IN THE MATTER OF THE ESTATE OF EMIL H. JOHNSON, EBBA INGEBORG JOHNSON, APPLICANT AND APPELLANT.

On February 4, 1916, Emil H. Johnson, a native of Sweden and a naturalized
citizen of the United States, died in the city of Manila, leaving a will, dated
September 9, 1915, by which he disposed of an estate, the value of which, as
estimated by him, was P231,800. This document is an holographic instrument,
being written in the testator’s own handwriting, and is signed by himself and
two witnesses only, instead of three witnesses required by section 618 of the
Code of Civil Procedure. This will, therefore, was not executed in conformity
with the provisions of law generally applicable to wills executed by inhabitants
of these Islands, and hence could not have been proved under section 618.

On February 9, 1916, however, a petition was presented in the Court of First
Instance of the city of Manila for the probate of this will, on the ground that
Johnson was at the time of his death a citizen of the State of Illinois, United
States of America; that the will was duly executed in accordance with the laws
of that State; and hence could properly be probated here pursuant to section 636
of the Code of Civil Procedure. This section reads as follows:

“Will made here by alien.—A will made within the Philippine Islands
by a citizen or subject of another state or country, which is executed in
accordance with the law of the state or country of which he is a citizen or
subject, and which might be proved and allowed by the law of his own state or
country, may be proved, allowed, and recorded in the Philippine Islands, and
shall have the same effect as if executed according to the laws of these
Islands.”

The hearing on said application was set for March 6, 1916, and three weeks
publication of notice was ordered in the “Manila Daily Bulletin.” Due
publication was made pursuant to this order of the court. On March 6, 1916,
witnesses were examined relative to the execution of the will; and upon March
16th thereafter the document was declared to be legal and was admitted to
probate. At the same time an order was made nominating Victor Johnson and John
T. Pickett as administrators of the estate, with the will annexed. Shortly
thereafter Pickett signified his desire not to serve, and Victor Johnson was
appointed sole administrator.

By the will in question the testator gives to his brother Victor one hundred
shares of the corporate stock in the Johnson-Pickett Rope Company; to his father
and mother in Sweden, the sum of P20,000; to his daughter Ebba Ingeborg, the sum
of P5,000; to his wife, Alexandra Ibañez, the sum of P75 per month, if she
remains single; to Simeona Ibañez, spinster, P65 per month, if she remains
single. The rest of the property is left to the testator’s five
children—Mercedes, Encarnacion, Victor, Eleonor and Alberto.

The biographical facts relative to the deceased necessary to an understanding
of the case are these: Emil H. Johnson was born in Sweden, May 25, 1877, from
which country he emigrated to the United States and lived in Chicago, Illinois,
from 1893 to 1898. On May 9, 1898, at Chicago, he was married to Rosalie
Ackeson, and immediately thereafter embarked for the Philippine Islands as a
soldier in the Army of the United States. As a result of relations between
Johnson and Rosalie Ackeson a daughter, named Ebba Ingeborg, was born a few
months after their marriage. This child was christened in Chicago by a pastor of
the Swedish Lutheran Church upon October 16, 1898.

After Johnson was discharged as a soldier from the service of the United
States he continued to live in the Philippine Islands, and on November 20, 1902,
the wife, Rosalie Johnson, was granted a decree of divorce from him in the
Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois, on the ground of desertion. A little
later Johnson appeared in the United States on a visit and on January 10, 1903,
procured a certificate of naturalization at Chicago. From Chicago he appears to
have gone to Sweden, where a photograph, exhibited in evidence in this case, was
taken in which he appeared in a group with his father, mother, and the little
daughter, Ebba Ingeborg, who was then living with her grandparents in Sweden.
When this visit was concluded, the deceased returned to Manila, where he
prospered in business and continued to live until his death.

In this city he appears to have entered into marital relations with Alejandra
Ibañez, by whom he had three children, to wit, Mercedes, baptized May 31, 1903;
Encarnacion, baptized April 29, 1906; and Victor, baptized December 9, 1907. The
other two children mentioned in the will were borne to the deceased by Simeona
Ibañez.

On June 12, 1916, or about three months after the will had been probated, the
attorneys for Ebba Ingeborg Johnson entered an appearance in her behalf and
noted an exception to the order admitting the will to probate. On October 31,
1916, the same attorneys moved the court to vacate the order of March 16 and
also various other orders in the case. On February 20, 1917, this motion was
denied, and from this action of the trial court the present appeal has been
perfected.

