Short answer. Yes, but only behind his own creditors. Article 1835 of the Civil Code says the individual property of a deceased partner is liable for all partnership obligations incurred while he was a partner — subject, however, to the prior payment of his separate personal debts. His estate answers for the firm's debts, but only in that order.
What the law says
The individual property of a deceased partner shall be liable for all obligations of the partnership incurred while he was a partner, but subject to the prior payment of his separate debts.
Civil Code, Article 1835 — Existing Liability Survives Dissolution. Read the full provision →
Death does not erase partnership debts
A partner's death is one way a partnership dissolves, but dissolution and death together do not wipe out what the firm owes. Article 1835 provides that the individual property of a deceased partner shall be liable for all obligations of the partnership incurred while he was a partner. His personal estate — separate from the partnership's own assets — remains exposed to those debts. This flows from the article's opening principle that dissolution does not of itself discharge the existing liability of any partner. So heirs cannot assume that because the partner has died, his estate is beyond the reach of the firm's creditors; the obligations follow the estate.
But only debts from his time as a partner
The liability is bounded by timing. The estate answers for obligations incurred while he was a partner — not for debts the partnership took on after he had already ceased to be one, nor for obligations that arose before he joined. This is a meaningful limit: it ties the deceased's estate to the period of his actual membership. Partnership debts contracted during his years in the firm fall within reach; those the continuing business runs up afterwards, once he is gone, do not attach to his individual property under this rule. Establishing when a particular obligation was incurred, relative to his membership, therefore matters a great deal to how far the estate is exposed.
His own creditors are paid first
The article sets a clear order of priority. The estate's liability for partnership debts is subject to the prior payment of his separate debts. That means the deceased partner's own personal creditors — those he owed in his individual capacity — are satisfied first out of his individual property. Only what remains after his separate debts are paid is available to the partnership's creditors. This protects the family and personal creditors of the deceased from being crowded out by the firm's obligations, and it reflects the law's treatment of the individual estate as primarily answerable for the person's own affairs before it is drawn upon for the venture he was part of.
What this leaves open
Article 1835 fixes that the estate is liable and in what order, but it does not by itself run the settlement. How partnership creditors present and prove their claims against the estate, how the estate is administered, and how the remaining partners wind up the business are governed by other rules on succession and on winding up. The article also does not decide disputes over exactly when a debt was incurred or whether a partner had truly ceased to be one. Heirs facing partnership creditors, or creditors trying to reach a deceased partner's property, should take advice on how these priorities play out in the particular estate before acting.