PHILIPPINE REPORTS ANNOTATED VOLUME 073 8/6/20, 12:04 PM

704 PHILIPPINE REPORTS ANNOTATED

Gonzalez vs. Basa

[No. 48695. September 30, 1942]

ANTONIO GONZALEZ, petitioner and appellee, vs. FELICIANO
BASA, JR., and PILAR LOPEZ DE BASA, oppositors and
appellants.

1.TORRENS REGISTRATION; DUTY OF REGISTER OF DEEDS TO REGISTER

DOCUMENTS REGULAR, AND NOT MUTILATED, IN FORM; LACK OF AUTHORITY
TO INQUIRE INTO INTRINSIC VALIDITY OF DOCUMENTS; CASE AT BAR.·In the
matter of the estate of a deceased person, the court ap​proved a project
of partition presented by the appellants and the appellee and jointly
signed by them. Thereafter, the appellants procured a certified copy
thereof in a modified or muti​lated form, that is, without the mortgage
lien in faVor of the appellee, and presented it to the register of deeds
for registration. The appellee objected to the registration thereof as
thus mutilated and requested the register of deeds, in lieu thereof, to
register the certified complete copy of said document. On refusal of
the register of deeds to accede to his re​quest, the appellee submitted
the matter to the fourth branch of the Court of First Instance of
Manila in consulta under section 200 of the Administrative Code, and
the said court ins​tructed the register of deeds to register the said
document in its entirety as requested by the appellee, and not in a
mutilated form as Tequested by the appellants. Held: That the court's
action is correct.
2.ID.; ID.; ID.; ID.·In deciding to comply with the request of the
appellants for the registration of the. project of partition as mutilated,
over the objection of the appellee, who tendered a complete, certified
true copy of the same doc​ument, the register of deeds impliedly
conced​ed to them the right to repudíate and annul an obligation
evidenced by said document against the will of the obligee and
without ju​dicial intervention. That is obviously wrong. It is precisely
his duty to see to it that a doc​ument presented for registration is
regular and in due form. The mutilated certified copy was irregular
on its face and should have been re​jected by him. In fact his authority
in the premises goes no farther than this. He has no authority to
inquire into the intrinsic va​lidity of a document based upon proofs

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PHILIPPINE REPORTS ANNOTATED VOLUME 073 8/6/20, 12:04 PM

aliunde. If he had no authority to inquire into the truth of appellants'

allegation as to lack of consider​ation for the mortgage in question,
much less was he authorized to assume the truth of such allegation
without any investigation. The project of partition in question, having
been signed by the parties and approved by the court, is presumed to
be valid and is acceptable for registration in its entirety. Neither of
the parties may alter it without the consent of the other and the
approval of the court.

APPEAL from a decision of the Court of First Instance of

Manila. Díaz, J.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.
Javier & Javier for appellants.
Antonio Gonzalez in his own behalf.

OZAETA, J.:
This is an appeal from a decision of the fourth branch of
the Court of First Instance of Manila instructing the
register of deeds of Manila to register a certain protect of
partition in its entirety as requested by the appellee and
not in a mutilated form as requested by the appellants.
It appears that in the matter of the estate of the
deceased Amalia Arcega y Alfonso Vda. de Basa, case No.
50872 of the Court of First Instance of Manila, Pilar Lo​pez
de Basa, as administratrix; Feliciano Basa, Jr., as sole and
universal heir, and An​tonio Gonzalez, as creditor and
attorney of the estate, presented to the court a project of
partition jointly signed by them and asked that it be
approved. The said document con​sists of several clauses.
Clause 2 contains an inventory of the properties left by the
de​ceased, and clause 3 contains a list of all the obligations
of the estate. Among said obligations is that specified on
page 22, letter (d), as follows:

"(d)
"Se ha presentado ante los Comisionados de avaluó y
reclamaciones, con la conformidad de los infrascritos, una
reclamación por el Sr. Antonio Gonzalez por la cantidad de veinte
mil doscientos cincuenta pesos (P20,250) que la finada Amalia
Arcega y Alfonso Vda. de Basa le debía al tiempo de su muerte.
"La naturaleza de la reclamación aparece explicada en el escrito
presentado por dicho Sr. Antonio Gonzalez al que va unido loa
documentos correspondientes. Los infrascritos Pilar Lopez de Basa,
cómo administradora judicial, y Feliciano Basa Jr., cómo linico
heredero de la finada Amalia Arcega y Al​fonso Vda. de Basa, han
prestado su conformidad a dicha reclamación por ser justa y

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PHILIPPINE REPORTS ANNOTATED VOLUME 073 8/6/20, 12:04 PM

fundada. Y los Comisionados lo han aprobado en su totalidad.

