Court Opinion

ID: 9644858
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 21:06:49.046765+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:19.165716
License: Public Domain

John A. Fogleman, Justice, dissenting. I respectfully dissent. While there are other matters involved on this appeal that I think call for a reversal and while I do not agree with other statements in the majority opinion, I will direct my remarks to one point only, because the majority opinion turns entirely upon that point. That is its reliance upon an oral agreement for insuring the life of the deceased. If the majority opinion properly interprets and applies the pertinent section of the Arkansas Insurance Code, then the drafters wasted words when they said that the section should not apply to life insurance. The pertinent section reads: 66-3219. Binders. — (1) Binders or other contracts for temporary insurance may be made orally or in writing, and shall be deemed to include all the usual terms of the policy as to which the binder was given together with such applicable indorsements as are designated in the binder, except as superseded by the clear and express terms of the binder. (2) No binder shall be valid beyond the issuance of the policy with respect to which it was given or beyond ninety (90) days from its effective date, whichever period is the shorter. (3) If the policy has not been issued a binder may be extended or renewed beyond such ninety (90) days with the written approval of the Commissioner, or in accordance with such rules and regulations relative thereto as the Commissioner may promulgate. (4) This section shall not apply to life or disability insurances. [Acts 1959, No. 148, § 286, p. 418.] This act contains 698 sections, not counting subsections. It specifically repealed virtually every Arkansas statute on the subject of insurance. It further contained the usual general repealer as to laws in conflict. Section 1 states: “This act constitutes the Arkansas Insurance Code.” There was no savings clause. If there was any doubt about the intention of the legislature to make this code the governing law relating to insurance in Arkansas, the title to the act will quickly dispel any such thought. It reads: ACT 148 AN ACT to Provide a Comprehensive Revision, Consolidation and Classification of the Laws of the State of Arkansas Relating to Insurance and to the Insurance Business; to Regulate the Incorporation, Formation, and Corporate Affairs of Domestic Insurance Companies, Societies, and Associations, and the Admission of Foreign and Alien Insurance Companies, Societies, and Associations; to Provide their Rights, Powers and Immunities, and to Prescribe the Conditions on Which Insurance Companies, Societies, and Associations Organized, Existing, or Authorized under this Act may Exercise their Powers; to Provide the Rights, Powers and Immunities and to Prescribe the Conditions on which Other Persons, Firms, Corporations and Associations Engaged in an Insurance Business may Exercise their Powers; to Provide for Service of Process on Unauthorized Insurers and the Conditions for Defense of Actions Brought Against Them in this State; to Provide for Certain Powers, Rights, Obligations, and Consequences as to Insurers and Others Relative to Insurance Contracts and Matters Arising from Such Contracts; to Provide for the Imposition of Licenses and Fees and for the Disposition Thereof; to Provide for the Imposition of a Privilege Tax upon Foreign and Alien Insurance Com-panies and Associations and for the Allocation Thereof; to Provide for the Imposition of a Privilege Tax upon Surplus Lines Brokers; to Provide for the Imposition of a Tax with Respect to Independently Procured Insurance Coverages; to Provide for the Departmental Supervision and Regulation of the Insurance Business Within or Relative to this State; to Provide Penalties for the Violation of this Act; Fixing Effective Date of Act; to Repeal Certain Acts, and for Other Purposes. Whenever there is a general codification of the law on any specific subject, that code supersedes any existing law.1 This was the obvious purpose of this code. The text authority cited by the majority should not be applied to the Arkansas statutes, because the whole subject of binders or other contracts for temporary insurance is covered by Ark. Stat. Ann. § 66-3219 (Repl. 1966). Certainly the majority is not holding that a permanent contract for life insurance is not required to be in writing, and certainly that result could not be proper if not even a binder or a contract for temporary life insurance is permitted. I submit that the majority has, in effect,' stricken § 286(4) from the act. For the reasons stated, I would reverse the judgment. I am authorized to state that Brown, J., joins in this dissent.  See, 2 Sutherland, Statutory Construction, Third Edition, (1943), 254 et seq., §§ 3708, 3712; 50 Am. Jur. 559, Statutes, § 554; 82 C. J. S. 496 et seq., §§ 292, 293; Chrisman v. Carney, 33 Ark. 316. The South Carolina Supreme Court spoke of the effect of its Insurance Code in Independence Ins. Co. v. Independent Life & Acci. I. Co., 218 S. C. 22, 61 S. E. 2d 399 (1950). The title and first sentence of the act and the express repeal section were similar to our act. It said: • It is manifest that by the Act of 1947 the legislature intended to wipe the slate clean of insurance laws and enact a complete code upon the subject. '# # # It is well settled by our decisions that the code as adopted is the general law and the omissions are lost.