Court Opinion

ID: 9671105
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:31:05.879435+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:07.906617
License: Public Domain

George Rose Smith, J., dissenting. The policy sued upon lapsed, at the expiration of the grace period, on November 12. There is no proof that the policy had ever been allowed to lapse before; so of course there is no proof of a custom on the part of the insurer to accept the payment of premiums after the expiration of the grace period. By the terms of the contract, however, the insured was entitled to have the policy reinstated, upon the payment of the past-due premiums and the submission of evidence of good health. Brewer died soon after midnight on the morning of November 19. That afternoon Mrs. Brewer, without knowledge of her husband’s death, left the amount of the overdue premiums at her neighbor’s house. The insurer’s agent, also without knowledge of Brewer’s death, went by and picked up the money. When the agent, still later in the day, learned of Brewer’s death he returned to the neighbor’s house, canceled the receipt in the premium book, and left a temporary receipt with the neighbor. Eight days later the insurer forwarded its check for the amount of the premiums collected on November 19. This tender was refused by Mrs. Brewer. On these facts alone it could not be seriously contended that the agent’s acceptance of the premiums effected a reinstatement of the policy. As far as I know, the authorities are uniform in holding that the insurer is not bound by its acceptance of premiums, upon a lapsed policy, without knowledge of the insured’s earlier death. Appleman on Insurance, § 2058; Sovereign Camp, W.O.W., v. Cox, 221 Ala. 58, 127 So. 847; Dillon v. National Council, 244 Ill. 202, 91 N. E. 417; Boll v. Catholic Knights, 220 Wis. 312, 265 N. W. 70. At most the insurer is required, in this situation, to return the premiums without unreasonable delay, but that requirement was met in this case. The majority impose liability on the ground that Mrs. Brewer and the insurer’s agent, two or three days before November 19, agreed that she would leave the premiums with her neighbor on that day. What happened, according to the stipulated facts, was that Mrs. Brewer visited the agent’s office to obtain a check for the cash value of a different policy which Brewer had elected to surrender. On that visit, the stipulation states, “it was agreed by and between plaintiff and Durham [the agent] that plaintiff would get the check endorsed by Virl Brewer and would leave certain premiums on [the policy in question] at the home of her next door neighbor on Monday, November 19. ’ ’ To say that ‘ ‘ it was agreed ’ ’ does not, in my opinion, satisfy the plaintiff’s burden of proving a binding contract. It is not suggested that there was any consideration for this agreement. Had Brewer lived and had Mrs. Brewer changed her mind about reinstating the policy, surely no one supposes that the insurer could have enforced this asserted agreement. Furthermore, the agreement certainly contemplated, as an implied condition, that Brewer would be alive on November 19. This is necessarily so, for there is no suggestion that the collecting agent had the authority to waive the requirement that the insured be in good health at the time of reinstatement. For these reasons I am unable to say that the supposed agreement entitles the plaintiff to recover.