G.R. No.

L-14074, In re will of Riosa

November 7, 1918
G.R. No. L-14074
In the matter of the probation of the will of Jose Riosa. MARCELINO CASAS,
applicant-appellant,
MALCOLM, J .:
The issue which this appeal presents is whether in the Philippine Islands the law
existing on the date of the execution of a will, or the law existing at the death of the
testator, controls.
Jose Riosa died on April 17, 1917. He left a will made in the month of January, 1908,
in which he disposed of an estate valued at more than P35,000. The will was duly
executed in accordance with the law then in force, namely, section 618 of the Code of
Civil Procedure. The will was not executed in accordance with Act No. 2645,
amendatory of said section 618, prescribing certain additional formalities for the
signing and attestation of wills, in force on and after July 1, 1916. In other words, the
will was in writing, signed by the testator, and attested and subscribed by three
credible witnesses in the presence of the testator and of each other; but was not signed
by the testator and the witnesses on the left margin of each and every page, nor did the
attestation state these facts. The new law, therefore, went into effect after the making
of the will and before the death of the testator, without the testator having left a will
that conforms to the new requirements.
Section 618 of the Code of Civil Procedure reads:
No will, except as provided in the preceding section, shall be valid to pass any estate,
real or personal, nor charge or affect the same, unless it be in writing and signed by
the testator, or by the testator's name written by some other person in his presence,
and by his express direction, and attested and subscribed by three or more credible
witnesses in the presence of the testator and of each other. The attestation shall state
the fact that the testator signed the will, or caused it to be signed by some other
person, at his express direction, in the presence of three witnesses, and that they
attested and subscribed it in his presence and in the presence of each other. But the
absence of such form of attestation shall not render the will invalid if it is proven that
the will was in fact signed and attested as in this section provided.
Act No. 2645 has amended section 618 of the Code of Civil Procedure so as to make
said section read as follows:
SEC. 618. Requisites of will. - No will, except as provided in the preceding section,
shall be valid to pass any estate, real or personal, nor charge or affect the same, unless
it be written in the language or dialect known by the testator and signed by him, or by
the testator's name written by some other person in his presence, and by his express
direction, and attested and subscribed by three or more credible witnesses in the
presence of the testator and of each other. The testator or the person requested by him
to write his name and the instrumental witnesses of the will, shall also sign, as
aforesaid, each, and every page thereof, on the left margin, and said pages shall be
numbered correlatively in letters placed on the upper part of each sheet. The
attestation shall state the number of sheets or pages used, upon which the will is
written, and the fact that the testator signed the will and every page thereof, or caused
some other person to write his name, under his express direction, in the presence of
three witnesses, and the latter witnessed and signed the will and all pages thereof in
the presence of the testator and of each other.
This court has heretofore held in a decision handed down by the Chief Justice, as to a
will made after the date Act No. 2645 went into effect, that it must comply with the
provisions of this law. (Caraig vs Tatlonghari, R. G. No. 12558, dated March 23, 1918
[not published].) The court has further held in a decision handed down by Justice
Torres, as to will executed by a testator whose death took place prior to the operative
date of Act No. 2645, that the amendatory act is inapplicable. (Bona vs. Briones,
[1918], 38 Phil., 276.) The instant appeal presents an entirely different question. The
will was execute prior to the enactment of Act No. 2645 and the death occurred after
the enactment of this law.
There is a clear cleavage of authority among the cases and the text-writers, as to the
effect of a change in the statutes prescribing the formalities necessary to be observed
in the execution of a will, when such change is made intermediate to the execution of
a will and the death of a testator. (See generally 40 Cyc., 1076. and any textbook on
Wills, and Lane's Appeal from Probate [1889], 57 Conn., 182.) The rule laid down by
the courts in many jurisdictions is that the statutes in force at the testator's death are
controlling, and that a will not executed in conformity with such statutes is invalid,
although its execution was sufficient at the time it was made. The reasons assigned for
applying the later statute are the following: "As until the death of the testator the paper
executed by him, expressing his wishes, is not a will, but a mere inchoate act which
may or may not be a will, the law in force at the testator's death applies and controls
the proof of the will." (Sutton vs. Chenault [1855], 18 Ga., 1.) Were we to accept the
foregoing proposition and the reasons assigned for it, it would logically result that the
will of Jose Riosa would have to be held invalid.
The rule prevailing in many other jurisdictions is that the validity of the execution of a
will must be tested by the statutes in force at the time of its execution and that statutes
subsequently enacted have no retrospective effect. This doctrine is believed to be
supported by the weight of authority. It was the old English view; in Downs (or
Downing) vs. Townsend (Ambler, 280), Lord Hardwicke is reported to have said that
"the general rule as to testaments is, that the time of the testament, and not the
testator's death, is regarded." It is also the modern view, including among other
decisions one of the Supreme Court of Vermont from which State many of the
sections of the Code if Civil Procedure of the Philippine Islands relating to wills are
taken. (Giddings vs. Turgeon [1886], 58 Vt., 103.)
