Court Opinion

ID: 5470782
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-01-09 20:37:32.549344+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:33:13.900462
License: Public Domain

Van Brunt, J.
The case of Cohen agt. The New York Mutual Life Insurance Company (50 N. Y., 610) is an authority directly sustaining the right of the court to entertain an action like the one at bar.
In that case it was held that, as the contract of life insurance is a peculiar one, and as it is fit and proper that the parties should know their rights under such a contract, where the present rights under such a contract are denied, a proper case is made out for the exercise of the equitable powers of the court.
That case seems also to dispose of the claim made by the defendants that the plaintiff has no standing in court, because the tender of the premiums has not been kept good. In that case there was no allegation that the tender had been kept good, yet the plaintiff was granted relief. The-only remaining question is a question of fact, viz.: Were false representations made to the defendants in respect to the health of Simon Mausbach, at the time of the application upon the policy in question ?
The evidence upon the part of the defense to sustain their claim in this regard, consists of the testimony of two physicians, who claim to have examined the assured in the year, 1873, and to - have found, from- such examination and from the statements made by the assured to them, that he had been suffering, anterior to the issuance of the policy upon his life, with chronic bronchitis and asthma, and had consulted physicians in Europe in respect thereto. If the testimony of these physicians is to be taken as true, then there clearly were misrepresentations made to the defendants as to the health of the assured, and they would have the right to cancel the policy which they had issued.
It seems to me apparent that the judgment of these phy*500sicians depended upon the statements alleged to have been made to them by the assured, rather than from any examination which they themselves made. At the time of this examination, it was entirely immaterial to them whether the disease was of long standing or of recent contraction,-and their examination of the patient was so cursory and superficial that it doesn’t seem possible that any solid judgment could have been based thereon. Neither was any satisfactory evidence given to show that it is possible, upon an examination of a patient, to tell whether the disease is ti'f two or four years standing. If it is possible to determine, with any degrée of certainty, the length of time during which the disease has been progressing by the changes, in the symptoms or otherwise, then it is equally certain that upon an examination being made during the time the disease is thus progressing, that its presence would be. detected.
Yet we find, from the evidence in this case, that a physician examined the assured at the time of the application for this assurance and found no evidences of any disease. We find, also, that the friends and acquaintances of the assured never saw any indications of any disease, nor is there any evidence whatever, that he had ever consulted a physician where he had lived for years.
It seems to me, therefore, that the evidence is entirely insufficient to justify me in holding that, at the time of the application for the insurance, the assured was suffering with this disease, as claimed by the defendants.
The plaintiff is entitled to judgment, with costs.