"Además, los infrascritos Pilar Lopez de Basa, cómo
administradora judicial, y Feliciano Basa Jr. cómo único heredero
de la causante Amalia Arcega y Alfonso Vda. de Basa, han
convenido con el referido Sr. Antonio Gonzalez en que el importe de
sus honorarios cómo abogado por la tramitación de este expediente
es de cinco mil pesos (P5,000), los cuales sumados a los veinte mil
doscientos cincuenta pesos (P20,250) dan un total de veinticinco mil
doscien​tos cincuenta, cantidad esta que ni la infrascrita ad​-
ministradora ni el infrascrito heredero Feliciano Basa Jr. pueden
pagar ahora por no tener dinero:

705

VOL. 73, SEPTEMBER 30, 1942 705

Gonzales vs. Basa

pero dichoa Pilar Lopez de Basa y el referido Feliciano Basa Jr.

mancomunada y solidariamente se comprometen y obligan a
pagarlo en lo futuro, devengando mientras tanto dicha cantidad de
P25,250 intereses a razón del ocho por ciento (8%) anual, y en
garantía del pago de dieho principal e intereses el Sr. Feliciano
Basa Jr. cede y traspasa en hipoteca a favor del Sr. Antonio
Gonzalez LOS BIENES INMUEBLES descritos en la cláusula segunda (A)
Nos. 1 al 48 de este proyecto de particion, por lo que la adjudicacion
de dichoa bienes inmuebles a favor del infrascrito Feliciano Basa Jr.
se hace sujeto a dicha hipoteca a favor del Sr. Antonio Gonzalez."

The adjudication is contained in clause 4, which reads as

follows:

"ADJUDICACION
"Cómo quiera que la causante AMALIA ARCEGA Y ALFONSO VDA. DE
BASA murió viuda y no tuvo en su matrimonio más que un sólo hijo,
el mencionado FELICIANO BASA JR., y cómo quiera que en el
testamento legalizado en este expediente al referido Sr. FELICIANO
BASA jr. se instituye único y universal heredero de todos los bienes
dejados por la finada, se le adjudica en este proyecto de partición
todos dichos bienes mencionados y descritos en la CL˘USULA SEGUNDA
de este proyecto de partición; pero sujeta dicha adjudicación a los
gravámenes hipotecarios mencionados en los párrafos (a), (b) y (d)
de la cláusula tercera, intitulada oblioaciones, de este proyecto de
partición, sobre los bienes ahi mencio​nados y especificados."

Said project of partition was approved by the court "en

todas sus partes" in an order dated January 12, 1938.

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Thereafter Feliciano Basa, Jr., thru his present attorney

Mr. Benedicto M. Javier, procured from the clerk of court a
certified copy of said project of partition in a mo​dified or
mutilated form in that page 22 thereof, which we have
copied above, was omitted at the express request of
Attorney Javier. The certification of the clerk of court,
dated June 18, 1941, reads in part as follows:

"I. L. PASICOLAN, Clerk of the above-entitled Court, do hereby

certify that the attached docu​ments, consisting of 26 pages, are true
and correct copies of 'LETTERS OF ADMINISTRATION' dated March 16,
1937, 'PROYEKTO DE PARTICIÓN' dated December 29, 1937 except the
entire page 22 thereof, and the letter 'd' in parenthesis and the
words 'de la cláusula tercera' appearing on page 24, which letter 'd'
rep​resents the said entire page 22; the 'order, dated January
12,1938, and the 'ORDEN' dated February 12, 1938.
"The elimination of the aforementioned page 22, and the letter
'd' and the words 'de la cláusula ter​cera' has been expressly
requested by Attorney Be​nedicto M. Javier."

That certified copy, together with the owner's duplicates

of the certificates of title covering the real properties
adjudicated to Feliciano Basa, Jr., was presented to the
register of deeds of Manila for registration with a view to
the issuance of the corre​sponding transfer certificates of
title in the name of Feliciano Basa, Jr., free from the
mortgage lien in favor of Antonio Gonzalez. The latter,
upon learning thereof, objected to the registration of the
project of parti​tion as thus mutilated and requested the
register of deeds, in lieu thereof, to register the certified
complete copy of said document which he then and there
presented with a view to the annotation of the mortgage in
his favor on the certificates of title to be issued in the name
of Feliciano Basa, Jr. The register of deeds refused to
accede to said request of Attorney Gonzalez on the ground
that Attorneys Javier & Javier, rep​resenting Feliciano
Basa Jr., refused to grant him authority to annotate said
mort​gage on the certificates of title to be issued in the
name of Basa, and that since a mort​gage is presumed to be
a voluntary transac​tion between the parties he had no
authority to make such annotation without the consent of
both parties. Thereupon Attorney Gon​zalez submitted the
matter to the fourth branch of the Court of First Instance
of Ma​nila in consulta under section 200 of the Ad​-
ministrative Code, with the result already indicated at the
outset.

