ENRIQUE T. JOCSON AND JESUS T. JOCSON, PETITIONERS AND APPELLANTS, VS. THE EMPIRE INSURANCE COMPANY, OPPOSITOR AND APPELLEE, AND INTESTATE ESTATE OF AGUSTIN A. JOCSON REPRESENTE…

Appeal from an order of the Court of First
Instance of Iloilo, certified to us by the Court of Appeals on the
ground that the questions involved are purely legal.

It
appears that in Special Proceedings No. 734 of the Court of First
Instance of Iloilo, Agustin A. Jocson was, on October 3, 1950,
appointed guardian of the persons and properties of his then minor
children, Carlos, Rodolfo, Perla, Enrique and Jesus, and as such
guardian, he had a bond filed with the Empire Insurance Co. as surety.
Among the properties of the minors were sums of money from war damage
payments which formed part of their inheritance from their mother, who
died in 1934, and a total of P18,000 of such war damage payments was
deposited in the bank by the guardian Jocson to the account of the
minors. In the course of the guardianship. Jocson submitted periodic
accounts to the court, among them those for expenses incurred for the
education and clothing of the wards for the period from October 2,1950
to October 2, 1951 and again for the period from October 13, 1951 to
March 16, 1953, the portions of the said expenses corresponding to the
minors Enrique and Jesus being, respectively, P400.20 and P330.40 for
the first period, and P850.26 and P1,410.10 for the second period. The
accounts were approved by the court.

Jocson died on February
12, 1954, and to succeed him, Perla, who together with her brothers
Carlos and Rodolfo, had already attained majority, was appointed
guardian of the remaining minors Enrique and Jesus. On September 29 of
that year, Perla filed a petition in the guardianship proceedings to
have the accounts of the deceased guardian, Jocson, reopened, claiming
that the disbursements made from the guardianship funds for the
education and clothing of the minors Enrique and Jesus were illegal.
Upon coming of age, Enrique and Jesus adopted the petition as their own
and then moved that the disbursements in question be declared illegal
and that Jocson’s bond as guardian to be made to answer therefor.

The
motion was opposed by the Empire Insurance Co., the surety on the bond,
as well as by the administratrix of the intestate estate of Jocson, and
the court, after considering the written arguments submitted by the
parties, rendered an order denying it and declaring the bond cancelled
and the guardianship terminated. The movants appealed, and it is that
appeal that has been certified to us by the Court of Appeals.

It
is appellants’ contention that the expenses for their education and
clothing during their minority were part of the support they were
entitled to receive from their father, so that when the latter paid
those expenses from the guardianship funds, he made illegal
disbursements therefrom for which his bond as guardian should be made
to answer.

The contention is clearly without merit. Support
does include what is necessary for the education and clothing of the
person entitled thereto (Art. 290, New Civil Code), But support must be
demanded and the right to it established before it becomes payable
(Art. 298, New Civil Code; Marcelo vs.
Estacio, 70 Phil., 215). For the right to support does not arise from
the mere fact of relationship, even from the relationship of parents
and children, but “from imperative necessity without which it cannot be
demanded, and the law presumes that such necessity does not exist
unless support is demanded” (Civil Code of the Philippines, Annotated,
Tolentino, Vol. 1, p. 181, citing 8 Manresa 685). In the present case,
it does not appear that support for the minors, be it only for their
education and clothing, was ever demanded from their father and the
need for it duly established. The need for support, as already stated,
cannot be presumed, and especially must this be true in the present
case where it appears that the minors had means of their own. In the
circumstances, the disbursements made by the deceased guardian Jocson,
with the approval of the court, for the education and clothing of the
appellant minors cannot be said to be illegal, so that the lower court
did not err in holding the guardian’s bond not liable for the same.
Furthermore, the claim for support should he enforced in a separate
action and not in these guardianship proceedings.

In view of the foregoing, the order appealed from is affirmed, but without costs since this is a paupers’ appeal.

Paras, C. J., Bengzon, Montemayor, Bautista Angelo, Labrador, Concepcion, Reyes, J. B. L., Endencia, and Felix, JJ., concur.