See Valdez v. Tuazon, 40 Phil. 943, 948 (1920) [Per J. Street, En Banc]. [8] Otherwise known as "The New Divorce Law." [9] Baptista v. Castañeda, 76 Phil. 461, 462 (1946) [Per J. Ozaeta, En Banc]. [10] Id. at 462-463. DISSENTING OPINION CAGUIOA, J.: The Supreme Court x x x aims to adopt a liberal construction of statutes. By liberal construction of statutes is meant that method by which courts from the language used, the subject matter, and the purposes of those framing laws, are able to find out their true meaning. There is a sharp distinction, however, between construction of this nature and the act of a court in engrafting upon a law something that has been omitted which someone believes ought to have been embraced. The former is liberal construction and is a legitimate exercise of judicial power. The latter is judicial legislation forbidden by the tripartite division of powers among the three departments of government, the executive, the legislative, and the judicial.[1] On the basis of the Court's rulings in Van Dorn v. Romillo, Jr.[2] (Van Dorn), Republic of the Philippines v. Orbecido III[3] (Orbecido), and Dacasin v. Dacasin[4] (Dacasin), the ponencia holds that Article 26(2) of the Family Code permits the blanket recognition, under Philippine law, of a divorce decree obtained abroad by a Filipino citizen against the latter's foreigner spouse. I disagree. At the outset, it bears to emphasize that the public policy against absolute divorce remains in force. At present, there exists no legal mechanism under Philippine law through which a Filipino may secure a divorce decree upon his own initiative. Accordingly, it is the Court's duty to uphold such policy and apply the law as it currently stands until the passage of an amendatory law on the subject. As members of the Court, ours is the duty to interpret the law; this duty does not carry with it the power to determine what the law should be in the face of changing times, which power, in turn, lies solely within the province of Congress. Article 26(2) of the Family Code is an exception to the nationality principle under Article 15 of the Civil Code. Article 26(2) was introduced during the meetings of the Joint Civil Code and Family Law Committee (the Committee) to address the effect of foreign divorce decrees on mixed marriages between Filipinos and foreigners. The provision, as originally worded, and the rationale for its introduction, appear in the deliberations: [Professor Esteban B. Bautista (Prof. Bautista)]'s position, even under the present law, was that the Filipina wife should be allowed to remarry as long as the divorce is valid under the national law of the husband, with which [Judge Alicia Sempio-Diy (Judge Diy)] and [Justice Leonor Ines-Luciano (Justice Luciano)] concurred. After further deliberation, [Justice Ricardo C. Puno (Justice Puno)] suggested that they formulate the base to cover the above situation. Judge Diy and [Justice Eduardo P. Caguioa (Justice Caguioa)] formulated the base as follows: In a mixed marriage between a Filipino citizen and a foreigner, both capacitated to marry under Philippine law, in case the foreigner should obtain a valid divorce abroad, capacitating him to remarry, the Filipino spouse shall likewise have capacity to remarry under Philippine law.[5] However, subsequent deliberations show that the Committee ultimately resolved to delete the provision and defer action until absolute divorce is determined in future legislation: On Article [26(2)], [Justice Jose B.L. Reyes (Justice Reyes)] commented that it seems to discriminate against Filipinos, who are married to Filipinos, since the provision governs only Filipinos married to foreigners. Justice Puno suggested that, in line with Justice Caguioa's view that xxx they should make the Proposed Family Code as acceptable as possible and since they are not touching on divorce which is one of the big issues and they