As will be discerned, the purpose of the proceeding on behalf of the
petitioner is to annul the decree of probate and put the estate into intestate
administration, thus preparing the way for the establishment of the claim of the
petitioner as the sole legitimate heir of her father.

The grounds upon which the petitioner seeks to avoid the probate are four in
number and may be stated, in the same sequence in which they are set forth in
the petition, as follows:

(1) Emil H. Johnson was a resident of the city of Manila and not a resident
of the State of Illinois at the time the will in question was executed;

(2) The will is invalid and inadequate to pass real and personal property in
the State of Illinois;

(3) The order admitting the will to probate was made without notice to the
petitioner; and

(4) The order in question was beyond the jurisdiction of the court.

It cannot of course be maintained that a court of first instance lacks
essential jurisdiction over the probate of wills. The fourth proposition above
stated must, accordingly, be interpreted in relation with the third and must be
considered as a corollary deduced from the latter. Moreover, both the third and
fourth grounds stated take precedence, by reason of their more fundamental
implications, over the first two; and a logical exposition of the contentions of
the petitioner is expressed in the two following propositions:

“(I) The order admitting the will to probate was beyond the jurisdiction of
the court and Void because made without notice to the petitioner;

“(II) The judgment from which the petitioner seeks relief should be set aside
because the testator was not a resident of the State of Illinois and the will
was not in conformity with the laws of that State.”

In the discussion which is to follow we shall consider the problems arising
in this case in the order last above indicated. Upon the question, then, of the
jurisdiction of the court, it is apparent from an inspection of the record of
the proceedings in the court below that all the steps prescribed by law as
prerequisites to the probate of a will were complied with in every respect and
that the probate was effected in external conformity with all legal
requirements. This much is unquestioned. It is, however, pointed out in the
argument submitted in behalf of the petitioner, that, at the time the court made
the order of publication, it was apprised of the fact that the petitioner lived
in the United States and that as daughter and heir she was necessarily
interested in the probate of the will. It is, therefore, insisted that the court
should have appointed a date for the probate of the will sufficiently far in the
future to permit the petitioner to be present either in person or by
representation; and it is said that the failure of the court thus to postpone
the probate of the will constitutes an infringement of that provision of the
Philippine Bill which declares that property shall not be taken without due
process of law.

On this point we are of the opinion that the proceedings for the probate of
the will were regular and that the publication was sufficient to give the court
jurisdiction to entertain the proceeding and to allow the will to be
probated.

As was said in the case of In re Davis (136 Cal., 590, 596), “the proceeding
as to the probate of a will is essentially one in rem, and in the very nature of
things the state is allowed a wide latitude in determining the character of the
constructive notice to be given to the world in a proceeding where it has
absolute possession of the res. It would be an exceptional case where a court would declare a statute void,
as depriving a party of his property without due process of law, the proceeding
being strictly in rem, and the res within the state, upon the ground that the
constructive notice prescribed by the statute was unreasonably short.”

In that case the petitioner had been domiciled in the Hawaiian Islands at the
time of the testator’s death; and it was impossible, in view of the distance and
means of communication then existing, for the petitioner to appear and oppose
the probate on the day set for the hearing in California. It was nevertheless
held that publication in the manner prescribed by statute constituted due
process of law. (See Estate of Davis, 151 Cal., 318; Tracy vs. Muir, 151 Cal.,
363.)

In the Davis case (136 Cal., 590) the court commented upon the act that,
under the laws of California, the petitioner had a full year within which she
might have instituted a proceeding to contest the will; and this was stated as
one of the reasons for holding that publication in the manner provided by
statute was sufficient. The same circumstance was commented upon in O’Callaghan
vs. O’Brien (199 U. S., 89), decided in the Supreme Court of the United States.
This case arose under the laws of the State of Washington, and it was alleged
that a will had been there probated without the notice of application for
probate having been given as required by law. It was insisted that this was an
infringement of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United
States. This contention was, however, rejected and it was held that the
statutory right to contest the will within a year was a complete refutation of
the argument founded on the idea of a violation of the due process
provision.

