Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1905-10-14

AGhI W4os
The concensus of opinion in regard to
. the insurance investigation now in prog
ress in New York is that it will eyentu-
ate in good for insurers and insured.
Even the most pessimistic opponents of
the principle of life insurance must ad.
nit that better conditions will follow the
publication, not only for the companies
which have been sorely stricken as re-
suit of the moral lapses of their officials,
but for the companies which are suffer
ing vicariously under the shadow of dis
trust that has been cast upon corporate
management generally.
Society cannot afford to throw down"
life insurance because of the remissness
Of high officials in one or two companies.
The principle of protection for the de-
pendent through provision for payment
to them of sufficient to keep the wolf of
want from the door is so closely inter-
woven with the social fabric that if it
were possible to eliminate it by force,
the social order would suffer a severe
strain. Public duty and private philan-
thropy would together be unable to meet
the appeals for assistance from women
and children bereft of their breadwin-
ners. A large proportion of the 1S,00O,-
900 policyholders In the United States
have by their wise provision for the fu-
ture insured organized society as well
incident to sudden dependency. Cases
without number could be cited in every
large city of the United States where
the death payments of life insurance
companies have saved wives and chill
dren from actual want, and made 1t
possible for widows to rear their chill
dren in a way to make them useful mem
bers of society. 1t would be interesting
to know how much of the total of in
surance risks in the United States con-
stitutes a bulwark against poverty. =
large part of the $11 ,179, 142,711 of out
standing insurance would undoubtedly,
on analysis, be found to be protection OF
this vital character.
Bringing the subject close to home, the
people of the northwest have in the
history of the Northwestern Mutual Life
Insurance company of Mllwaukee--a
company of which every resident of the
northwest has special reason to feel
proud-a record which shows how much
a well-cOnducted life insurance company
contributes to the support of the existing
social order. The first record of losses
paid is that for the year ending June /,
1860, $3500-a gocdly sum for a young
company in those times of pioneering
in life insurance, but a mere pittance in
comparison with the princely amount
now paid out annually for death losses.
The death payments increased in logical
proportion to the company's business,
and in ten years January i, 1900
reached $443, 442.S9, quite a large
amount, yet still small in comparison
with the amount now annually paid to
the beneficiaries of the insured. For the
year ending January /, 1886. the death
payments surpassed the million mark for
the first time, aggregating 81 ,O49,004.04
Since that time they have increased with
the company's immense business, until to-
day the payments on account of death
losses approximates seven millions an
nually. The exact figures for the year
ending January l, 1905, are $685.
40303.
Since its organization the Northwest
ern Mutual Life Insurance company has
paid death claims to the aggregate OF
SIS, $50, 552. 96. This enormous sum Of
money has contributed in no small de.
gree TO the welfare of society as a whole.
The prompt payment of the death claims
has in thousands of instances made it
possible for helpless widows to get
along" without appealing to public char
ity or private philanthropy.
The Northwestern Mutual Life lnsur-
ance company's management has been
unswervingly honest, and its history has
been an open book from which the in
sured could read the records at will
The officers of the company have nc
side lines OF official interest. They are
devoted solely to the conservation of the
interests of the policy holders, who are
with them mutually concerned in the
well being of the corporation. 1t is one
of the most substantial life insurance
companies in the United States, and its
record is absolutely stainless.