Strang v. Camden Lodge, A. O. U. W. of N.Y.

• Decision Date: 12 June 1906
• Citation: 64 A. 93,73 N.J.L. 500
• Parties: STRANG v. CAMDEN LODGE, A. O. U. W. OF NEW JERSEY, et al.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

64 A. 93

73 N.J.L. 500

STRANG

v. CAMDEN LODGE, A. O. U. W. OF NEW JERSEY, et al.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

June 12, 1906.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Application by the state, on the relation of George Strang, for writ of mandamus to Camden Lodge, A. O. U. W. of New Jersey, and others. Writ denied.

Argued November term, 1906, before FORT, GARRETSON, and REED, JJ.

Howard Carrow, for relator. J. I. Blair Reilly and William A. Barkalow, for respondents.

GARRETSON, J. This is an application for a writ of mandamus commanding and enjoining Camden Lodge, Ancient Order of United Workmen of New Jersey, to restore the relator to membership in the lodge and to compel them to accept his monthly dues and assessments. The Ancient Order of United Workmen is a fraternal beneficial association. Camden Lodge is a subordinate lodge under the jurisdiction of the Grand Lodge of New Jersey, and subject to its laws, rules, and regulations. The Grand Lodge of New Jersey is subordinate to and under the jurisdiction of the Supreme Lodge, and subject to its laws, rules, and regulations. April 20, 1881, the relator applied to Camden Lodge for a degree, and in his application agreed that compliance on his part "with all the laws, regulations, and requirements which are or may be hereafter enacted by said order is the express condition upon which I am to be entitled to participate in the beneficiary fund and have and enjoy all the other benefits and privileges of said order." April 25, 1881, a beneficiary certificate was issued to relator entitling him to participate in the beneficiary fund of the order to the amount of $2,000 payable to his wife at his death. The certificate contained these words, "this certificate is issued upon the express condition that said George Strang shall, in every particular while a member of said order, comply with all the laws, rules, and requirements of said order." The following general law of the order was adopted in 1898, by the Grand Lodge of New Jersey, and has been in effect ever since: "Any member of the order who shall after August 1, 1808, enter into the business of selling by retail intoxicating liquors as a beverage shall be expelled from the order. Provided that any member of the order who shall after August 1, 1808, have entered or who shall hereafter enter into the business or occupation of selling by retail intoxicating liquors as a beverage shall stand suspended from any and all rights to participate in the beneficiary fund of the order and his beneficiary certificate shall become null and void from and after the date of his so engaging in said occupation and no action of the lodge of which he is a member or of the Grand Lodge or any officer thereof shall be necessary or a condition precedent to such suspension. In case any assessment shall be received from a member who has thus engaged in such occupation after August 1, 1808, the receipt thereof shall not continue the beneficiary certificate of such member in force nor shall it be a waiver of his so engaging in such occupation." This has also been a law of the Supreme Lodge since 1898. The relator engaged in the business or occupation of selling by retail Intoxicating liquors as a beverage in January, 1905, and has continued in that business ever since. The relator paid his assessments up to the month of May, 1905. In the month of May, 1905, there became due an assessment of $3.84 which the relator offered to the financier of Camden Lodge, which the financier declined and refused to accept. The lodge has never taken any action to suspend the relator as a member of the lodge except that the financier announced at the first meeting night in June that the relator was suspended because he had entered into the business of selling by retail intoxicating liquors as a beverage. The law of the lodge seems to be self-executing, and that a member who engages in the prohibited business, if subject to the law, becomes eo instante suspended and the cerificate becomes forfeited, and is not continued by the receipt of subsequent assessments, nor is such receipt a waiver of his engaging in such occupation.

The relator contended that he was not bound by this law of the society as to the business of retail liquor dealer because it was an unreasonable limitation upon relator's vested property rights, and was not such a regulation or requirement as was contemplated in his written application for membership. O'Neill v. Legion of Honor, 70 N. J. Law, 410, 57 Atl. 463 (in this court), was upon demurrer to pleas in a suit to recover damages for declaring void a benefit certificate issued to the plaintiff. In that case the Legion of Honor had issued a benefit certificate agreeing to pay to the beneficiary $5,000 upon compliance with all the by-laws of the order then existing or thereafter adopted. Subsequent to issuing the certificate the order amended its by-laws so as to declare that $2,000 should be the highest amount paid on the death of a member upon any certificate theretofore or thereafter issued, and the court in ...