Text of the provision
Art. 1. Marriage is a special contract of permanent union between a man and a woman entered into in accordance with law for the establishment of conjugal and family life. It is the foundation of the family and an inviolable social institution whose nature, consequences, and incidents are governed by law and not subject to stipulation, except that marriage settlements may fix the property relations during the marriage within the limits provided by this Code.
(52a)
Family Code of the Philippines, Executive Order No. 209, approved July 6, 1987. The Code took effect on August 3, 1988 (Republic v. Orbecido III, G.R. No. 154380, October 5, 2005). Reproduced in full.
What this article means
Article 1 opens the Code by defining marriage as a special contract — special because, unlike an ordinary contract, its terms are not left to the parties. Its "nature, consequences, and incidents are governed by law," not by stipulation. The one narrow exception is property: spouses may fix their property relations by a marriage settlement, but only within the limits the Code itself allows.
The article also calls marriage the foundation of the family and an inviolable social institution. That framing is why the grounds for treating a marriage as void (Article 35) or voidable (Article 45) are narrow and specific, rather than left to the parties' agreement to simply undo.
Related provisions
- Article 2 — the essential requisites this contract requires.
- Article 5 — the age of legal capacity to enter it.
- Article 35 — marriages void from the beginning.
Cases interpreting this article
- Authorities construing the "special contract" and inviolable-institution language of Article 1 will be added here as each is verified against primary sources.