Carrigan v. Massachusetts Ben Ass'n

• Decision Date: 01 October 1884
• Citation: 26 F. 230
• Parties: CARRIGAN v. MASSACHUSETTS BENEFIT ASS'N. [1]
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania

26 F. 230

CARRIGAN v. MASSACHUSETTS BENEFIT ASS'N. ^[1]

United States Circuit Court, E.D. Pennsylvania.

October, 1884

This was an action brought to recover $5,000 on a policy of insurance on the life of Mary A. McCaffrey, for the benefit of her sister, Margaret Carrigan, the plaintiff. The declaration was in covenant, and set out the policy at length. The defendants filed a plea of 'covenants performed, absque hoc, with leave to give in evidence the special matter,' and several special pleas, alleging-- First, that the application on which the policy was issued was a forgery; that Mary A. McCaffrey never signed it second, that the insured was in the last stage of consumption at the time the application was made, which represented her to be in robust and perfect health; third, that the policy in suit was part of a conspiracy entered into by the plaintiff the examining physician, and several others, to cheat and defraud the defendant association and others out of large sums of money. The case was tried before Judges MCKENNAN and BUTLER, in the United States circuit court, at Philadelphia October 15, 1885, and a verdict was rendered for the defendants. The plaintiff offered in evidence the policy and proofs of loss, and proved the death of the insured, and there rested. The defendants proved that the signature to the application purporting to be that of Mary McCaffrey was not her genuine signature, whereupon the plaintiff's counsel admitted such to be the fact, but claimed that her name was signed thereto in her absence by one John J. Devlin, who had been told by the insured to sign her name to the application in case she were not present when it should be presented for her signature. The defendants then offered in evidence the application, which was objected to by the plaintiff, on the ground that a copy of the application had not been incorporated in or attached to the policy; and, in support of this objection, presented and read the following statute, passed by the legislature of Pennsylvania, and approved May 11, 1881.

'Be it enacted, etc., that all life and fire insurance policies upon the lives or property of persons within this commonwealth, whether issued by companies organized under the laws of this state, or by foreign companies doing business therein, which contain any reference to the application of the insured, or the constitution, by-laws, or other rules of the company, either as forming part of the policy of contract between the parties thereto, or having any bearing on said contract, shall contain, or have attached to said policies, correct copies of the application, as signed by the applicant, and the by-laws referred to; and, unless so attached and accompanying the policy, no such application, constitution, or by-laws shall be received in evidence, in any controversy between the parties to, or interested in, the said policy, nor shall such application or by-laws be considered a part of the policy or contract between such parties.'

The plaintiff contended that under this law the application could not be admitted; that the penalty for a failure to attach a copy of the application to the policy was the absolute exclusion of the application from the case, and was so intended by the legislature. The defendants contended that they offered it for the purpose of establishing or showing fraud, and not as a part of the contract of insurance, though the policy referred to it and made it a part of the contract; that the legislature never intended to shield and reward a fraud, but only that the terms of the policy itself should not be varied or modified by the introduction or admission in evidence of the application, where no copy was attached to the policy.

After argument of counsel, the court rendered the following decision.

J. Rich. Grier and James M. West, for plaintiff.

W. S. Campbell, for defendant.

BUTLER J.

When this case was previously tried this application was produced, as it is now, for the purpose of proving fraud. I said then it was not necessary to consider (in the view I took of the law) whether the statute is in any case applicable to the trial of a cause in this court. I intimated no opinion or impression respecting it. Since that time this question has been decided, not upon this statute, but upon a similar statute, in New York. The statute is held to be applicable to trial in this court.

The decision of that question, however, now, as it then was, is unnecessary, because the...