Caudell v. Woodward
| Decision Date | 19 February 1895 |
| Parties | Caudell v. Woodward. |
| Court | Kentucky Court of Appeals |
Mrs. Matilda Woodward, deceased, was a member of the United Order of the Golden Cross, a benevolent institution, organized under the laws of the State of Tennessee, but a subordinate commandery of which had been organized at Louisville. The purpose of the order was to unite, fraternally, persons of every honorable profession, business, &c., to give moral and material aid to the members, and to establish a benefit fund, out of which, upon the death of a member, a sum of not exceeding two thousand dollars should be paid in accordance with the provisions of the charter and constitution to be hereafter considered.
The certificate of Mrs. Woodward was payable, one-half to her son, James Woodward, and one-half to her friend, Catherine Caudell. In the contest over this fund the court below adjudged the whole of it to the son, and Caudell has appealed.
It is agreed by both sides that the charter of the incorporation and the constitution of the commanderies contain the law by which the fund is to be controlled and the case determined. The former provides that the objects of the order are:
1. "To unite fraternally all acceptable men and women. *
2. "To give all moral and material aid in its power to members. * *
3. "To establish a benefit fund, from which a sum, not to exceed two thousand dollars, shall be paid at the death of each member to his or her family, or to be disposed of as he or she may direct.
4. "To establish a fund for the relief of sick and distressed members," &c.
The constitution provides, among the objects of the order, as follows:
3. "To establish a benefit fund, from which, on satisfactory evidence of the death of a beneficiary member of the order, who has complied with all its lawful requirements, a sum not exceeding two thousand dollars, in each class, shall be paid, as he or she may have directed while living and as contained in the benefit certificate."
Section 2, of General Law, No. II, under the head of Benefit Certificates, provides thus:
"Applicants shall enter upon the medical examiner's blank the name or names of the members of their family, or those dependent upon them, to whom they desire their benefit paid, and the same shall be entered in the benefit certificate by the Supreme Keeper of Records."
Further, in an exhibit purporting to have been filed with Mrs. Caudell's answer, which is a circular issued by the order, we find among the objects of the order this significant provision:
3. "To establish a benefit fund, from which, on the satisfactory evidence of the death of a member, who has complied with all lawful requirements of the order, a sum not to exceed two thousand...
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... ... designation of a person prohibited by law from being the ... beneficiary. See Caudell v. Woodward, 96 Ky. 646, 29 ... S.W. 614; Weigelman v. Bronger, 96 Ky. 132, 28 S.W ... 334; and Cooke, Life Ins. & Ben. Soc. p. 106. In Beard v ... ...
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...counsel that the judgment complained of follows Basye v. Adams, 81 Ky. 368; Weigelman v. Bronger, 96 Ky. 132, 28 S.W. 334; Caudell v. Woodward, 96 Ky. 646, 29 S.W. 614; Beard v. Sharp, 100 Ky. 606, 38 S.W. 1057; but it earnestly insisted that the question was not really presented to the cou......