Los Angeles herald., 1892-08-30
LIFE INSURANCE FOR WOMEN.
why a wife Should Never Insure Her Life
in Favor of Her Husband.

Whv a wife Should Never Insure Her Life
in Favor of Her Husband.
The subject of life insurance is begin
ming to attract attention among women.
It is known that though the aggregate
volume of the sum payable on life poll
cies in Europe and America amounts to
the enormous figure of $4,000, 900 ,O00--
a sum exceeding the total cost of all the
railroads in the world added to all the
national debts-the risks taken out on
female lives amount to comparatively
small sum. This has arisen partly from
the unwillingness of life insurance COM
panies to insure women, a feeling which
induces some companies to refuse to in
sure them at all, while others charge
per cent. additional for female risks. and
partly from the fact that the woman is
not, as rule, the family breadwinner
and her death does not, save in excep-
tional cases, require to be guarded
against in a pecuniary point of view
Still the number of women whose de-
mise would take bread out of the mouths
of others is on the increase.
Companies object to take female risks
because women are exposed to die of
casualties and diseases from which men
are exempt. But, on the other hand,
men are exposed to die of accidents or of
diseases produced by reckless lives quite
as frequently as women perish in child
birth or from diseases incident to mater
nifty. The sexes are fairly on an equal
ity in this respect. 1t is probable that
healthy young woman of twenty, wheth-
er married or unmarried, is about as
good a risk as young man of the same
age.
Some Of the companies raise the point
whether any one has an insurable inter-
est in the life of a woman. A mans wife
and children have an insurable interest
in his life, but who suffers a pecuniary
loss when girl or married woman
dies7 Certainly not, as general rule,
the father, OF the mother, or the broth
ers and sisters of the former, or the hus-
band Of the latter; they may be plunged
into deep affliction, but affliction cannot
be measured in dollars.
But the case alters if the girl or the
married woman belongs to the working
class, so that she is in whole OF in part
the breadwinner for the household; then
her father, mother, brothers, sisters,
children, and possibly her husband,
may have an interest in her life which
can be insured. II she belongs to the
leisure class, and does not contribute by
her daily exertions to the daily susie
nance of her family, it is not easy to see
who has an interest in her life which
could be appraised in dollars, and for
which company could make compensa-
ton in the form of check.
1t is common, when marriage takes
place between young people who have no
fortune and expect to be dependent on
the husbands exertions, for the man to
insure his life in favor of his wife and
children. This is one of the most benef-
icent uses of life insurance. Formerly,
more frequently than now, the consorts
assured their lives reciprocally, each in
favor of the other. This operation never
could be reconciled with business prin-
ciples or sound ethics.
Experience. moreover, has developed
the unpleasant fact that the mortality
among women whose lives are insured
III IaVOT OF Uu6lT uuSDduuS lS larger UudH
the ordinary mortality tables warrant.
1t is terrible thing to say, but doctors
and criminal lawyers believe the crime
of wife murder to be much more fire.
quent than is commonly supposed. 1t is
a crime that is rarely suspected, and
still more rarely detected. A woman is
taken i'll with strange pain. She con-
suits doctor, who knows that women
are always having strange pains, and
that they generally arise from very SIM
pie causes. He prescribes for this or that
organic trouble. The pain continues.
The woman tries other medicines, which
have relieved friends of hers under sim
liar circumstances. The husband acts
as nurse and gives the medicines. In
these days Of science, toxicology knows
dozen drugs which are difficult to de-
tect by smell, taste OF sight, but which,
if regularly administered, will sap life
and eventually cause death.
AS general rule, a girl should refuse
to insure her life in favor of her hus-
band, and a we'll administered company
should refuse to issue such a policy
San Francisco Argonaut.