The laws of these Islands, in contrast with the laws in force in perhaps all
of the States of the American Union, contain no special provision, other than
that allowing an appeal in the probate proceedings, under which relief of any
sort can be obtained from an order of a court of first instance improperly
allowing or disallowing a will. We do, however, have a provision of a general
nature authorizing a court under certain circumstances to set aside any
judgment, order, or other proceeding whatever. This provision is found in
section 113 of the Code of Civil Procedure, which reads as follows:

“Upon such terms as may be just the court may relieve a party or his legal
representative from a judgment, ordeor other proceeding taken against him
through his mis take, inadvertence, surprise or excusable neglect; Provided,
That application therefor be made within a reasonable time, but in no case
exceeding six months after such judgment, order, or proceeding was taken.”

The use of the word “judgment, order or other proceeding” in this section
indicates an intention on the part of the Legislature to give a wide latitude to
the remedy here provided, and in our opinion its operation is not to be
restricted to judgments or orders entered in ordinary contentious litigation
where a plaintiff impleads a defendant and brings him into court by personal
service of process. In other words the utility of the provision is not limited
to actions proper but extends to all sorts of judicial proceedings.

In the second section of the Code of Civil Procedure it is declared that the
provisions of this Code shall be liberally construed to promote its object and
to assist the parties in obtaining speedy justice. We think that the intention
thus exhibited should be applied in the interpretation of section 113; and we
hold that the word “party,” used in this section, means any person having an
interest in the subject matter of the proceeding who is in a position to be
concluded by the judgment, order, or other proceeding taken.

The petitioner, therefore, in this case could have applied, under the section
cited, at any time within six months from March 16, 1916, and upon showing that
she had been precluded from appearing in the probate proceedings by conditions
over which she had no control and that the order admitting the will to probate
had been erroneously entered upon insufficient proof or upon a supposed state of
facts contrary to the truth, the court would have been authorized to set the
probate aside and grant a rehearing. It is no doubt true that six months was,
under the circumstances, a very short period of time within which to expect the
petitioner to appear and be prepared to contest the probate with the proof which
she might have desired to collect from remote countries. Nevertheless, although
the time allowed for the making of such application was inconveniently short,
the remedy existed; and the possibility of its use is proved in this case by the
circumstance that on June 12, 1916, she in fact here appeared in court by her
attorneys and excepted to the order admitting the will to probate.

It results that, in conformity with the doctrine announced in the Davis case,
above cited, the proceedings in the court below were conducted in such manner as
to constitute due process of law. The law supplied a remedy by which the
petitioner might have gotten a hearing and have obtained relief from the order
by which she is supposed to have been injured; and though the period within
which the application should have been made was short, the remedy was both
possible and practicable.

From what has been said it follows that the order of March 16, 1916,
admitting the will of Emil H. Johnson to probate cannot be declared null and
void merely because the petitioner was unavoidably prevented from appearing at
the Original hearing upon the matter of the probate of the will in question.
Whether the result would have been the same if our system of procedure had
contained no such provision as that expressed in section 113 is a matter which
we need not here consider.

Intimately connected with the question of the jurisdiction of the court, is
another matter which may be properly discussed at this juncture. This relates to
the interpretation to be placed upon section 636 of the Code of Civil Procedure.
The position is taken by the appellant that this section is applicable only to
wills of aliens; and in this connection attention is directed to the fact that
the epigraph of this section speaks only of the will made here by an alien and
to the further fact that the word “state” in the body of the section is not
capitalized. From this it is argued that section 636 is not applicable to the
will of a citizen of the United States residing in these Islands.

We consider these suggestions of little weight and are of the opinion that,
by the most reasonable interpretation of the language used in the statute, the
words “another state or country” include the United States and the States of the
American Union, and that the operation of the statute is not limited to wills of
aliens. It is a rule of hermeneutics that punctuation and capitalization are
aids of low degree in interpreting the language of a statute and can never
control against the intelligible meaning of the written words. Furthermore, the
epigraph, or heading, of a section, being nothing more than a convenient index
to the contents of the provision, cannot have the effect of limiting the
operative words contained in the body of the text. It results that if Emil H.
Johnson was at the time of his death a citizen of the United States and of the
State of Illinois, his will was provable under this section in the courts of the
Philippine Islands, provided the instrument was so executed as to be admissible
to probate under the laws of the State of Illinois.

We are thus brought to consider the second principal proposition stated at
the outset of this discussion, which raises the question whether the order of
probate can be set aside in this proceeding on the other ground stated in the
petition, namely, that the testator was not a resident of the State of Illinois
and that the will was not made in conformity with the laws of that State.

