The Philippines is the only country, aside from the Vatican, that outlaws absolute divorce. Our law follows the nationality principle embodied in Article 15 of the Civil Code. It reads ‘laws relating to family rights and duties, or the status, condition and legal capacity of persons are binding upon citizens of the Philippines, even though living abroad.’
While our laws allow a compromise, which is defined as a ‘contract where parties, by making reciprocal concessions, avoid a litigation or put an end to one already commenced, under Article 2028, yet, ‘no compromise on the civil status of persons or validity of a marriage shall be valid,’ under Article 2035. In mixed marriages between a Filipino and foreign spouse, the latter has legal capacity to divorce, which allows him to remarry while the Filipina remains married. To remedy this problem, the second paragraph was added to Article 26 of the Family Code, which reads: ‘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 to remarry, the Filipino spouse shall likewise have capacity to remarry under Philippine law.
Question – may a Filipina divorce her foreign spouse abroad? May our courts recognize the divorce decree obtained by a Filipina when the second paragraph of Article 26 of the Family Code states that foreign divorce be obtained by the foreign husband? Is this a form of discrimination of women, which the Magna Carta of Women or R.A. 9710 seeks to avoid? This issue was answered by our Honorable Supreme Court in Abel v. Rule, et. al., G.R. No. 234457, 12 May 2021. In that case, a US citizen Raemark and Filipino citizen Mindy got married in 2005 in Los Angeles, California, USA. In 2008, they jointly sought the summary dissolution of their marriage before the Los Angeles Superior Court. In 2009, the Superior Court of California dissolved the marriage. Later, Raemark became a dual Filipino citizen. In 2012, Mindy became a US citizen. In 2017, after the Manila City Registry Office recorded the authenticated California judgment dissolving their marriage, Raemark filed a petition for judicial recognition of foreign divorce before the Regional Trial Court. The Office of the Solicitor General opposed the petition on the ground that the divorce decree was not obtained by the alien spouse. While Mindy was still a Filipino citizen, she cannot file or obtain divorce decree jointly with her foreign spouse since she has no legal capacity to given consent to a divorce due to a Philippine law. It is also a collusion, which is prohibited. The RTC dismissed the petition since the joint filing of divorce decree by Raemark and Mindy contravened Article 26(2) of the Family Code, which only allowed the alien spouse to obtain a divorce decree. After the denial of his motion for reconsideration, Raemark appealed directly to the Supreme Court on pure question of law – whether a divorce decree jointly obtained by a Filipino and their alien spouse can be judicially recognized.
Our Supreme Court ruled that assuming, for the sake of argument, that the word “obtained” should be interpreted to mean that the divorce proceeding must be actually initiated by the alien spouse, still, the Court will not follow the letter of the statute when to do so would depart from the true intent of the legislature or would otherwise yield conclusions inconsistent with the general purpose of the act. Laws have ends to achieve, and statutes should be so construed as not to defeat but to carry out such ends. The second paragraph of Article 26 of the Family Code is a corrective measure to address an anomaly where the Filipino spouse is tied to the marriage while the foreign spouse is free to many under the laws of his country. It should not make a distinction. In both instance, it is extended as a means to recognize the residual effect of the foreign divorce decree on Filipinos whose marital ties to their alien spouses are severed by operation of the latter’s national law. This interpretation finds support in the State’s constitutional fiat to “ensure fundamental equality before the law of women and men. Republic Act No. 9710, or Magna Carta of Women, likewise “ensures the substantive equality of women and men” through “the abolition of the unequal structures and practices that perpetuate discrimination and inequality. Section 19 directs the State to eliminate discrimination on matters related to marriage and family relations and ensure that men and women have “the same rights to enter into and leave marriages. Laws do not exist in vacuum. It must be harmonized with other laws and jurisprudence. Thus, the Family Code’s Article 26 (2) is read together with R.A. 9710’s Section 19, can only be interpreted to mean that it is immaterial who initiated the divorce proceedings abroad as ruled in the 2018 en banc case of Republic v. Manalo.
