Court Opinion

ID: 9519436
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 01:16:29.106203+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:44:22.204590
License: Public Domain

BRYANT, J., dissents. It is my opinion that the verdict of the jury and the judgment of the court should be affirmed. The position taken by tbe trial judge, as set forth in tbe majority opinion, “tbat tbe burden is upon tbe insurance company to prove by competent evidence tbat a false answer in tbe application for insurance was material to tbe risk and knowingly was made witb intent to deceive and for tbe purpose of procuring tbe issuance of tbe policy,” is, in my opinion, a correct statement of tbe law. It is also my opinion tbat there were questions of fact which precluded tbe direction of a verdict. It is true tbat Mr. Justice Niemeyer in delivering tbe opinion of tbe court in tbe case of Hamberg v. Mutual Life Ins. Co., 322 Ill. App. 138 (decided in 1944), used tbe language quoted in tbe majority opinion. However, Mr. Presiding Justice O’Connor specially concurred and specifically disagreed witb the principle enunciated in tbe quotation mentioned above, and said tbat in tbe construction of tbe section of tbe Insurance Code here involved, being section 154 (Ill. Rev. Stats. 1955, chap. 73, par. 766), tbe word “or” after tbe word “deceive” should be construed to mean “and,” and in this special concurring opinion Mr. Justice Matcbett concurred for tbe same reasons. Thus, although tbe quotation in tbe majority opinion here is from tbe opinion of tbe court, tbe majority of tbe court did not agree witb tbat interpretation. I also note tbat Mr. Presiding Justice O’Connor in tbat opinion cited with approval tbe article of Professor Harold C. Havigburst appearing in 32 Ill. Law Rev. 391, and particularly tbat part relating to this section of tbe Insurance Code, beginning on page 402. Tbe article appears to have been cogently reasoned and written, and its citation witb approval by tbe majority of tbe court in the Hamberg case was entirely warranted. I also note tbat in tbe case of Mid-States Ins. Co. v. Brandon, 340 Ill. App. 470, where tbe opinion was written by Mr. Presiding Justice Lewe and was concurred in by Justices Burke and Kiley, the court said, in quoting tbe decision in the Hamberg case, that in that case “this court in construing the foregoing statute held that the word ‘or’ after the word ‘deceive’ should be construed to mean ‘and.’ ” Both of these cases are cited as authorities in an article by Chase M. Smith on Automobile Insurance, 42 Ill. Bar Journal 146, at 148. In the case of La Penta v. Mut. Trust Life Ins. Co., 4 Ill.App.2d 60, where Mr. Justice McCormick delivered the opinion of the court and Mr. Presiding Justice Schwartz and Mr. Justice Robson concurred, the court discussed this section of the Insurance Code, being section 154, and quoted with approval the special concurring opinions of Mr. Presiding Justice O’Connor and Mr. Justice Matchett and cited the fact that this construction had been approved in the case of Mid-States Ins. Co. v. Brandon, supra, and again accepted their earlier interpretation. Entirely independent of the factual situation in the instant case, it would seem highly incredible to me that it was intended that a misrepresentation which could “materially affect either the acceptance of the risk or the hazard assumed by the company” but which was made entirely inadvertently by the applicant, without any knowledge of what was his actual condition and without the slightest idea of deceiving the insurance company, could by itself be sufficient to void the insurance policy; and, on the other hand, it would seem equally preposterous that a misrepresentation or false warranty which was “made with actual intent to deceive” and with knowledge of its falsity, but which had no materiality upon the acceptance of the risk or the hazard assumed by the policy, could be grounds to deprive the insured of the benefits of his contract. The provisions set forth in this section of the statute are so analogous to representations in other fraudulent transactions, where they must he false, knowingly made with intent to deceive, material to the action to be taken and relied upon, that to hold them to be disjunctive and not necessarily concurrent would create an anomalous situation. I see no reason for disturbing the law as interpreted by this court since 1944 in regard to the interpretation of section 154 of the Insurance Code, and, in my opinion, to give the section any other interpretation would be in derogation of the rights of the insured, as so correctly pointed out in Professor Havighurst’s article and the ensuing decisions of this court.