The order of the Court of First Instance admitting the will to probate
recites, among other things:

“That upon the date when the will in question was executed Emil H. Johnson
was a citizen of the United States, naturalized in the State of Illinois, County
of Cook, and that the will in question was executed in conformity with the
dispositions of the law of the State of Illinois,”

We consider this equivalent to a finding that upon the date of the execution
of the will the testator was a citizen of the State of Illinois and that the
will was executed in conformity with the laws of that State. Upon the last point
the finding is express; and in our opinion the statement that the testator was a
citizen of the United States, naturalized in the State of Illinois, should be
taken to imply that he was a citizen of the State of Illinois, as well as of the
United States.

The naturalization laws of the United States require, as a condition
precedent to the granting of the certificate of naturalization, that the
applicant should have resided at least five years in the United States and for
one year within the State or territory where the court granting the
naturalization papers is held; and in the absence of clear proof to the contrary
it should be presumed that a person naturalized in a court of a certain State
thereby becomes a citizen of that State as well as of the United States.

In this connection it should be remembered that the Fourteenth Amendment to
the Constitution of the United States declares, in its opening words, that all
persons naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction
thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they
reside.

It is noteworthy that the petition by which it is sought to annul the probate
of this will does not assert that the testator was not a citizen of Illinois at
the date when the will was executed. The most that is said on this point is he
was “never a resident of the State of Illinois after the year 1898, but became
and was a resident of the city of Manila,” etc. But residence in the Philippine
Islands is compatible with citizenship in Illinois; and it must be considered
that the allegations of the petition on this point are, considered in their
bearing as an attempt to refute citizenship in Illinois, wholly
insufficient.

As the Court of First Instance found that the testator was a citizen of the
State of Illinois and that the will was executed in conformity with the laws of
that State, the will was necessarily and properly admitted to probate. And how
is it possible to evade the effect of these findings ?

In section 625 of the Code of Civil Procedure it is declared that “the
allowance by the court of a will of real or personal property shall be
conclusive as to its due execution.”

The due execution of a will involves conditions relating to a number of
matters, such as the age and mental capacity of the testator, the signing of the
document by the testator, or by someone in his behalf, and the acknowledgment of
the instrument by him in the presence of the required number of witnesses who
affix their signatures to the will to attest the act. The proof of all these
requisites is involved in the probate; and as to each and all of them the
probate is conclusive. (Castañeda vs. Alemany, 3 Phil. Rep., 426; Pimentel vs.
Palanca, 5 Phil. Rep., 436; Chiong Joc-Soy vs. Vaño, 8 Phil. Rep., 119; Sanchez
vs. Pascual, 11 Phil. Rep., 395; Montafiano vs. Suesa, 14 Phil. Rep., 676.)

Our reported cases do not contain the slightest intimation that a will which
has been probated according to law, and without fraud, can be annulled, in any
other proceeding whatever, on account of any supposed irregularity or defect in
the execution of the will or on account of any error in the action of the court
upon the proof adduced before it. This court has never been called upon to
decide whether, in case the probate of a will should be procured by fraud,
relief could be granted in some other proceeding; and no such question is now
presented. But it is readily seen that if fraud were alleged, this would
introduce an entirely different factor in the case. In Austria vs. Ventenilla
(21 Phil. Rep., 180, 184), it was suggested but not decided that relief might be
granted in case the probate of a will were procured by fraud.

The circumstance that the judgment of the trial court recites that the will
was executed in conformity with the law of Illinois and also, in effect, that
the testator was a citizen of that State places the judgment upon an
unassailable basis so far as any supposed error apparent upon the face of the
judgment is concerned. It is, however, probable that even if the judgment had
not contained these recitals, there would have been a presumption from the
admission of the will to probate as the will of a citizen of Illinois that the
facts were as recited in the order of probate.

As was said by this court in the case of Banco Español-Filipino vs. Palanca
(37 Phil. Rep., 921), “There is no principle of law better settled than that
after jurisdiction has once been acquired, every act of a court of general
jurisdiction shall be presumed to have been rightly done. This rule is applied
to every judgment or decree rendered in the various stages of the proceedings
from their initiation to their completion (Voorhees vs. United States Bank, 10
Pet., 314; 35 U. S., 449); and if the record is silent with respect to any fact
which must have been established before the court could have rightly acted, it
will be presumed that such fact was properly brought to its knowledge.”

