GODOFREDO BUCCAT, applicant and appellant, against LUIDA MANGONON DE BUCCAT,

defendant and appellee.

MARRIAGE; VALIDITY.Marriage is a sacred institution: it is the foundation on which society

rests. To clear it, clear and reliable evidence is needed. There is no such evidence in this case.

APPEAL against a judgment of the Court of First Instance of Baguio. Carlos, J.

The facts are listed in the Court's decision.
D. Feliciano Leviste, D. Toms P. Paganiban and Mrs. Sotera N. Megia in representation of the
appellant.
Mrs. Luida Mangonon of Buccat in her own representation.

HORRILLENO, M .:

This case has been raised to this Superiority by the Court of First Instance of Baguio, since it
raises only a matter of purely law.
On March 20, 1939, the plaintiff initiated the present case, in which the defendant did not appear,
despite having been duly summoned. As a result, when the plaintiff was allowed to present his evidence,
the lower court ruled in favor of the defendant. Hence this appeal.
The plaintiff seeks annulment of his marriage to the defendant Luida Mangonon de Buccat on
November 26, 1938, in the City of Baguio, on the ground that, by consenting to that marriage, he did so
because the defendant had assured her that she was a virgin.
From the decision of the lower court, the following facts arise:
The complainant met the defendant in March 1938. After several interviews, both were
committed on September 19 of the same year. On November 26 of the same year, the plaintiff married the
defendant in the Catholic Cathedral of the City of Baguio. After marital living for eighty-nine days, the
defendant gave birth to a nine-month-old boy, on February 23, 1939. As a result of this event, the plaintiff
left the defendant and did not return to marital life with her.
We see no reason to revoke the judgment appealed. The plaintiff's and appellant's allegation is
implausible that he had not even suspected the defendant's pregnant condition, which is, as has been
proved, in very advanced pregnancy. So there is no place to estimate the fraud of which the appellant
speaks. The allegation that it is not uncommon to find persons of the abdomen developed seems childish
to deserve our consideration, all the more so since the plaintiff was a freshman.
Marriage is a sacred institution: it is the foundation on which society rests. To clear it, clear and
reliable evidence is needed. There is no such evidence in this case.
Finding the appellate judgment adjusted to law, must be confirmed, as we hereby confirm, in all
its parts, with the costs to the appellant. This is how it is ordered.
Avancea, Pres., Imperial, Daz, and Laurel, MM., are satisfied.
The sentence is confirmed.