delivered the opinión of the Court.
Thе Merchants Mutual Automobile Liability Insurance Company, the plaintiff in error, is a New York corporation authorized to insure agáinst recoveries of damages by pеrsons injured by automobiles and other vehicles, for whose operation the insured is responsible. It issued a policy August 16,1919, to Frank Coron,, thus to indemnify him in the operation of his аutomobile truck to the extent of.$5,000, together with interest and costs. The'policy contained a provision, inserted pursuant to the require-. ment of Section 1Ó9 of the Insurance Laws of New York. ■ (Laws of 1918, ch. 182.) The section reads as follows:
“ On and after the first day of January, nineteen hundred and eighteen- no policy of insurance against', lоss *128 or damage resulting from accident to or injury suffered by an employee or other person and for which the person insured is hable, or, against loss or damage tо property caused by horses or by any vehicle drawn, propelled or operated by any motive power, and for which loss or damage the person insurеd is liable, shall be issued or delivered to any person in this state by any corporation authorized ... to do business in this state, unless there shall be contained within such policy а provision that the insolvency or bankruptcy of the person insured shall not release the insurance carrier from the payment of damages for injury sustained or loss occasioned during- the life of such policy, and stating that in case execution against the insured is returned unsatisfied in an action brought by the injured, or his or her personal representative in case death results from the accident, because of such insolvency or bankruptcy, that then an action may be maintained by the injured person, or his or her personal representative, against such corporation under the terms of the policy for the amount of the judgment in The said .action not exceeding the amount of the policy.”
Smart was injured by the truck of Coron. He brought suit against Coron for damages and recovered a judgment for $11,000. He issued executiоn against Coron upon, the judgment, which was- returned unsatisfied, and supplemental proceedings were undertaken against him without success.
The Supreme Court of the State held that on the-record Coron was insolvent, 'that under the clause of the policy embodying the provision of Section 109 the action lay, and because of а failure to set up any good defense, a summary judgment was entered for $5,000 and interest and costs in favor of Smart against the Company.
The case has been brought here by the Company under Section 237 of the Judicial Code, upon the claim that Section 109 is invalid, first in that it deprives the Insur-
*129
anee Company of its property without due proсess of law, and, second, because it is in conflict with the bankruptcy laws of the United States. It is well settled that the business of insurance is of such a peculiar character, affects so many people and is so intimately connected with the common good that the State creating insurance corporations and giving them аuthority to engage in that business may, without transcending the limits of legislative power, regulate their affairs so far at least as to prevent them from committing wrongs or injustice in the exercise of their corporate functions.
Northwestern Life Insurance Company
v.
Riggs,
Another reason for the legislation is suggested in the opinion’ of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York (Roth v. National Automobile Mutual Casualty Company, 202 N. Y. App. Div. 667, 674), to wit,that it was enacted on the recommendation of the State Superintendent of Insurance to make impossible a. practice of some companies to collude with the insured after an injury foreshadowing heavy damages had ’ occurred, and to secure an adjudication of -the insured in bankruptcy whereby recovery on the policy could be defeated because, fhe bankrupt had sustained no loss.
Whatever the especial occasion for the enactment, it is clear that the exercise of the police power in passing it was reasonable and can not be said to deprive the Insurance Company of property, without due process of law. It is to be remembered that the assumption of liability by the Insurancе Company under Section 109 is entirely voluntary. It need not; engage in such insurance if it chooses not to do so.
The second objection is that the policy in this clausе makes provision for an unlawful preference under the National Bankruptcy Act, when the owner who is indemnified is a bankrupt at the time of the injury.
Passing by the-difficulty that suggests itself thаt the Insurance Company is not one of the creditors of the insolvent insured and so is hardly in position to question the Validity of the law for a defect of this kind
(Heald
v.
District of Columbia,
We. think that there is in this state legislation complained of, no conflict with the policy or the letter of the bankrupt lаw.
A third objection is made that there was no sufficient evidence that the insured was insolvent. This was a *132 question of fact under the proceedings which were instituted by execution and what followed. . The state courts have found it to exist and it .is not for us to question their findings.
The judgment is
Affirmed.