The Court of First Instance is a court of original and general jurisdiction;
and there is no difference in its faculties in this respect whether exercised in
matters of probate or exerted in ordinary contentious litigation. The trial
court therefore necessarily had the power to determine the facts upon which the
propriety of admitting the will to probate depended; and the recital of those
facts in the judgment was probably not essential to its validity. No express
ruling is, however, necessary on this point.

What has been said effectually disposes of the petition considered in its
aspect as an attack upon the order of probate for error apparent on the face of
the record. But the petitioner seeks to have the judgment reviewed, it being
asserted that the findings of the trial court—especially on the question of the
citizenship of the testator—are not supported by the evidence. It needs but a
moment’s reflection, however, to show that in such a proceeding as this it is
not possible to reverse the original order on the ground that the findings of
the trial court are unsupported by the proof adduced before that court. The only
proceeding in which a review of the evidence can be secured is by appeal, and
the case is not before us upon appeal from the original order admitting the will
to probate. The present proceedings by petition to set aside the order of
probate, and the appeal herein is from the order denying this relief. It is
obvious that on appeal from an order refusing to vacate a judgment it is not
possible to review the evidence upon which the original judgment was based. To
permit this would operate unduly to protract the right of appeal.

However, for the purpose of arriving at a just conception of the case from
the point of view of the petitioner, we propose to examine the evidence
submitted upon the original hearing, in connection with the allegations of the
petition, in order to see, first, whether the evidence submitted to the trial
court was sufficient to justify its findings, and, secondly, whether the
petition contains any matter which would justify the court in setting the
judgment, aside. In this connection we shall for a moment ignore the
circumstance that the petition was filed after the expiration of the six months
allowed by section 113 of the Code of Civil Procedure.

The principal controversy is over the citizenship of the testator. The
evidence adduced upon this point in the trial court consists of the certificate
of naturalization granted upon January 10, 1903, in the Circuit Court of Cook
County, Illinois, in connection with certain biographical facts contained in the
oral evidence. The certificate of naturalization supplies incontrovertible proof
that upon the date stated the testator became a citizen of the United States,
and inferentially also a citizen of said State. In the testimony submitted to
the trial court it appears that, when Johnson first came to the United States as
a boy, he took up his abode in the State of Illinois and there remained until he
came as a soldier in the United States Army to the Philippine Islands. Although
he remained in these Islands for sometime after receiving his discharge, no
evidence was adduced showing that at the time he returned to the United States,
in the autumn of 1902, he had then abandoned Illinois as the State of his
permanent domicile; and on the contrary the certificate of naturalization itself
recites that at that time he ‘claimed to be a resident of Illinois.

Now, if upon January 10, 1903, the testator became a citizen of the United
States and of the State of Illinois, how has he lost the character of citizen
with respect to either of these jurisdictions? There is no law in force by
virtue of which any person of foreign nativity can become a naturalized citizen
of the Philippine Islands; and it was, therefore, impossible for the testator,
even if he had so desired, to expatriate himself from the United States and
change his political status from a citizen of the United States to a citizen of
these Islands. This being true, it is to be presumed that he retained his
citizenship in the State of Illinois along with his status as a citizen of the
United States. It would be novel doctrine to Americans living in the Philippine
Islands to be told that by living here they lose their citizenship in the State
of their naturalization or nativity.

We are not unmindful of the fact that when a citizen of one State leaves it
and takes up his abode in another State with no intention of. returning, he
immediately acquires citizenship in the State of his new domicile. This is in
accordance with that provision of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution
of the United states which says that every citizen of the United States is a
citizen of the State wherein he resides. The effect of this provision
necessarily is that a person transferring his domicile from one State to another
loses his citizenship in the State of his original abode upon acquiring
citizenship in the State of his new abode. The acquisition of the new State
citizenship extinguishes the old. That situation, in our opinion, has no analogy
to that which arises when a citizen of an American State conies to reside in the
Philippine Islands. Here he cannot acquire a new citizenship; nor by the mere
change of domicile does he lose that which he brought with him.

The proof adduced before the trial court must therefore be taken as showing
that, at the time the will was executed, the testator was, as stated in the
order of probate, a citizen of the State of Illinois. This, in connection with
the circumstance that the petition does not even so much as deny such
citizenship but only asserts that the testator was a resident of the Philippine
Islands, demonstrates the impossibility of setting the probate aside for lack of
the necessary citizenship on the part of the testator. As already observed, the
allegation of the petition on this point is wholly insufficient to justify any
relief whatever.

