Long v. St. Joseph Life Ins. Co.

• Decision Date: 09 April 1923
• Docket Number: No. 22692.,22692.
• Citation: 248 S.W. 923
• Parties: LONG v. ST. JOSEPH LIFE INS. CO.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

248 S.W. 923

LONG v. ST. JOSEPH LIFE INS. CO.

No. 22692.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 2.

April 9, 1923.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Harrison County; L. B. Woods, Judge.

Action by U. S. G. Long against the St. Joseph Life Insurance Company. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appealed to the Court of Appeals, where the judgment was affirmed, and the case was certified to the Supreme Court (225 S. W. 106). Affirmed.

Robert A. Brown and Richard L. Douglas, both of St. Joseph, for appellant.

Barlow, Barlow & Kautz, of Bethany, J. M. Johnson, of Kansas City, and J. D. Hill, of Okmulgee, Okl., for respondent.

WHITE, J.

This case was certified to this court by the Kansas City Court of Appeals, because of supposed conflict with certain decisions of the Springfield Court of Appeals. The opinion of the Court of Appeals clearly states the facts and correctly determines the issues. See 225 S. W. 106.

Since the rendition of that opinion by the Kansas City Court of Appeals, several courts have announced conclusions in harmony with it. Barnett v. Merchants' Life Ins. Co. (Old. Sup.) 208 Pac. 271, loc. cit. 273; Rex Health & Accident Ins. Co. v. Pettiford, 74 Ind. App. 507, 129 N. E. 248; Boatwright v. American Life Ins. Co., 191 Iowa, 253, 180 N. W. 321, 11 A. L. R. 1085; Benham v. American Central Life Ins. Co., 140 Ark. 612, 217 S. W. 462, loc. cit. 463; Nutt v. Security Life Ins. Co., 142 Ark. 29, 218 S. W. 675. In each of those cases there was a provision limiting the liability of the company in case of death while the insured "was engaged in any military or naval service in time of war," or provisions of similar import. The Supreme Court of Kansas has decided the question differently. Bradshaw v. Farmers' & Bankers' Life Ins. Co., 107 Kan. 681, 193 Pac. 332, 11 A. L. R. 1091.

That provision of the policy must be interpreted with an understanding of the general purpose of the contract. Against what contingencies did the insurer intend to protect itself ? It is plain that it did not intend to except from the hazards, against which it undertook to insure, the ordinary risks of military life, such risks as attended the performance of any kind of military duty in circumstances of peace. It is only the hazards of war that were excepted.

In this instance the insured never went to France. He was in training camp; after the Armistice he went home on furlough, and while at home he died of pneumonia induced by influenza—a complaint as prevalent out of the army as in it. To hold that the insured was not at the time "engaged in military service in time of war" is to interpret the language of the stipulation according to its most apparent meaning and in accordance with the general purpose of the contract. We might say of a merchant or lawyer that he was engaged in the mercantile business or the law business, if he was away from his place of business on a vacation. That would, however, be because he had a direct interest in the business, and a personal and direct influence upon its operation, although absent. According to the construction of all the courts, an employee of a railroad company is not engaged in interstate traffic, unless at the very time at which the question is to be determined he is employed in the direct furtherance of interstate traffic, or engaged in work so closely connected with interstate traffic as necessarily to become a part...