Riddlesbarger v. Hartford Insurance Company
| Decision Date | 01 December 1868 |
| Citation | 19 L.Ed. 257,7 Wall. 386,74 U.S. 386 |
| Parties | RIDDLESBARGER v. HARTFORD INSURANCE COMPANY |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
ERROR to the Circuit Court for Missouri.
This was an action against the Hartford Insurance Company upon a policy of insurance in the sum of five thousand dollars, issued by the said company, a corporation created under the laws of Connecticut, to the plaintiff, upon a brick building, belonging to him, situated in Kansas City, in the State of Missouri. The policy bore date on the first of June, 1861, and was for one year. The building was destroyed by fire in March, 1862, and in June following the plaintiff brought an action for the loss sustained in the Kansas City Court of Common Pleas, in the county of Jackson in that State. To this action the defendant appeared and answered to the merits, and the cause continued in that court until June, 1864, when it was dismissed by the plaintiff. Within one year after this dismissal the present action was commenced in the Court of Common Pleas in the County of St. Louis, from which it was transferred to the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Missouri.
The policy contained the following condition:
'That no suit or action of any kind against said company for the recovery of any claim upon, under, or by virtue of the said policy shall be sustainable in any court of law or chancery, unless such suit or action shall be commenced within the term of twelve months next after the loss or damage shall occur, and in case any suit or action shall be commenced against said company after the expiration of twelve months next after such loss or damage shall have occurred, the lapse of time shall be taken and deemed as conclusive evidence against the validity of such claim thereby so attempted to be enforced.'
To the present action the defendant pleaded this condition. The plaintiff replied the commencement of the first action in the Kansas City Court of Common Pleas within the year stipulated in the condition, and the commencement of the present action within one year after the dismissal of that action. To the replication the defendant demurred.
The statute of limitations of Missouri, after prescribing various periods of limitation for different actions, provides that if in any action commenced within the periods mentioned, the plaintiff shall 'suffer a nonsuit,' he may commence a new action within one year afterwards.
The Circuit Court sustained the demurrer, and rendered final judgment thereon for the defendant, and the plaintiff brought the case here by writ of error.
Mr. James Hughes, for the plaintiff in error.
I. Parties cannot by a contract agree upon a limitation different from the statutes within which suit shall be brought, or the right to sue be barred. This would be in conflict with the law and its policy. The point is so expressly ruled by McLean, J.,1 and by the Supreme Court of Indiana which followed him.2
This is an attempt to bar or discharge a right of action before the right accrues. It is a well-settled principle, that a release can only operate upon an existing claim.3
Why has a condition or agreement in a policy, providing that all disputes arising under it shall be referred to arbitration, been held to be void? Because it is an attempt to oust the jurisdiction of the courts.4
II. But if the limitation contract, as to the time of bringing the suit, is valid, and binds the plaintiff to commence his action within twelve months next after the loss occurred, then we insist that inasmuch as the plaintiff did commence his action against the defendant, within the time prescribed, viz., in June, 1862, in the Kansas City Court of Common Pleas, in Jackson County, Missouri, in which he sought to recover, for the same cause of action and none other, that he seeks to recover for in the present suit; to which action defendant appeared and filed an answer to the merits thereof; that said action was pending and undetermined in said court until June, 1864, when plaintiff sufiered a nonsuit therein, and the present action was commenced in the St Louis Court of Common Pleas, in July, 1864, within twelve months after the nonsuit was suffered; then plaintiff has complied with the condition in said contract according to, and in compliance with the then existing laws of Missouri, and is entitled to maintain the present action.5
The contract was made in the State of Missouri, and was made with reference to the then existing laws of that State.
That law became a part of the contract itself, and to that law we must look in giving a construction to the contract; and so far as the remedy is concerned, when suit is brought in that State to enforce a right growing out of that contract, the law of that State must alone govern and determine. The Revised Statute of 1855 were in force when the contract was made, and so continued in force until after the commencement of this suit in the Common Pleas Court of St. Louis County.
The statute of limitations of that State enacts that actions of this kind shall be brought within five years next after the cause of action accrues, provided that if any action be commenced within the time prescribed, and the plaintiff therein 'suffer a nonsuit,' such plaintiff may commence a new action, within one year from the time of such nonsuit suffered.
Mr. R. D. Hubbard, contra.
Mr. Justice FIELD, after stating the case, delivered the opinion of the court, as follows:
By the demurrer to the replication two questions are presented for our determination: First; whether the condition against the maintenance of any action to recover a claim upon the policy, unless commenced within twelve months after the loss, is valid; and Second; whether if valid, the condition was complied with in the present case under the statute of limitations of Missouri.
The objection to the condition is founded upon the notion that the limitation it prescribes contravenes the policy of the statute of limitations. This notion arises from a misconception of the nature and object of statutes of this character. They do not confer any right of action. They are enacted to restrict the period within which the right, otherwise unlimited, might be asserted. They are founded upon the general experience of mankind that claims, which are valid, are not usually allowed to remain...
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