Short answer. The case may be converted into an ordinary action. Section 6 allows this conversion if a breach or violation of the instrument, statute, or regulation occurs before the case is finally terminated, and the parties are then permitted to file whatever additional pleadings are necessary or proper.
What the law says
If before the final termination of the case, a breach or violation of an instrument or a statute, executive order or regulation, ordinance, or any other governmental regulation should take place, the action may thereupon be converted into an ordinary action, and the parties shall be allowed to file such pleadings as may be necessary or proper.
Rule 63, Section 6 — Conversion into ordinary action. Read the full provision →
From interpretation to enforcement, in one case
Declaratory relief exists to settle uncertainty before anyone actually breaches an agreement or violates a law. But disputes evolve, and Section 6 anticipates that: if a real breach or violation happens while the case is still pending and before final termination, the court is not required to dismiss the declaratory action and force a fresh lawsuit. Without this provision, a party could lose the benefit of a case already underway simply because the very uncertainty the case was meant to resolve turned into an actual violation before the court had a chance to rule on it.
Conversion into an ordinary action
Instead, the same case may be converted into an ordinary action, meaning it continues under the same docket but now addresses the consequences of the actual breach or violation, not just the abstract question of rights or interpretation that started it. This covers breaches of the instrument itself, or of the statute, executive order, ordinance, or other regulation involved. The word 'may' signals this is not automatic — the court exercises judgment over whether conversion is the appropriate path given how the case has actually developed by that point.
New pleadings become necessary
Because the nature of the action changes, the parties are allowed to file whatever pleadings become necessary or proper to litigate the breach — for example, pleading damages or specific performance that were not part of the original petition. This spares litigants from starting an entirely separate suit over facts that arose during the case they already filed, and it lets the same court, already familiar with the instrument and the parties' dispute over it, resolve the resulting enforcement questions without the delay and expense of duplicate litigation over essentially the same underlying relationship. The party who committed the breach is bound by whatever the converted case ultimately decides, just as if the enforcement suit had been filed separately from the start; a party who ignores the amended pleadings risks default the same way any defendant would in an ordinary civil action.
Related provisions
- Rule 63, Section 6 — Conversion into ordinary action
- Rule 63, Section 5 — Court action discretionary
- Rule 63, Section 3 — Notice on Solicitor General