46 N.E.2d 921 | Ill. | 1943
Bernard Fichter, plaintiff-appellant, filed in the circuit court of Cook county a suit against Milk Wagon Drivers' Union, Local 753, et al., to recover the sum of $3193, claimed to be due as sick benefits under the bylaws of that union. Trial was had before a jury, which returned a verdict against him, and on appeal to the Appellate Court for the First District the judgment of the circuit court was affirmed.
The facts are substantially as follows: Fichter became a member of the Milk Wagon Drivers' Union in 1920, and June 15, 1928, sustained a permanent injury as the result of an accident while driving a milk wagon. During all of this time he was paying monthly to the union, benefit dues in addition to the regular union dues, as provided by the bylaws. At the time of such disability the bylaws of the union, adopted in 1922, provided sick benefits of $20 per week for each member in good standing, and $2 per week extra for a wife, and the same for each child under the age of sixteen years. The bylaws in force at the time of the injury read: "A sick benefit shall be paid to members in good standing of twenty dollars ($20.00) per week. * * * As soon as 90 days of benefit has been paid a member, if he is still sick his dues stop and he draws two ($2.00) dollars per week extra for his wife and each child under 16 years."
Appellant, as a result of his injuries, became afflicted with chronic thrombophlebitis of both legs, which means the destruction of the deep-seated veins; his legs were ulcerated, swollen, discolored and hardened. He had been treated for eight years by physicians of the union and many other doctors. He spent two and one half years under care of the General Electric Company clinic, and after 1935 spent two years in the Cook County Hospital, and still is in a chronic and continuous state of ill health. No evidence *94 was offered by defendant disputing this condition, or that it still exists, but on the contrary, it continued to pay sick benefits under the 1922 bylaws from June, 1928, until January, 1936, without objection. There is no doubt plaintiff was sick, and the payments by appellee so admit, and appellant came clearly within the definition of sickness under said bylaws.
In December, 1935, the union local amended its bylaws as to sick benefits, by which payments to a wife and minor children were omitted, and benefits of $20 per week were authorized, with a maximum of twelve weeks benefit to a member having a membership of one year, and twelve additional weekly benefits for each additional year of continuous service up to and including the tenth year. After ten years of continuous employment in good standing, members were entitled to benefit for full time of sickness. Prior to this amendment plaintiff had been paid each week benefits ranging from $26 to $35, depending upon the number of his family coming within the provisions of the bylaws. Section 74 of the constitution and bylaws of 1922 of said union authorizes amendment of the bylaws and gives the procedure for so doing.
When the amendment of December, 1935, became effective the defendant notified plaintiff they would "carry" him for ninety-two weeks at $20 per week instead of what he had been receiving, and that after that time he would be done. Plaintiff made no reply to this notice, but accepted it and cashed checks for $20 for the period of ninety-two weeks. Shortly after he had received the ninety-second payment he filed his suit alleging he was entitled to receive the payment of $26 per week under the bylaws of 1922, and that the amendment of 1935 was not binding upon him. At the time of the last payment plaintiff was handed a withdrawal card from the union, and retained the same until the time of the trial, and offered it in evidence. *95
The record presents these principal questions: (1) Could the amended bylaws be applied to the claim of the plaintiff, which had accrued and was being paid at the time the amendment was made? (2) Is the plaintiff barred from bringing this suit because of an implied contract upon his part to conform to the 1935 bylaws, or because of ratification, or an accord and satisfaction?
Upon the first question it would appear upon principle that where a member had made his monthly benefit payments in accordance with the bylaws and became sick and entitled to a benefit, which was being paid, it would not be reasonable or just to allow payments to be avoided by the adoption of a bylaw discharging the debtor from liability. No authorities directly in point from this State have been cited, but such appears to be the rule in other jurisdictions. Becker v. Berlin Beneficial Society,
In Becker v. Berlin Beneficial Society, supra, which presented exactly the same question as here, the court said: "Some time after the defendant society became liable to the plaintiff for dues at the rate of two dollars and fifty cents per week, and after it had paid them for more than one year, it proceeded to amend its bylaws so as to reduce the amounts of the benefits. This was certainly an easy mode of relieving the society from an obligation, and if successful, will doubtless be followed by other similar associations. The difficulty in the way of this convenient mode of paying debts is that it is repudiation pure and simple. The argument that the plaintiff, being a member of the society, is bound by the bylaw, does not meet the difficulty. It may be a good bylaw as to future cases, but at the time it was passed the plaintiff was something more than a *96 member. He was a creditor whose rights had previously attached, and those rights cannot be swept away by such a scheme as this bylaw." We think this succinct statement is the law applicable to the present situation.
