Jurisprudence Covered by the 2020/2021 Bar Examination

The Omnibus Guidelines for the 2020/2021 Bar Examinations provide that “only laws … and canonical doctrines … as of June 30, 2019 are examinable materials.”  The Omnibus Guidelines also state that “principles of law are not covered by the cut-off period” and that “any principle of law that appeared in the Court’s decisions after June 30, 2019, is included in the coverage of the examinations.” 

Here, “principle of law” means a holding which appeared in a Supreme Court decision rendered on or before 30 June 2019.  To illustrate, Neypes v. Court of Appeals, 469 SCRA 633, 644 (2005), held that a party who files a motion for reconsideration or new trial of a judgment or final order has, in case of denial of the motion, a fresh 15-day period from notice of such denial within which to file the notice of appeal. The mere fact that the Neypes holding was reiterated in Supreme Court decisions after 30 June 2019 would not remove it from the bar coverage.

On the other hand, a holding which appears for the first time in a Supreme Court decision (what we call a “leading case”) rendered after 30 June 2019 is excluded from the bar coverage.  Thus, in the case of Pulido v. People, G.R. No. 220149, 27 July 2021, the Supreme Court held that a subsequent judicial decree of nullity of the first marriage, obtained after contracting the second marriage, is a defense in bigamy.  Pulido is a leading case since previous decisions held that a person who contracts a second marriage without a prior court declaration of nullity of his first marriage was liable for bigamy even if the first marriage was subsequently declared void by a court.  Thus, the Pulido holding is not included in the bar exam coverage.

Assuming that a 2020/2021 bar examination problem will deal with a fact situation similar to that in Pulido, my advice is to answer it using the pre-Pulido doctrine. This approach would be in accordance with the Omnibus Guidelines.   The same advice goes for similar questions dealing with holdings abandoned after 30 June 2019.  My thinking though is that a bar examiner would shy away from asking a question involving an abandoned doctrine. The long and the short of it is that a 2020/2021 bar reviewee should simply not bother with jurisprudence laid down after 30 June 2019.

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