ART. 122. The chambers of administration of the audiencias, after receiving the proceedings referred to in the foregoing article, or in view of the proceedings commenced or prosecuted before them, and that of the supreme court, in a proper case, shall forward the same to the department of public prosecution for a report thereon with precedence over everything else.

ART. 123. In view of said report, and after completing the proceedings, if necessary, the chambers of administration of the audiencias, or that of the supreme court, in a proper case, shall decide whether the remedy of complaint should or should not be sought.

If they decide that said remedy should be sought, they shall do so in a statement containing the reasons, unless they should accept the report of the department of public prosecution without any other addition.

ART. 124. The Government shall decide these disputes in the manner prescribed in the laws and regulations."

TITLE III.-APPLICATIONS TO CIVIL COURTS FOR MODIFICATION OF ACTIONS OF ECCLESIASTICAL COURTS."

ART. 125. An application for the modification of the action of an ecclesiastical court may be made when an ecclesiastical judge or court hears, or attempts to hear, a secular cause not subject to ecclesiastical jurisdiction, or attempts to execute any judgment, by attachment or sale of property, pronounced in any matter within his or its jurisdiction, without seeking the aid of the ordinary jurisdiction.

ART. 126. The audiencias of Cuba and Porto Rico shall pass on applications for the modification of the action of the Nunciature or of the higher ecclesiastical tribunals of the court; and the audiencias on those relating to the action of other ecclesiastical judges or courts of their respective districts.

Against the decisions rendered thereon by the supreme court, or by the audiencias, there shall be no further remedy.

ART. 127. The following persons may apply for the modification of the action of ecclesiastical courts:

1. Those who consider themselves injured by the usurpation of powers made by an ecclesiastical judge or court.

2. The public prosecutors of the audiencias at their own instance or upon the request of that of the supreme court.

ART. 128. The municipal public prosecutors (fiscales), deputy public prosecutors (promotores fiscales), and the judges and courts of the ordinary jurisdiction can not directly make application for the modification of the action of an ecclesiastical tribunal.

When the above-mentioned officials should learn that some ecclesiastical judicial authority has interfered in any matter foreign to its jurisdiction, they shall apply to the public prosecutors of the audiencias or to the one of the supreme court, according to their respective powers, furnishing the data and information they may have in order that they may make the application, should they consider it proper. ART. 129. Persons who consider themselves injured by an ecclesiastical judge or court, and who desire to make an application for the

• See note to article 116. The subsequent proceedings are indicated in the organic law of the judiciary.

See note to article 112.

modification of his or its action, shall do so in the manner prescribed by this law.

ART. 130. The department of public prosecution shall make the application directly and without any preparation whatsoever.

ART. 131. The person injured shall prepare the application before the ecclesiastical judge or tribunal, requesting, in a signed petition, that said ecclesiastical court desist in the hearing of the matter and forward the record of the proceedings already had to the competent judge, stating that if this be not done, royal protection against his action will be sought.

ART. 132. When the ecclesiastical judge or court should deny the petition made in accordance with the foregoing article, the person injured may demand a certified copy of the ruling of denial, and after it has been obtained the application shall be considered as prepared.

ART. 133. If the ecclesiastical judge or court should refuse to issue said certificate, or not issue an order desisting from hearing the matter, the person injured may file a complaint in the audiencia within the territory of which the former exercises his or its jurisdiction, in accordance with the provisions of this law.

ART. 134. The court before which the complaint is made, if competent to pass upon the application, shall order the ecclesiastical judge or court to deliver the certificate to the appellant within three days after the receipt of the royal order addressed to him for that purpose. ART. 135. If the ecclesiastical judge or court should not comply with the order mentioned in the foregoing article, a second royal order shall be sent to the same, threatening said ecclesiastical judge or court with the penalty prescribed for this case in the Penal Code."

ART. 136. If the second royal order should not be obeyed, the court taking cognizance of the application shall order the judge of first instance of the judicial district in which the ecclesiastical judge or tribunal resides, to recover the record of the proceedings and forward the same, and immediately begin the institution of the proper criminal action.

In such case the application for modification of the action of the ecclesiastical court shall be considered as made by the transmission of said record.

