Court Opinion

ID: 9832609
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 22:02:15.434736+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:49.101617
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
Plaintiff in error insists, first, that forfeiture was not set up, and under the rule announced in Mullen v. Mutual Life Insurance Co., 89 Tex. 259, 34 S. W. 605, evidence of notice should not have been admitted. The decision in the Mullen Case is based upon a New York statute, which provides that no life insurance company doing business in that state should declare forfeited any policy by reason of nonpayment of an annual premium, unless a notice in writing should be duly mailed to the assured not less than 30 days before each payment was due. If the rule announced had any application to this case, we think the pleadings are sufficient to authorize the introduction of the testimony. We did not, however, base our affirmance of the judgment upon the question of notice. Section 330 of the by-laws provides for the suspension of a member without notice, who has failed to pay a monthly rate, per capita tax, or additional assessment; and section 331 does not require the service of any notice of forfeiture upon the assured, but provides that after the member has been suspended, under section 330, the fact of such suspension must be reported to the Supreme *702Record Keeper, and that the record keeper shall report the name' of each member so suspended to the tent at its next regular review. Section 332 merely provides that when • a member has failed to pay his tent dues or any fine or special assessment for a period of 30 days after the same is due, he shall be reported in open tent by the record keeper, and that before making such report the record keeper shall notify such member to pay the amount. This section has no reference whatever to the failure on the part of a member to pay the monthly rate, per capita tax, or additional assessment. These matters are controlled by the provisions of sections 330 and 331. We did not even intimate that the language of any of the sections was obscure. On the contrary, we think they are clear and explicit.
Section 330 provides that the member shall stand suspended without notice; and, even though we should hold that the court erred in admitting the testimony tending to show that notice was given by Young, the error is harmless. As we construe sections 330 and 331, no affirmative action on the part of defendant in error was necessary in order to forfeit the certificate. The failure of the member to make the required payment ipso facto worked a forfeiture.
The motion is, in all things, overruled.