Carter v. John Hancock Mut. Life Ins. Co.
| Decision Date | 22 July 1879 |
| Citation | 127 Mass. 153 |
| Parties | William C. Carter v. John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance Company |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Judgment affirmed.
S Wells, for the defendant.
C. U Bell, for the plaintiff.
OPINION
The plaintiff holds a policy on his own life, issued by the defendant, dated in August 1866, and payable to a person named in it in case of the plaintiff's death within ten years, but to the plaintiff if he should survive that period. It is termed an endowment policy. It contains an express condition, "that, if any premium due upon this policy shall not be paid at the day when the same is payable, this policy shall thereupon become forfeited and void; this condition, however, being subject to the provisions of the 186th chapter of the acts of the Legislature of Massachusetts in the year 1861, entitled 'An Act to regulate the forfeitures of policies of life insurance.'"
The plaintiff paid in cash, or by his own notes, all the several annual premiums except the last one, due in August 1875. This he did not pay. The company had due notice that the plaintiff had survived the period of ten years named in the policy. The question to be decided is whether, notwithstanding his failure to pay the last premium, he is now entitled to recover the amount of the insurance. This depends on the effect to be given to the reference in the policy to the St. of 1861.
It is not necessary, in deciding this case, to consider the question whether the St. of 1861 applies, by its own force, to endowment insurance policies, so called, because the forfeiture clause in the plaintiff's policy is, in terms, made subject to the conditions of that statute. The only question, therefore, is as to the construction to be given to the forfeiture clause, thus qualified.
The defendant contends that the effect of the statute when incorporated into the policy is merely to keep it alive for a certain period of temporary insurance, after the failure of the assured to pay the stipulated premium when due, and to make the sum insured payable only in case of the death of the assured before the expiration of that period. The plaintiff, on the other hand, contends that the effect is to make the sum insured payable if either the death of the assured or the expiration of the ten years occurs during the period of temporary insurance. The defendant relies on the language of the second section of the statute, which provides that, if the death of the assured occurs within the term of temporary insurance, the company shall be bound to pay the amount of the policy; and argues that, as the statute specifies the death as the contingency on which the liability to pay depends, there can be no liability after the failure to pay the premium, except in case of death.
It is to be observed, however, that...
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