ART. 137. When proof of the denial decreed by the ecclesiastical judge or tribunal has been presented before the proper court, or when the application has been directly made by the department of public prosecution, a decision shall be rendered admitting or denying the admission of said application.

ART. 138. The court shall order the admission when there are reasons leading it to believe that the ecclesiastical judge or tribunal has gone beyond the limits of his or its jurisdiction and powers. Otherwise it shall declare that the appeal was not well taken.

ART. 139. In the same order in which the court admits the application, it shall require by royal order that the ecclesiastical judge or tribunal transmit the records within three days, unless they should already be before the court as a consequence of the fulfillment of the prescriptions of article 136.

ART. 140. In the royal order issued in accordance with the provisions of the foregoing article, the ecclesiastical judge or tribunal shall

See article 388 of the Penal Code for Cuba and Porto Rico.

be requested to cite the parties to appear within ten days, if willing, which period can not be extended, before the court hearing the application, for the purpose of asserting their rights.

ART. 141. If the parties appear by virtue of the provisions of the foregoing article, they shall be considered as parties to the application. Should they not do so, the application shall be heard without their attendance in the same manner and with the same effect as if they had been present.

ART. 142 The ecclesiastical judges and courts may cite their respective prosecuting attorneys to appear as parties before the ordinary jurisdiction.

The said ecclesiastical judges or courts shall have the same character of parties when they appear at the hearing of the application to sustain their acts and competency.

ART. 143. If the ecclesiastical judge or court should not forward the records of the proceedings demanded of him, the provisions of article 136 shall be observed.

ART. 144. If the judge of first instance, in compliance with the provisions of article 136, should forward the record to the court, he shall order notice thereof to be given to the parties thereto, citing them to appear for the purposes prescribed in article 140.

ART. 145. After the records of the proceedings have been forwarded by the judge of the first instance, in accordance with the provisions contained in the preceding articles, the application shall be considered as admitted by the mere fact that said record is before the court of competent jurisdiction

ART. 146. In any case, after the records have been received by the audiencia, the application shall be heard and determined in the manner prescribed in this law for appeals upon incidental issues.

ART. 147. The representative of the department of public prosecution shall also be a party to the applications not made by the same, and he must in all cases attend the hearing thereof.

ART. 148. The court shall render a decision within eight days following the hearing, limiting itself to the following declarations:

1. That the application is not well taken, taxing the costs against the person making it and ordering that the record be returned to the ecclesiastical judge or court for the continuation of the proceedings according to law. In no case can the costs be taxed against the department of public prosecution.

2. That the ecclesiastical judge or court has wrongfully assumed jurisdiction in the matter, and ordering the same to vacate any impositions or punishments he or it may have imposed. In such case the costs may be taxed against the ecclesiastical judge or court, if he or it should, with well-known temerity, have assumed powers and jurisdiction which said ecclesiastical judge or tribunal did not have.

This order shall be communicated in writing to the ecclesiastical judge or court.

ART. 149. A report of every decision declaring that an ecclesiastical judge or court has wrongfully assumed jurisdiction shall be made to the government, a copy of said decision being also forwarded.

ART. 150. When it should be declared that an application is not well taken, the records of the proceedings shall be returned to the ecclesiastical judge or court, with the proper certificate, in order that he or it may proceed in the matter according to law.

ART. 151. After the return of the records of the proceedings, the costs shall be appraised and taxed. The audiencia shall issue the proper orders for their collection by judicial compulsion.

ART. 152. If it be declared that the ecclesiastical judge or court has wrongfully assumed jurisdiction, the records of the proceedings shall be forwarded to the judge of competent jurisdiction, and the parties who have appeared before the court shall be cited to appear before the competent judge, the ecclesiastical judge being given

written notice thereof.

TITLE IV. CONSOLIDATIONS.

SECTION I.-CONSOLIDATION OF ACTIONS.

ART. 153. The plaintiff may consolidate in his complaint as many causes of action as he may have against the defendant, even though they proceed from different titles, provided that said actions are not incompatible with each other.

ART. 154. The simultaneous exercise of two or more causes of action in one and the same action shall be incompatible, and they can not, therefore, be consolidated, in the following cases:

1. When said causes of action mutually exclude or are antagonistic to each other, to such an extent that the selection of one prevents the exercise of the other or renders it invalid.

