Bigelow v. Berkshire Life Insurance Company

• Decision Date: 01 October 1876
• Citation: 93 U.S. 284,23 L.Ed. 918
• Parties: BIGELOW v. BERKSHIRE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

93 U.S. 284

23 L.Ed. 918

BIGELOW v. BERKSHIRE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY.

October Term, 1876

ERROR to the Circuit Court of the United States for the Northern District of Illinois.

This is an action on two policies issued by the defendant on the life of Henry W. Bigelow. Each contained a condition in avoidance, if the insured should die by suicide, sane or insane; and in such case the company agreed to pay to the party in interest the surrender value of the policy at the time of the death of Bigelow. The defendant pleaded that Bigelow died from the effects of a pistol-wound inflicted upon his person by his own hand, and that he intended by this means to destroy his life. To this the plaintiffs replied, that Bigelow, at the time when he inflicted the pistol-wound upon his person by his own hand, was of unsound mind, and wholly unconscious of the act. A demurrer to this replication was sustained by the court below, and the plaintiffs bring the case here for review.

Argued by Mr. Thomas Hoyne for the plaintiff in error.

An act of self-destruction has never been held to avoid a policy of life insurance, when the insane person has been so unsound of mind as to be unconscious of the act he was committing. Borradaile v. Hunter, 5 Mann. & Gr. 639; Hartman v. Keystone Ins. Co., 21 Penn. 466; Dean v. Mutual Life Ins. Co., 4 Allen, 96; Cooper v. Mass. Life Ins. Co., 102 Mass. 227; Eastbrook v. Union Ins. Co., 54 Me. 224; Breasted v. Farmers' Loan and Trust Co., 4 Hill, 73; 4 Seld. 299; 2 Bigelow, Life Ins. Cas. 4; Bliss, Life Ins., sect. 243, p. 415; Pierce v. Travellers' Ins. Co., 3 Ins. Law J. 422; Van Zandt v. Mutual Benefit Life Ins. Co., 55 N. Y. 177.

In all cases, sane or insane, the law allows the plaintiff to show that death was not intended by the deceased; but that it was an involuntary act, or a result of mental disease. Borradaile v. Hunter, supra; Hopps' Case, 31 Ill. 392.

The decided cases all establish that only persons capable of discriminating the particular act are to be held in law accountable. Van Zandt v. Mutual Benefit Life Ins. Co., supra; Bliss, Life Ins., supra; Pierce v. Travellers' Ins. Co., supra; Breasted v. Farmers' Loan and Trust Co., supra; Life Ins. Co. v. Terry, 15 Wall. 580, and cases there cited.

A suicide, 'sane or insane,' is a connection of words without meaning, if taken apart from their literal signification, or out of the context. Their real meaning as they stand connected with the other words of the proviso is, that, if the insured be sane or insane at the time he intentionally commits suicide, i.e., self-murder, the policy is to be void and of no effect.

Even if it be conceded that a death self-inflicted, whether a suicide or not, is within the terms of the policy, yet the fact that the death was not intentional, by reason of the insured's mental unconsciousness of his act, would clearly render the company liable.

Mr. H. G. Miller, contra.

MR. JUSTICE DAVIS delivered the opinion of the court.

There has been a great diversity of judicial opinion as to whether self-destruction by a man, in a fit of insanity, is within the condition of a life policy, where the words of exemption are that the insured 'shall commit suicide,' or 'shall die by his own hand.' But since the decision in Life Ins. Co. v. Terry, 15 Wall. 580, the question is no longer an open one in this court. In that case the words avoiding the policy were, 'shall die by his own hand;' and we held that they referred to an act of criminal self-destruction, and did not apply to an insane person who took his own life. But the insurers in this case have gone further, and sought to avoid altogether this class of risks. If they have succeeded in doing so, it is our duty to give effect to the contract; as neither the policy of the law nor sound morals forbid them to make it. If they are at liberty to stipulate against hazardous occupations, unhealthy climates, or death by the hands of the law, or in consequence of injuries received when intoxicated, surely it is competent for them to stipulate against intentional self-destruction, whether it be the voluntary act of an accountable moral agent or not. It is not perceived why they cannot limit their liability, if the assured is in proper language told of the extent of the limitation, and it is not against public policy. The words of this stipulation, 'shall die by suicide (sane or insane),' must receive a reasonable construction. If they be taken in a strictly literal sense, their meaning might admit of discussion; but it is obvious that they were not so used. 'Shall die by his own hand, sane or insane,' is, doubtless, a more accurate mode of expression; but it does not more clearly declare the intention of the parties. Besides, the authorities uniformly treat the terms 'suicide' and 'dying by one's own hand,' in policies of life insurance, as synonymous, and the popular understanding accords with this interpretation. Chief Justice Tindall, in Borradaile v. Hunter, 5 Mann. & Gr. 668, says, 'The expression, 'dying by his own hand,' is, in fact, no more than the translation into English of the word of Latin origin, 'suicide." Life insurance companies indiscriminately use either phrase, as conveying the same idea. If the words, 'shall commit suicide,' standing alone in a policy, import self-murder, so do the words, 'shall die by his own hand.' Either mode of expression, when accompanied by qualifying words, must receive the same construction. This being so, there is no difficulty in defining the sense in...