Each seminar features the following combined topics (on a 2 to 5 PM schedule):
[1] Essential provisions of the Family Code (one hour, 15 minutes)
[2] Protecting your marriage from marital infidelity (one hour, 15 minutes)
[3] Cybermissions: how church members can participate in evangelism and world missions through the Internet (30 minutes)
Other available topics: Preventing the sexual abuse of children (adults); Introduction to photography (youth groups; OHP or LCD projector needed).
Contact Atty Gerry T. Galacio at gtgalacio@yahoo.com if your church or group is interested in these seminars.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Free Sunday afternoon lecture-seminars for Baptist churches, adults and youth groups
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Heirs and inheritances (Part 1): If your spouse dies without a last will, who will inherit?
Situation A: You and your deceased spouse have children
[1] Only you and your children are entitled to inherit under Article 996 of the New Civil Code of the Philippines. Your deceased spouse’s siblings, parents, or grandparents are excluded.
Art. 996. If a widow or widower and legitimate children or descendants are left, the surviving spouse has in the succession the same share as that of each of the children.
If any of your children died before your spouse (their parent), their own children will be entitled to inherit from your spouse by right of representation.
For example, you and your spouse have four children, and your spouse died leaving one million pesos as his estate.
• Your conjugal share is 50% or five hundred thousand pesos.
• The remaining five hundred thousand pesos will be divided among the children, with you counted as one child.
• Thus, you and the children will receive one hundred thousand pesos each as inheritance.
[2] If your deceased spouse has illegitimate children, they are entitled to inherit under Article 176 of the Family Code. Please read my post
Situation B: You and your deceased spouse have no children
[1] If your deceased spouse’s parents (either father or mother, or both) are still alive, then you and the parents will inherit under Article 997 of the New Civil Code of the Philippines.
Art. 997. When the widow or widower survives with legitimate parents or ascendants, the surviving spouse shall be entitled to one-half of the estate, and the legitimate parents or ascendants to the other half.
If your spouse’s parents are already dead but the “ascendants” (like grandparents) are still alive, Article 997 will also apply. Your spouse’s siblings, if any, are not entitled to inherit.
[2] If your deceased spouse has illegitimate children, then you and the illegitimate children will inherit under Article 998 of the New Civil Code of the Philippines.
Art. 998. If a widow or widower survives with illegitimate children, such widow or widower shall be entitled to one-half of the inheritance, and the illegitimate children or their descendants, whether legitimate or illegitimate, to the other half.
Article 998 applies even if your deceased spouse, at the time of death, had parents or siblings. Only you and the illegitimate children are entitled to inherit. If the illegitimate children died before your spouse, then you and the illegitimate children’s descendants (by right of representation) will inherit.
[3] If your deceased spouse has illegitimate children and “ascendants” (parents or grandparents), then you, the illegitimate children, and the ascendants will inherit under Article 1000 of the New Civil Code of the Philippines.
Art. 1000. If legitimate ascendants, the surviving spouse, and illegitimate children are left, the ascendants shall be entitled to one-half of the inheritance, and the other half shall be divided between the surviving spouse and the illegitimate children so that such widow or widower shall have one-fourth of the estate, and the illegitimate children the other fourth.
Your spouse’s siblings, if any, are not entitled to inherit.
[4] If your deceased spouse has no ascendants (parents or grandparents) or illegitimate children, but has siblings, then you and the siblings will inherit under Article 1001 of the New Civil Code of the Philippines.
Art. 1001. Should brothers and sisters or their children survive with the widow or widower, the latter shall be entitled to one-half of the inheritance and the brothers and sisters or their children to the other half.
[5] If your deceased spouse has no illegitimate children, siblings, or ascendants (parents or grandparents), then you inherit everything.
Note: These articles apply only if you are not legally separated from your spouse, or your marriage has not been declared void.
1. This Department hereby issues the enclosed “2010 Revised Manual of Regulations for Private Schools in Basic Education” (2010 Revised Manual for brevity) for the guidance and compliance of all concerned stakeholders in basic private education.
2. Any part or provision of the enclosed 2010 Revised Manual, which may be held invalid or declared unconstitutional, shall not affect the effectivity and efficiency of operation and implementation of the remaining parts or provisions thereof.