Upon the other point—as to whether the will was executed in conformity with
the statutes of the State of Illinois—we note that it does not affirmatively
appear from the transcription of the testimony adduced in the trial court that
any witness was examined with reference to the law of Illinois on the subject of
the execution of will. The trial judge no doubt was satisfied that the will was
properly executed by examining section 1874 of the Revised Statutes of Illinois,
as exhibited in volume 3 of Starr & Curtis’s Annotated Illinois Statutes,
2nd ed., p. 426; and he may have assumed that he could take judicial notice of
the laws of Illinois under section 275 of the Code of Civil Procedure. If so, he
was in our opinion mistaken. That section authorizes the courts here to take
judicial notice, among other things, of the acts of the legislative department
of the United States. These words clearly have reference to Acts of the Congress
of the United States; and we would hesitate to hold that our courts can, under
this provision, take judicial notice of the multifarious laws of the vari6us
American States. Nor do we think that any such authority can be derived from the
broader language, used in the same section, where it is said that our courts may
take judicial notice of matters of public knowledge “similar” to those therein
enumerated. The proper rule we think is Hto require proof of the statutes of the
States of the American Union whenever their provisions are determinative of the
issues in any action litigated in the Philippine courts.

Nevertheless, even supposing that the trial court may have erred in taking
judicial notice of the law of Illinois on the point in question, such error is
not now available to the petitioner, first, because the petition does not state
any fact from which it would appear that the law of Illinois is different from
what the court found, and, secondly, because the assignment of error and
argument for the appellant in this court raises no question based on such
supposed error. Though the trial court may have acted upon pure conjecture as to
the law prevailing in the State of Illinois, its judgment could not be set
aside, even upon application made within six months under section 113 of the
Code of Civil Procedure, unless it should be made to appear affirmatively that
the conjecture was wrong. The petitioner, it is true, states in general terms
that the will in question is invalid and inadequate to pass real and personal
property in the State of Illinois, but this is merely a conclusion of law. The
affidavits by which the petition is accompanied contain no reference to the
subject, and we are cited to no authority in the appellant’s brief which might
tend to raise a doubt as to the correctness of the conclusion o,f the trial
court. It is very clear, therefore, that this point cannot be urged as of
serious moment.

But it is insisted in the brief for the appellant that the will in question
was not properly admissible to probate because it contains provisions which
cannot be given effect consistently with the laws of the Philippine Islands; and
it is suggested that as the petitioner is a legitimate heir of the testator she
cannot be deprived of the legitime to which she is entitled under the law
governing testamentary successions in these Islands. Upon this point it is
sufficient to say that the probate of the will does not affect the intrinsic
validity of its provisions, the decree of probate being conclusive only as
regards the due execution of the will. (Code of Civil Procedure, secs. 625, 614;
Sahagun vs. De Gorostiza, 7 Phil. Rep., 347, 349; Chiong Joc-Soy vs. Vaño, 8
Phil. Rep., 119, 121; Limjuco vs. Ganara, 11 Phil. Rep., 393, 395.)

If, therefore, upon the distribution of this estate, it should appear that
any legacy given by the will or other disposition made therein is contrary to
the law applicable in such case, the will must necessarily yield upon that point
and the law must prevail. Nevertheless, it should not be forgotten that the
intrinsic validity of the provisions of this will must be determined by the law
of Illinois arid not, as the appellant apparently assumes, by the general
provisions here applicable in such matters; for in the second paragraph of
article 10 of the Civil Code it is declared that “legal and testamentary
successions, with regard to the order of succession, as well as to the amount of
the successional rights and to the intrinsic validity of their provisions, shall
be regulated by the laws of the nation of the person whose succession is in
question, whatever may be the nature of the property and the country where it
may be situate.”

From what has been said, it is, we think, manifest that the petition
submitted to the court below on October 31, 1916, was entirely insufficient to
warrant the setting aside of the order probating the will in question, whether
said petition be considered as an attack on the validity of the decree for error
apparent, or whether it be considered as an application for a rehearing based
upon the new evidence submitted in the affidavits which accompany the petition.
And in this latter aspect the petition is subject to the further fatal defect
that it was not presented within the time allowed by law.

It follows that the trial court committed no error in denying the relief
sought. The order appealed from is accordingly affirmed with costs. So
ordered.

Torres, Johnson, Malcolm, Avanceña, and Fisher, JJ.,
concur.