177 A. 43 | Pa. | 1935
The accident policies under which appellee claims are identical in that they provided that if an accidental injury should "continuously and wholly disable and prevent the insured from performing any and every kind of duty pertaining to the occupation in which he is engaged at the time of the accident" the company would pay insured a weekly indemnity fifty-two weeks, and ". . . if the insured shall then and thereafter be continuously and wholly disabled by such injuries, independently of all other causes, from engaging in any and every occupation or employment for wage or profit, the Company will continue the payment of weekly indemnity so long as the insured shall be so disabled." A life insurance policy under which appellee claims provided for payment to the insured of a monthly income if as the result of bodily injury he should become totally disabled "so as to be prevented thereby from engaging in any business or occupation and performing any work for compensation or profit, and that such disability has already continued uninterrupted for a period of at least four months." As a result of an injured knee occurring April 15, 1931, the insured was paid weekly benefits under the accident policies until August 17, 1932, and monthly indemnity under the life policy until November 15, 1932. Thereafter further payments were refused on two grounds: [1] the insured was no longer totally and permanently disabled; and [2] he was not now wholly disabled from engaging in "any and every occupation or employment for wage or profit," as stipulated in the accident policies, or "from engaging in any business or occupation and performing any work for compensation or profit," the condition in the life insurance policy. In this action by the assured *407 to recover on the policies for benefits after the fifty-two-week period, a judgment was entered in his favor; this appeal followed.
The chief complaint is to trial errors, particularly the charge of the court. The jury was instructed that totally and wholly disabled, as used in the policies, meant not "absolute helplessness, but rather the inability of the insured to do the greater portion or substantial part of his work or duty." This left the jury free to find that the plaintiff was entitled to recover so long as he could not perform the substantial part of the occupation at which he was engaged at the time of the accident. The policies definitely excluded any such interpretation. The policies said any business, occupation or employment for compensation or profit. It should be clear that disability to engage in any business or occupation does not mean disability merely to carry on the same business or occupation that he had previously been engaged in. A similar question was presented to this court in B. O. Relief Assn. v. Post,
While the words of the policy must receive reasonable construction and, literally interpreted, the words total disability to engage "in any and every occupation of employment for wage or profit" would require that an insured be a helpless invalid before he would be entitled to benefits under the policy, this cannot be what the parties intended. It is rare that any man is incapacitated from doing some work; many a blind man weaves baskets; a man with both legs and one arm off can sit in a doorway and sell lead pencils, or act as a telegraph operator; but it cannot well be argued that either is not totally disabled. A reasonable interpretation of the words of the policy is, that the total disability to engage in any occupation or work for compensation or profit which is insured against, means inability to perform any of the duties of any occupation which the insured might be ordinarily capable of performing. Many courts of other jurisdictions construing similar provisions of insurance policies have given these words a like interpretation: Indiana Life Endowment Co. v. Reed,
Appellee contends, however, that, under the recent cases of Janney v. Scranton Life Ins. Co.,
The court below erred in the instruction quoted; it is unnecessary to consider any of the other assignments of error.
Judgment reversed and a venire facias de novo awarded.