3. Any existing Department Circulars, Orders, Memoranda, such as the 1992 Revised Manual of Regulations for Private Schools (8th edition) issued as DECS Order No. 92. s. 1992 dated August 10, 1992, or any parts thereof which are contrary to or inconsistent with any provision of the enclosed 2010 Revised Manual shall be deemed repealed or modified accordingly.
4. The enclosed 2010 Revised Manual of Regulations for Private Schools in Basic Education shall take effect beginning school year 2010-2011.
5. Immediate dissemination of and strict compliance with this Order is hereby directed.
1. We are issuing the enclosed “2010 Revised Manual of Regulations for Private Schools in Basic Education” (2010 Revised Manual for brevity) for the guidance and compliance of all stakeholders in basic private education.
Instead of “This Department”, I used “We” because it is clear from the letterhead and logo that it’s the DepEd issuing the Order.
I deleted “hereby” since it adds nothing and nothing is lost by deleting it. (Drafting Wills, Trusts, and Other Estate Planning Documents: A Style Manual, by Kevin D. Millard)
George Hathaway, chair of the State Bar of Michigan's Plain English Committee since 1983, says avoiding “hereby”:
“Law students usually write well, but when they get into actual practice, they switch. A fine example is the word hereby. You would be amazed at how many law students know they should not use the word hereby when writing their brief for a legal writing class; when they get out into practice, however, there are 49 other types of documents, and in those 49 other documents, they usually use the word hereby.”
Paragraph 1 of the Order states that for brevity, the manual should be referred to as “2010 Revised Manual”. Yet, paragraph 4 inconsistently uses the complete title “2010 Revised Manual of Regulations for Private Schools in Basic Education”.
I deleted the modifier “concerned” since stakeholders, by definition, would be concerned.
3. The 2010 Revised Manual supersedes any contrary or inconsistent provisions of Department Circulars, Orders, Memoranda, such as DECS Order No. 92. s. 1992 dated August 10, 1992 (Revised Manual of Regulations for Private Schools, 8th edition).
I used the word “supersedes” instead of the phrase “repealed or modified”.
The Order uses the word “deemed” incorrectly. Bryan A. Garner, editor in chief of Black’s Law Dictionary, in his book on language and writing says that “the word deem should create a legal fiction, not state a truth.”
In “Synthesis: legal reading, reasoning and writing in Canada” (by Margaret Elizabeth McCallum,Christina L. Kunz,Deborah A. Schmedem), the authors recommend:
Avoid use of the term “to deem” as a substitute for “to think” or “to consider”. The word means “to treat [a thing] as being something that it is not, or possessing certain qualities it does not possess”. In this technical sense, “deem” is used in statutes to create a legal fiction; for example, a statute that requires applications to be originals signed by the applicant may provide that faxed applications will be deemed to be originals.
4. The 2010 Revised Manual of Regulations will take effect beginning school year 2010-2011.
Paragraph 1 of the Order states that for brevity, the manual should be referred to as “2010 Revised Manual”. Yet, paragraph 4 inconsistently uses the complete title “2010 Revised Manual of Regulations for Private Schools in Basic Education”.
The word “enclosed” is used four times in this Order to modify the 2010 Revised Manual. After paragraph 1 where the word is first used, “enclosed” should no longer have been used. All references to the 2010 Revised Manual cannot possibly refer to any other manual.
5. We direct all stakeholders to immediately disseminate and comply with this Order.
“Immediate dissemination of and strict compliance with this Order is hereby directed” is boilerplate text written in the passive voice.
How do you define legalese?
"Legalese has four elements, as defined in David Mellinkoff's Legal Writing: Sense and Nonsense: formalisms, such as now comes; archaic words, such as hereby; redundancies, such as each and every; and Latin words, such as per curiam."
"There are also four elements of poor writing in general, which I call gobbledegook: long sentence length, weak passive verbs, wordy phrases and unnecessarily long words. If you pick up any English textbook, you will see, 'Write under rather than pursuant to. Write if rather than in the event of.' But when you look at documents written by practicing lawyers or even at state statutes, all you see is pursuant to."
"If lawyers would eliminate the legalese and the gobbledegook from their writing, they would eliminate eight major elements of unclear writing. Show me a document from which those eight elements have been eliminated, and I will show you a clearly written document. Look at the opinions of [U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell] Holmes. Good, clear writing has always been promoted, but in the day-to-day practice of law, it is rarely executed."
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