Psychological incapacity – a legal concept

THE Public Information Office of the Supreme Court served notice on the people of the Philippines: the high tribunal has pronounced psychological incapacity found in Article 36 of the Family Code, a ground for the absolute nullity of marriage, as a legal and not a medical concept. That was not breaking new ground, because it has always been a legal concept.

Guilt, negligence, delay, capacity — all these are legal concepts, even if the man (or woman) on the street uses them for nonlegal purposes.