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Both parties have filed lengthy briefs en​tirely out of

proportion to the nature of the question involved. The
appellants oppose the registration of the complete certified
copy of the project of partition and try to justify their
presentación to the register of deeds of said document in a
mutilated condition by alleging (1) that they are not
indebted to Attorney Gonzalez in the sum of P25,250 or any
part thereof; (2) "that in the remote event that they have
signed any contract of indebtedness for any amount in
favor of Attorney Antonio Gonzalez, the same was without
consideration and they have been de​ceived in signing it
without being first aware of its contents, insofar
[inasmuch] as At​torney Antonio Gonzalez is their
'compadre' and formerly enjoyed their absolute confi​dence";
and (3) that the mortgage obliga​tion in question was
inserted in said project of partition by Attorney Antonio
Gonzalez without their knowledge and consent.
In deciding to comply with the request of the appellants
for the registration of the project of partition as mutilated,
over the objection of the appellee, who tendered a complete,
certified true copy of the same

706

706 PHILIPPINE REPORTS ANNOTATED

Gonzalez vs. Basa

document, the register of deeds of Manila impliedly

conceded to them the right to repudíate and annul an
obligation evidenced by said document against the will of
the obligee and without judicial intervention. That is
obviously wrong. It is precisely his duty to see to it that a
document presented for regis​tration is regular and in due
form. The mutilated certified copy was irregular on its face
and should have been rejected by him. In fact his authority
in the premises goes no farther than this. He has no
authority to inquire into the intrinsic validity of a doc​-
ument based upon proofs aliunde. If he had no authority to
inquire into the truth of appellants' allegation as to lack of
consider​ation for the mortgage in question, much less was
he authorized to assume the truth of such allegation
without any investigation. The project of partition in
question, having been signed by the parties and approved
by the court, is presumed to be valid and is acceptable for
registration in its entirety. Neither of the parties may alter

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PHILIPPINE REPORTS ANNOTATED VOLUME 073 8/6/20, 12:04 PM

it without the consent of the other and the approval of the

court.
The reasoning of the register of deeds that, inasmuch as
a mortgage is a voluntary transaction, he had no authority
to register it without the consent of both parties, is
fallacious. He confuses the execution of a mortgage with its
registration. It is the execution of the mortgage that is
voluntary. Once a mortgage has been signed in due form,
the mortgagee is entitled to its registration as a matter of
right. By executing the mort​gage the mortgagor is
understood to have given his consent to its registration,
and he cannot be permitted to revoke it unilaterally. The
validity and fulfilment of contracts can​not be left to the will
of one of the contract​ing parties (article 1256 of the Civil
Code).
In the last analysis, the case is as if Feliciano Basa, Jr.,
had presented to the reg​ister of deeds a certified complete
copy of the project of partition with the request that the
register of deeds, take into consid​eration only the rights,
and ignore the obli​gations, evidenced by said document. It
is the same as if a buyer of real property who mortgaged
the property bought to secure the payment of the purchase
price, had presented the combined deed of sale and
mortgage to the register of deeds with the request to
transfer the title to him without annotating the mortgage
thereon. Is the register of deeds authorized to comply with
such re​quest? No reasonable person would so con​tend; and
yet that is what the register of deeds of Manila proposes to
do in the pres​ent case.
Feliciano Basa, Jr., claims the right to have the
properties of his deceased mother transferred to his name
by the register of deeds in virtue of the adjudication
contained in the project of partition which was duly
approved by the court; but that adjudication was made
expressly subject to the mortgage obligation in question.
Basa certainly can​not invoke and at the same time
repudíate the said document. If he wants to annul the
mortgage stipulated in said project of parti​tion and secure
a clean title to the property adjudicated to him, he should
first procure the annulment by appropriate judicial ac​tion
before presenting said document for registration. He cannot
arrogate to himself the right to annul said mortgage or to
amend the court's order approving the project of partition
"in all its parts."
The questions of fact raised by appellants in this

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proceeding concerning the alleged lack of consideration for

the mortgage in question and the circumstances under
which they signed the project of partition, should be
litigated in an appropriate judicial action and not in this
consulta, wherein the only ques​tion that may properly be
determined is whether the register of deeds should accept
for registration a certified mutilated copy or a certified
complete copy of the project of partition in question.
Needless to say, the decision on this question cannot affect
the right of the appellants to attack the valid​ity of the
mortgage in question in an ap​propriate separate action.
The decision appealed from is affirmed, with costs. So
ordered.

Yulo, C. J., Moran, Paras, and Bocobo, J J., concur.

Judgment affirmed.

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