Jones v. Hollywood Style Shop

• Decision Date: 31 May 1933
• Docket Number: No. 9202.,9202.
• Citation: 62 S.W.2d 167
• Parties: JONES v. HOLLYWOOD STYLE SHOP.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

Page 167

62 S.W.2d 167

JONES v. HOLLYWOOD STYLE SHOP.

No. 9202.

Court of Civil Appeals of Texas. San Antonio.

May 31, 1933.

Rehearing Denied June 28, 1933.

Appeal from Cameron County Court; A. M. Kent, Judge.

Suit by the Hollywood Style Shop against Elliott Jones, Attorney in Fact for Lloyd's America. From an order overruling the defendant's plea of privilege, the defendant appeals.

Order affirmed.

Ingrum, Smith & Morris, of San Antonio, for appellant.

C. M. Wunderman, of San Benito, and Seabury, George & Taylor, of Brownsville, for appellee.

FLY, Chief Justice.

This is a suit filed by appellee against appellant, on a policy of fire insurance given by the appellant on merchandise in Harlingen, Cameron county. Appellant filed its plea of privilege to be sued in Bexar county, where its principal offices were located. The plea of privilege was contested on the ground that appellant had an agent in Harlingen. The plea of privilege was denied by the district court.

The Lloyd's plan of insurance is authorized by chapter 19, articles 5013 to 5023, inclusive, of the Revised Statutes of 1925, together with several amendments thereto (Vernon's Ann. Civ. St. arts. 5013-5023). The plan is evidently one adopted from the well-known and historic Lloyd's of England, and was originally organized, and is still so organized, to permit citizens to engage in certain classes of insurance without involving its underwriters, except to the amount invested by them in the scheme. The "plan" is sui generis in America in the field of insurance. There is no provision in the statute for the issuance of a charter, but it provided that an attorney shall be appointed and he shall, or may, be issued a permit by the commissioners of insurance in Texas to operate, giving the name of the attorney and the location of the principal office of said attorney. Provision is made for service on the attorney or one or more of the underwriters. In this case service was had on Elliott Jones, described as attorney in fact for Lloyd's.

It may be enlightening, as well as interesting, to copy herein a brief history of the origin and objects of the plan in England, as given in Cyclopedia of Law and Procedure, on page 1524, in its effort to illuminate American minds on this novel English plan of insurance. It is as follows:

"What is familiarly known as a `Lloyd's' contract or policy of insurance, (is) where the insurers are such as individuals and not as a corporate insurance company, and where the liability for loss, under the contract, of the individual underwriters is several and not joint." English L. Dict.

"Origin and history.—In times of William the Third and Queen Anne, when coffee-houses in London were the fashionable places of resort, Lloyd's coffee-house, at the corner of Abchurch Lane, Lombard Street, became the wonted resort of seafaring men, and those that did business with them. There, and subsequently in Pope's Head Alley, and ultimately on the west side of the old Royal Exchange, to which place the coffee-house was successively removed, the underwriters of London congregated, having formed at this centre an association among themselves, and with it a system of agency radiating everywhere. Lloyd's underwriters now meet and carry on their business in subscription rooms over the Royal Exchange, still called Lloyd's. The affairs of the subscribers to these rooms are managed by a committee, chosen from their own number, called Lloyd's committee, and presided over by...