Court Opinion

ID: 9824903
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 11:40:31.646183+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:07:58.444316
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing
In brief on application for rehearing counsel states: “The Court here, in order that the insured might receive the weekly benefits which will probably exceed the amount to be paid for the loss of both feet, has unconsciously destroyed the coverage now held by thousands of people in the State who have policies which contain the same provision as designated in the policy sued on as Section C. In many of these policies there will not be any other provisions under which they can receive any benefits, so, they will lose all, because of this decision.”
We certainly did not intend that our original opinion should invite such dire distress.
We are here concerned with the task of determining which of two provisions of the policy is to be applied. Both are contained in the contract and were purposely incorporated therein. Each should be read and construed in connection with the other, and both should be given a field of application, in consonance with established proof.
One of the paragraphs has to do with specific loss of members and this without regard to total disability. The other relates to illness and accident with regard to total disability.
Some courts have gone so far as to declare that if the insured is totally disabled this determines the matter and his benefits are referable to the provision of the policy which provides for total disability. We are not in accord with this extreme view. In some cases, the specific loss clause would have to be entirely ignored and therefore be without purposeful application.
If the insured in the case at bar had lost both feet only, his benefits would be awarded under the terms of paragraph C. The question of total disability would not enter as a determinable factor.
If the policy had contained only the specific loss clause, the intent of the parties would have been directed there.
With the inclusion of the other paragraph, we are not authorized to expunge it from the contract and declare that it has no purposeful meaning if the facts warrant a contrary view.
Appellant cites Goldstein v. Standard Accident Ins. Co., 236 N.Y. 178, 140 N.E. 235, and Hill v. National Life & Accident Ins. Co., La.App., 160 So. 312. The insured in each of these cases lost the sight of his eye or eyes. The injury, therefore, came within the actual designation of the specific loss clause. It is to be noted that in the former case the policy provisions are not similar to those in the case at bar. In any event, our view is not out of harmony with these authorities.
To take an extreme example: Suppose the insured had lost by severance both legs at the hip joints and both arms at the shoulder joints, and thereby became a “basket case.” To adhere to the position of the appellant, we would be compelled to hold that his benefits would be referable to the specific loss clause because he suffered the loss of both feet and both hands above the ankles and wrists. We do not think the policy warrants so literal a construction.
The application” for rehearing is overruled.