Article 21, Chapter 2: Human Relations

Main Topic: Chapter 2: Human Relations
Sub-topic: Compensation of Damages of Willfull Acts Contrary to Morals, Good Customs or Public Policy

Art. 21. Any person who willfully causes causes loss or injury to another in a manner that is contrary to morals, good customs or public policy shall compensate the latter for damage.

Discussion/Explanation:

1. Willful acts Contrary to Morals

Would not Art.21 obliterate the boundary line between morality and law? The answer is that, in the last analysis, every good law draws its breath of life from morals, from those principles, which are written with words of fire in the conscience of man… Furthermore, there is no belief of more baneful consequences upon the social order than that person may with impunity cause damage to his fellowmen so long as he does not break any law of the State, though he may be defying the most sacred postulates of morality. What is more, the victim loses faith in the ability of the government to afford him protection or relief.

Art. 21 was intended to expand the concept of torts in this jurisdiction by granting adequate legal remedy for the untold number of moral wrong which is impossible for human foresight to specifically provide in the statutes

Nota Bene:

The allegation of malice or ill does not bring the case under Art.21 which can only apply in the absence of contractual stipulations.

Note: In a corporation, the by-laws govern the relations of the members, not Art. 21

2. Art. 21 Distinguished from Art. 20

a. Art. 21- The act is contrary to morals, good customs or public policy. In Art. 20- The act is contrary to law.

b. In Art. 21- The act is done willfully.

Note: “Willful” may mean not merely voluntary but with a bad purpose.

In Art. 20-The act is done either wilfully or negligently.

3. Examples

a. A student wilfully humiliates a professor, causing to have a nervous breakdown. This would be contrary to good customs and morals, and the professor can sue for damages.

b. Example given by the Code Commission

A seduces the 19 year-old daughter of X. A promise of marriage either has not less been made or cannot be proved. The girl becomes pregnant. Under the present criminal laws, there is no crime as the girl is above 18 years of age. Neither can any civil action for breach of promise be filed. Under Art. 21, she and her parents would have the right to bring an action for damages against A.

Note: The example given by the Code Commission is correct, provided that the man had in some way defrauded or deceived the girl (not necessarily “seducing” her, as the term is used under the Revised Penal Code). But if the two of them had engaged in illicit relations out of mutual carnal lust, then it is believed that there can be no recovery of damages, since both parties are at fault.

Next, one who wilfully dismissed an employee without just cause breaks a contract, and is both morally and legally liable under Art. 21 of the Civil Code.

Justice Antonio Barredo:

“Misconduct” implies “a wrongful intention and not a mere error of judgment”. Even if a judge is not correct in his legal conclusions, his judicial actuations cannot be regarded as grave misconduct ,unless the contrary sufficiently appears.

J. Sarmiento:

Unlike simple grants of power of attorney, an agency declared to be compatible with the intent of the parties, cannot be revoked at will. The reason is that it is one coupled with an interest, the agency having been created for mutual interest of the agent and the principal. Thereupon, interest is not limited to the commissions earned as a result of business transactions concluded, but one that extends to the very subject matter of power of management delegated. Accordingly, a revocation proved to be entitles the prejudiced party to a right of damages.

4. Can there an Action for Breach of Promise to Marry?

a. For the recovery of actual damages, yes. Thus, if a person gives another P500 because the latter promised to marry the former, and the promise is not fulfilled, the money given can be recovered. Thus, also if a teacher resigns her position because of a man’s promise to marry her, she can recover indemnity for damage if later on the promise is not fulfilled. The same thing may be said for the recovery of wedding expenses, such as the wedding breakfast, the ceremony, the trousseau, the issuances of invitations, if one party fails to appear.

b. Recovery of Moral Damages

In Hermosisima v. Court of Appelas, the Supreme Court held that under Civil Code, there can be no recovery of moral damages for a breach of promise to marry. AS SUCH. The omission in the Civil Code of the proposed Chapter on Breach of Promise Suits is a clear manifestation of legislative intent not to sanction as such, suits for breach of promise to marry, otherwise many “innocent men may become the victims of designing and unscrupulous females”. However, if there be seduction, moral damages may be recovered under Art. 2219, par. 3 of the Civil Code. The Court, however implied that if there be moral seduction as distinguished from criminal seduction, there may be a grant for moral damages, possibly under Art. 21. In said Hermosisima case however, it was the woman who virtually seduced the man, by ”surrendering herself” to him because she, a girl 10 years OLDER, was “overwhelmed by her love” for him.


Another example is a married man, who was adopted son of a relative of a girl’s father and who had the same family as the girl, became very close to the girl and her family. In fact, the members of the family considered him as one of them. In 1952, the man thus frequented the house of the girl on the pretext of desiring to teach her how to pray the rosary. The two eventually fell in love, and met each other in clandestine trysts, over the objections of the family. One day in 1957, the man wrote the girl a note asking her to have a date with him. The girl went to him. Her parents, brothers, sisters now sue the defendant (married man) under Art. 21.