2. When the judge who is to take cognizance of the main action. should be incompetent, by reason of the matter or amount in litigation, to take cognizance of the consolidated actions.

3. When, in accordance to law, the causes of action must be heard and decided in actions of a different character.

ART. 155. Causes of action which by reason of the amount litigated are subjects of oral actions, may be joined in actions of greater or of lesser import."

In such cases the competency of the judge and the kind of declaratory action to be brought shall be determined by the accumulated value of all that may be the object of the complaint.

ART. 156. Causes of action against several persons, or by several persons against one, arising from the same source of title or based upon the same cause of action, may be joined and brought in one action.c

a Mayor cuantía: Greater import. These actions are such as involve interests valued at more than 3,000 pesetas, questions relating to political or honorary rights, those in which the interest involved can not be appraised or determined, personal exemptions and privileges, filiations, paternity, and other questions involving the civil status and condition of persons.

Menor cuantia: Lesser import. Actions involving interests of over 250 and not exceeding 3,000 pesetas.-Alcubilla, Diccionario de la Administración española. Juicio declarativo: That involving doubtful and controverted rights which must be judicially decided.-Escriche, Diccionario razonado de legislación y jurisprudencia.

Article 156 is limited to permitting a consolidation when one person has several causes of action against another, and when several persons have a cause of action against one person, fixing the kind of causes of action which may be joined in either case, without determining the effects of the consolidation; and article 159 provides that all the causes of action must be heard in the same suit and decided by the same judgment. Therefore, there is no appeal for the vio75270-09- -18

ART. 157. The consolidation of actions shall not be permitted after answer to the complaint has been made, but the plaintiff reserves the right to institute the proper independent actions.

ART. 158. If, before answer is made, the complaint be extended in order to consolidate new causes of action in addition to those already included in the complaint, the period of time to answer shall be counted from the time of the filing of the extension of the complaint. ART. 159. When the consolidation of causes of action can take place and is made at the proper time by the plaintiff, it shall produce the effect of their being heard in one and the same action and being decided in one and the same judgment.

SECTION II.-CONSOLIDATION OF RECORDS OF PROCEEDINGS.

ART. 160. Consolidation of records of proceedings may only be ordered at the instance of a proper party to the action.

Proper parties for this purpose shall be those who may have appeared as litigants in any of the causes, the consolidation of which is desired."

ART. 161. The consolidation may be ordered in the following cases: 1. When the judgment to be rendered in one of the actions, the consolidation of which is requested, would raise the exception of res judicata in the other.

2. When an action is pending before the competent court on the same matter which is the object of that instituted subsequently.

3. When bankruptcy or insolvency proceedings are pending and the property of the insolvent or bankrupt is the subject of the action instituted.

4. When testamentary or intestate proceedings are pending and the property of the estate is the subject of the action instituted and said action is declared to be subject to consolidation with said proceedings."

lation of article 156 when taken under the wrongful assumption that it grants to one colitigant the right to maintain an action which another may have abandoned after having brought it.-Decision of May 18, 1891.

The causes of action can not be consolidated when their origin and the persons against whom they are directed are different.-Decision of April 14, 1886.

The consolidation can not take place when the actions which the plaintiff exercises arise from different private contracts entered into by him with different fire insurance companies.-Decision of April 20, 1887.

a Records of proceedings can not be consolidated when they relate to acts which are not connected with each other.—Decision of May 9, 1864.

The decree ordering the consolidation of appeals of which a court of justice is taking cognizance is not final.-Decision of March 29, 1889.

The decision declaring the consolidation of two appeals not proper, is not final for the purposes of appeals for annulment of judgment. Decision of February 3, 1888.

The law does not make any distinction between voluntary and involuntary bankruptcy for the purposes of the consolidation of proceedings pending, which involve the property of the bankrupt.-Decision of March 12, 1869.

The law requires, in order to permit the consolidation, that the action be brought against the property involved in the testamentary proceedings and that it be of those which can be consolidated; and if according to this rule, the action against the testamentary property may be consolidated to said proceedings, such is not the case when said action does not affect property which does not belong to the estate, as is the case of property sold after the period agreed upon has elapsed.-Decision of January 3, 1872.

A personal action against a debtor can not be joined to the testamentary proceedings of his deceased wife.-Decision of January 3, 1872.