Of the numerous decisions of divergent tendencies, the opinion by the learned Justice
Sharswood (Taylor vs. Mitchell [1868], 57 Pa. St., 209) is regarded to be the best
considered. In this opinion is found the following:
Retrospective laws generally if not universally work injustice, and ought to be so
construed only when the mandate of the legislature is imperative. When a testator
makes a will, formally executed according to the requirements of the law existing at
the time of its execution, it would unjustly disappoint his lawful right of disposition to
apply to it a rule subsequently enacted, though before his death.
While it is true that every one is presumed to know the law, the maxim in fact is
inapplicable to such a case; for he would have an equal right to presume that no new
law would affect his past act, and rest satisfied in security on that presumption. . . . It
is true, that every will is ambulatory until the death of the testator, and the disposition
made by it does not actually take effect until then. General words apply to the
property of which the testator dies possessed, and he retains the power of revocation
as long as he lives. The act of bequeathing or devising, however, takes place when the
will is executed, though to go into effect at a future time.
A third view, somewhat larger in conception than the preceding one, finding support
in the States of Alabama and New York, is that statutes relating to the execution of
wills, when they increase the necessary formalities, should be construed so as not to
impair the validity of a will already made and, when they lessen the formalities
required, should be construed so as to aid wills defectively executed according to the
law in force at the time of their making (Hoffman vs. Hoffman, [1855], 26 Ala., 535;
Price vs. Brown, 1 Bradf., Surr. N.Y., 252.)
This court is given the opportunity to choose between the three rules above described.
Our selection, under such circumstances, should naturally depend more on reason than
on technicality. Above all, we cannot lose sight of the fact that the testator has
provided in detail for the disposition of his property and that his desires should be
respected by the courts. Justice is a powerful pleader for the second and third rules on
the subject.
The plausible reasoning of the authorities which back the first proposition is, we
think, fallacious. The act of bequeathing or devising is something more than inchoate
or ambulatory. In reality, it becomes a completed act when the will is executed and
attested according to the law, although it does not take effect on the property until a
future time.
It is, of course, a general rule of statutory construction, as this court has said, that "all
statutes are to be construed as having only a prospective operation unless the purpose
and intention of the Legislature to give them a retrospective effect is expressly
declared or is necessarily implied from the language used. In every case of doubt, the
doubt must be resolved against the restrospective effect." (Montilla vs. Corporacion
de PP. Agustinos [1913], 24 Phil., 220. See also Chew Heong vs. U.S. [1884], 112
U.S., 536; U.S. vs American Sugar Ref. Co. [1906], 202 U.S., 563.) Statute law, as
found in the Civil Code, is corroborative; article 3 thereof provides that "laws shall
not have a retroactive effect, unless therein otherwise prescribed." The language of
Act No. 2645 gives no indication of retrospective effect. Such, likewise, has been the
uniform tendency of the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands on cases having
special application to testamentary succession. (Abello vs. Kock de Monaterio
[1904], 3 Phil., 558; Timbol vs. Manalo [1906], 6 Phil., 254; Bona vs. Briones, supra;
In the Matter of the Probation of the Will of Bibiana Diqui?a [1918], R. G. No. 13176,
1 concerning the language of the Will. See also section 617, Code of Civil Procedure.)
The strongest argument against our accepting the first two rules comes out of section
634 of the Code of Civil Procedure which, in negative terms, provides that a will shall
be disallowed in either of five cases, the first being "if not executed and attested as in
this Act provided." Act No. 2645 has, of course, become part and parcel of the Code
of Civil Procedure. The will in question is admittedly not executed and attested as
provided by the Code of Civil Procedure as amended. Nevertheless, it is proper to
observe that the general principle in the law of wills inserts itself even within the
provisions of said section 634. Our statute announces a positive rule for the
transference of property which must be complied with as completed act at the time of
the execution, so far as the act of the testator is concerned, as to all testaments made
subsequent to the enactment of Act No. 2645, but is not effective as to testaments
made antecedent to that date.
To answer the question with which we began this decision, we adopt as our own the
second rule, particularly as established by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. The
will of Jose Riosa is valid.
The order of the Court of First Instance for the Province of Albay of December 29,
1917, disallowing the will of Jose Riosa, is reversed, and the record shall be returned
to the lower court with direction to admit the said will to probate, without special
findings as to costs. So ordered.
Arellano, C.J., Torres, Johnson, Street, Avance?a and Fisher, JJ., concur.