The cases cited in opposition are, upon examination, not found to be in opposition to this principle. The case of Floyd v.Medroes,
We entertain no doubt that bylaws changing appellant's rights after they had become vested would not bind him. Appellee claims, however, that the power reserved to amend the bylaws authorized the change made in the benefits payable to appellant. Section 74 of the constitution and bylaws of 1922 is as follows: "This Constitution and By-Laws can be amended as follows: Any three members may over their signature, present to the union, at any regular meeting, any amendment or alteration to this constitution, and after being read at two regular meetings, shall lay over to the next regular meeting when it shall be voted upon. If the amendment or alteration receives a two-thirds vote it is adopted." There is nothing in this section by which any member consents that any vested right may be taken from him.
In Covenant Mutual Life Ass'n v. Kentner,
In Peterson v. Gibson,
Section 74 of the bylaws was not sufficient to change or destroy the right of plaintiff, which became vested upon his becoming sick within the terms of said bylaws.
It is urged that the acceptance of $20 per week under the amended bylaws amounted to an implied contract to abide by and be bound by them. In Cumber v. Wane, 1 Strange, 425, it was held that giving a note for five pounds cannot be pleaded as a satisfaction for a debt of fifteen pounds, and following this it has been definitely held in Illinois that the payment of a lesser sum in satisfaction of a larger sum due and owing does not cancel the original obligation, even though expressly accepted in discharge thereof, because such a promise is without consideration.
In Hayes v. Massachusetts Mutual Life Ins. Co.
It is also contended that the acceptance by appellant for the period of ninety-two weeks of $20 constituted an accord and satisfaction of what was due under the bylaws in existence at the time he was injured. One of the absolute essentials of an accord and satisfaction is that there exist a bona fide dispute as to an amount due between the parties. (In re Estate of Cunningham,
It is also contended appellee is bound upon the theory of ratification. This theory amounts to no more than the *100 contention that the greater sum can be satisfied by the payment of the lesser. It is but urging in another way that appellee, through its own act in changing its bylaws, and paying the amount specified thereunder, may escape liability. In any of the cases in which it is attempted to satisfy a greater sum by the payment of a lesser, ratification could be claimed by the acceptance of a lesser sum. But as pointed out above, this defense is ineffective even in the case of an express agreement to take less, and hence ratification as an acquiescence in such lesser payments would be equally ineffective.
It is also contended by appellee that contracts of this type, made by a labor union, should be considered and decided upon a different basis than contracts of insurance or benefit companies, because of proof offered that the burden of its sick benefits under the bylaws of 1922 was greater than they had anticipated. The same contention was made in Covenant Mutual Life Ass'n v.Kentner, supra, where we said: "As to any other contract no one would think of saying that one party can annul the agreement and make another to suit its convenience without the consent of the other party, or that expediency or inability to continue business would warrant repudiating the contract and substituting another. Whatever theories might arise as to duties and obligations not founded upon contract, wherever there is a contract its terms must control the rights of the parties. The law does not undertake to make or modify contracts, whether relating to insurance or to some other subject, but it enforces contracts as the parties themselves have made them." We cannot accept the doctrine that a party competent to contract may, because of the peculiar nature of its organization, have a different law applied to it than other contracting parties.
At the close of the evidence in the case the plaintiff moved for a directed verdict, and also for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict, both of which were refused by *101
the court. There is no dispute as to the facts in this case. The sickness of plaintiff is not denied; the failure to pay in accordance with the bylaws of 1922 is not disputed. The defenses alleged by appellee were not available as a matter of law, so the whole question resolved itself down to whether, under the proved facts, the plaintiff, as a matter of law, was entitled to recover. Under this situation the Supreme Court is empowered to review a decision of the trial court, and determine whether the facts, as a matter of law under the competent proof, entitled plaintiff to recover the sum demanded. (Becket v. Woolworth Co.
The judgments of the Appellate Court for the First District and of the circuit court of Cook county are reversed, and the cause is remanded to the circuit court with directions to enter judgment in favor of the plaintiff for the sum of $3193.
Reversed and remanded, with directions.