless expressly so provided<|>Implied Repeal: When a law which implied repeals a prior law is itself repealed, the law first repealed shall thereby be revived, unless the repealing law provides otherwise
• Constitution is the supreme law of the land because it is the direct expression of the will of the people
• Doctrine of Operative Fact

  It nullifies the void law but sustains its effects, and rights of the parties who relied on the law prior to its declaration of unconstitutionality are still valid
• Judicial decisions applying or interpreting the laws or the Constitution


  Shall form part of the legal system of the Philippines
• Principle of Separation of Powers


  Judicial department has no power to enact laws, but the Supreme Court's interpretation of a statute forms part of the law as of the date it was originally passed