Shadgett v. Phillips & Crew Co.

• Decision Date: 17 December 1901
• Citation: 131 Ala. 478,31 So. 20
• Parties: SHADGETT ET AL. v. PHILLIPS & CREW CO.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

31 So. 20

131 Ala. 478

SHADGETT ET AL. v. PHILLIPS & CREW CO.

Supreme Court of Alabama

December 17, 1901

Appeal from chancery court, Henry county; W. L. Parks, Chancellor.

Bill by the Phillips & Crew Company against Minnie Shadgett and others. From a decree in favor of complainant, defendants appeal. Reversed.

Espy Farmer & Espy, for appellants.

J. B Dell, for appellee.

SHARPE J.

Unless the mere fact that Mrs. Shadgett received the piano as a gift from her husband, with knowledge of his obligation to insure it for complainant's benefit, placed her in the shoes of her husband with respect to that obligation, it is impossible to recognize any principle upon which complainant can claim the insurance money in controversy. The contract of insurance was wholly between the defendant and the insurance company and was personal, in the sense that the money agreed to be paid in case of loss was not to stand in the place of the piano itself, but was a mere indemnity against the loss of defendant's interest therein. If her interest was small on account of incumbrances existing in favor of complainant that fact was for the consideration only of the insurer and defendant, for complainant has no concern with the adjustment of the loss between them. We know of no principle either of law or equity which would bind defendant to carry out her donor's contract to insure, in the absence of any agreement on her part to do so, even though the property in her hands was subject to complainant's rights therein as a conditional vendor. In the case of Miller v. Aldrich, 31 Mich. 408, relied on for complainant, not only was there an agreement on the part of the mortgagor that mortgaged property should be kept insured by the mortgagor for the mortgagee's benefit, but a policy had been taken out accordingly, and thereafter the mortgagor sold the property, and his vendee, in conjunction with the mortgagor, procured a discontinuance of that policy, and the issuance of another payable to the vendee alone. This was held to be a wrong to the mortgagee, in that it deprived him of that which had been already provided for his security; and to prevent such wrong the court of equity interposed by decreeing payment of the proceeds of the second insurance to the first mortgagor, whose rights he had helped to displace. It is true, it was said by the court that the agreement with the mortgagee to insure for his benefit "was, in equity,...