As a rule, a divorce obtained abroad between spouses who are both Filipinos is not recognized under Philippine law. Ergo, while they may each remarry abroad, the Philippines will see that as a bigamous marriage because in its eyes, the original spouses are still married to each other.

What if the divorce is between a foreigner and a Filipino? Under Article 26 of the Family Code, that is a valid divorce and the Filipino spouse can remarry in the Philippines provided the divorce is recognized by our courts.

In the case I am to tackle today, the spouses jointly filed for a dissolution of their marriage in California, USA. At the time, one of the spouses was American while the other was Filipino. By the time the dissolution was granted by the US court, the American husband had re-acquired Philippine citizenship.

The wife, on the other hand, subsequently acquired US citizenship. Thereafter, the husband filed a petition in the Philippine courts to have this dissolution of marriage recognized under Philippine law.

The State, through the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG), opposed this on the ground that both parties, meaning including the Filipino wife, jointly filed for dissolution of the marriage. Invoking Article 26 of the Family Code, the OSG was of the opinion that for the foreign dissolution to be validly recognized in the Philippines, it must only be the American spouse who would petition it. The Filipino wife could not and should not jointly file. Doing so disqualifies their dissolution from being recognized by our courts. The trial court sided with the State. It thus dismissed the petition for recognition. When the matter was raised to the Supreme Court, it ruled in favor of the petition for recognition. Here is the High Court’s explanation on the matter:

“In Republic v. Manalo and succeeding cases, we have consistently held that it is irrelevant if the foreign or Filipino spouse initiated the foreign divorce proceeding. Thus, the question that should be raised before the courts “is not who among the spouses initiated the proceedings but rather if the divorce obtained... was valid.” In Manalo:

Paragraph 2 of Article 26 speaks of “a divorce x x x validly obtained abroad by the alien spouse capacitating him or her to remarry.” Based on a clear and plain reading of the provision, it only requires that there be a divorce validly obtained abroad. The letter of the law does not demand that the alien spouse should be the one who initiated the proceeding wherein the divorce decree was granted. It does not distinguish whether the Filipino spouse is the petitioner or the respondent in the foreign divorce proceeding. The Court is bound by the words of the statute; neither can We put words in the mouths of the lawmakers. “The legislature is presumed to know the meaning of the words, to have used the words advisedly, and to have expressed its intent by the use of such words as are found in the statute. Verba legis non est recedendum, or from the words of a statute there should be no departure.”

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 to not defeat but to carry out such ends and purposes. As held in League of Cities of the Phils. et al. v. COMELEC, et al.:

The legislative intent is not at all times accurately reflected in the manner in which the resulting law is couched. Thus, applying a verba legis or strictly literal interpretation of a statute may render it meaningless and lead to inconvenience, an absurd situation or injustice. To obviate this aberration, and bearing in mind the principle that the intent or the spirit of the law is the law itself, resort should be to the rule that the spirit of the law controls its letter.

To reiterate, the purpose of Paragraph 2 of Article 26 is to avoid the absurd situation where the Filipino spouse remains married to the alien spouse who, after a foreign divorce decree that is effective in the country where it was rendered, is no longer married to the Filipino spouse. The provision is a corrective measure to address an anomaly where the Filipino spouse is tied to the marriage while the foreign spouse is free to marry under the laws of his or her country.

(To be continued)