McJunkin v. McJunkin's Estate

• Decision Date: 22 March 1973
• Docket Number: No. 18051,18051
• Citation: 493 S.W.2d 278
• Parties: Charles H. McJUNKIN, Appellant, v. ESTATE of Howard M. McJUNKIN, Herbert Henry McJunkin, Sr., Executor, Appellee.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

Page 278

493 S.W.2d 278

Charles H. McJUNKIN, Appellant, v. ESTATE of Howard M. McJUNKIN, Herbert Henry McJunkin, Sr. Executor, Appellee.

No. 18051.

Court of Civil Appeals of Texas Dallas.

March 22, 1973.

Robert C. Johnson, Jr., Grady, Johnson, Smith & Blakeley, Dallas, for appellant.

Paul J. Chitwood, Chitwood, Riley & Thompson, Dallas, for appellee .

BATEMAN, Justice.

This is a suit for damages for breach of contract. The appellant Charles H. McJunkin sued his father's estate and appeals from a take nothing judgment rendered by the trial court sitting without a jury. The case is submitted on an agreed statement of the facts.

Appellant's father, Howard M. McJunkin, had a National Service Life Insurance policy insuring his life in the sum of $10,000. He was divorced from appellant's mother and in the community property settlement agreement he agreed to execute and deliver to the proper governmental agency an appropriate written form naming appellant as the irrevocable beneficiary of the full amount of said policy, specifically waiving and surrendering the right to change the beneficiary at any future time, provided that appellant pay 'from the proceeds' thereof certain funeral expenses of his father. The trial court concluded as a matter of law that this portion of the agreement was illegal, void and unenforceable because of applicable federal statutes. These statutes are parts of §§ 717 and 3101 of 38 U.S.C.A., as follows:

' § 717.

(a) The insured shall have the right to designate the beneficiary or beneficiaries of insurance maturing on or after August 1, 1946, and shall, subject to regulations, at all times have the right to change the beneficiary or beneficiaries of such insurance without the consent of such beneficiary or beneficiaries.

' § 3101.

(a) Payments of benefits due or to become due under any law administered by the Veterans' Administration shall not be assignable except to the extent specifically authorized by law, and such payments made to, or on account of, a beneficiary shall be exempt from taxation, shall be exempt from the claim of creditors, and shall not be liable to attachment, levy, or seizure by or under any legal or equitable process whatever, either before or after receipt by the beneficiary.'

After his father's death, appellant discovered that contrary to the said agreement the father had changed the beneficiary to another . Appellant makes no claim against the government, nor against the last named beneficiary, and does not assert any right in or to the policy or the proceeds thereof. He sues solely for damages arising from breach by his father of the agreement not to change the beneficiary.

In Wissner v. Wissner, 338 U.S. 655, 70 S.Ct. 398, 400, 94 L.Ed. 424 (1950), the contest for the proceeds of a similar National Service Life Insurance policy was between the parents of the deceased soldier, who had been named as beneficiaries, and the soldier's widow, who claimed one-half the proceeds under the community property laws of California. In construing the statutes quoted above the United States Supreme Court held that the Congress had 'spoken with force and clarity in directing that the proceeds belong to the named beneficiary and no other.' The California courts had held that the widow had a 'vested right' to the insurance proceeds, but the United States Supreme Court held otherwise, saying:

'Whether directed at the very money received from the Government or an equivalent amount, the judgment below nullifies the soldier's choice and frustrates the deliberate purpose of Congress. It cannot stand.'

In Woolsey v. Panhandle Refining Co., 131 Tex. 449, 116 S.W.2d 675, 678 (1938), the principal question was whether an employer and an employee could make a valid contract obligating the employer to furnish lifetime employment to the employee in consideration of his agreement not to file a claim with the Industrial Accident Board. In view of the provision in the Texas Workmen's Compensation Act requiring that an agreed settlement be within the terms of the Act, and that a lump sum settlement is unenforceable without approval of the Industrial Accident Board, our Supreme Court held that the agreement, being in violation of the Act, was void and unenforceable .

Williams v. Williams, 255 N.C. 315, 121 S.E.2d 536 (1961), involved a separation and property settlement agreement between the parties in which the husband had agreed that he would maintain and keep in force certain policies of government insurance on his life in which the wife was designated the beneficiary, and that he would not change the beneficiary. The parties were then divorced and the husband remarried and changed the beneficiary. The Supreme Court of North Carolina held that this agreement was in effect an assignment of the proceeds of the policies, which was prohibited by federal statute, that the agreement was...