The Supreme Court, applying the Art. 21 ruled that indeed he, a married man, has seduced the girl, through an ingenious and tricky scheme, to the extent of making her fall in love with him. Verily, he has committed an injury to the girl’s family in a manner contrary to morals, good customs and public policy. He was therefore ordered to pay P5000 as damages and P2000 as attorney’s fees, in addition to the expenses of the litigation.

Another question has been raised, A, married man, and B, an unmarried woman, entered into a written agreement to marry each other when A became a widower. After becoming a widower, A married another woman. Can B sue A for breach of promise?

Answer: No, insofar as moral damages are concerned. Moreover, to engage in such a promise during the lifetime of another’s spouse would be contrary to good morals and good customs, and the agreement, even on that ground alone, must be considered void.

Note: Had there been carnal knowledge, the matter would even be worse. Thus it has been held that a promise of marriage founded on carnal intercourse has an unlawful consideration, and no suit on such promise can possibly prosper.

Further question was raised. In an action based on a breach of promise to marry, what rights has the aggrieved party in cases:

a. When there has been carnal knowledge?

b. When there has been NO carnal knowledge?

Answer:

a. When there has been carnal knowledge, the aggrieved party may:

1. ask the other to recognize the child, should there be one, and give support to said child.

2. sue for moral damages, if there be criminal or moral seduction, but not if the intercourse was due to mutual lust. In other words, if the cause be the promise to marry, and the effect be the carnal knowledge, there is a chance that there was a criminal or moral seduction, hence recovery of moral damages will prosper. If it be the other way around, there can be no recovery of moral damages, because here mutual lust has intervened. However, the girl may recover moral damages if the man, in his effort to make the girl withdraw a suit for support of the child, deliberately calls the attention of the girl’s employer to her condition as an unwed mother- a maneuver causing her mental anguish and even physical illness and suffering.

3. sue for actual damages, should there be any, such as the expenses for the wedding preparations.

b. When there has been no carnal knowledge, there may be an action for actual and moral damages under certain conditions, as when there has been a deliberate desire to inflict loss or injury, or when there has been an evident abuse of a right. Thus, a man who deliberately fails to appear at the altar during the scheduled wedding simply because it was his intention to embarrass or humiliate the girl no doubt inflicts irreparable injury to her honor and reputation, wounds her feelings, and leads the way for her possible social ostracism. The girl in such a case can recover not only actual but also moral and exemplary damages.

Mere breach of promise to marry is not actionable wrong, but to formally set a wedding and go through all the preparation therefore, only to walk out of it when the marriage is about to be solemnized is quite different. Obviously, it is contrary to good customs, and the defendant consequently must be held answerable for damages in accordance with Art. 21 of the Civil Code.

Another, if a lawyer has a carnal knowledge of a poorly educated girl, promises to marry her to continue his carnal satisfaction, and then breaks his promise on account of an expensive wedding which the parents of the girl insist upon, may he be disbarred?

Yes, for he has not maintained the highest degree of morality and integrity, which at all times is expected of and must be possessed by a member of the bar.

5. Breach of Promise of Employment

In order that an action for breach of promise of employment may succeed, nothing short of an actual, clear, and positive promise on the part of the prospective employer must be shown by competent evidence. His unjustified hopes, perhaps inspired by courteous dealings of the other party, do not constitute a promise of employment whose breach is actionable at law.

6. Claim for Damages When Victim is at Fault

If a man defaults in the payment of his light bills, he cannot successfully bring an action for moral damages if the electric company should temporarily disconnect his light facilities. Even assuming that the act of the electric company constitutes a breach of public policy, still no recovery can be had, for Art. 21 of the Civil Code which is relied upon by him must necessarily be construed as granting the right to recover damages only to injured persons who are not themselves at fault.

7. Nominal Damages

Nominal damages ate granted for the vindication or recognition of a right violated or invaded. And this is so even if actual damages be not proved. Nominal damages in the amount of P10,000 may even be granted, and should there be bad faith on the part of the offender, the amount may be greater.

8. Effect of Price Increases

Although it is of judicial notice that prices and costs of materials and labor have substantially increased since 1970, it is not fair to give material men and laborers four times the value of what they had furnished or constructed. It is sufficient to give them 12% interest per annum from the time they filed their complaint.

9. May Moral Damages be Granted?

Facts: A school administrator, because of a personal grudge, relieved two vocational teachers of their assignments, and even when ordered by the Secretary of Education to reinstate them to refuse to do so. May said administrator be held liable for moral damages?

Thru Justice Ramon C. Aquino: No, because the case does not fall under any of the cases when moral damages can be granted.

Dissenting (J. Abad Santos)—

Yes, because, in connection with Art. 21, entitles them to damages because of harassment on the part of the administrator.

--------

The failure to give prior notice amounts to a tort, and the petitioner’s act in disconnecting respondent’s gas service without prior notice constituted breach of contract amounting to an independent tort. The pre-maturity of the action was held indicative of intent to cause additional mental and moral suffering to private respondents and a clear violation of Art. 21, providing that “any person who willfully causes loss or injury to another in a manner that is contrary to morals, good customs or public policy shall compensate the latter for damages”.