62 Pa. Super. 417 | Pa. Super. Ct. | 1916
Opinion ry
The policy of insurance on which this suit is founded provides for a number of indemnities, ranging from total loss of life, through partial liability for loss of hands, feet, or eyes, single or entire: double indemnity in specified instances, for confining and nonconfining illness; special and chronic diseases, and a percentage accumulation under named conditions, and was in force when the insured met an accidental death by drowning. The controlling clauses are — Paragraph A, entitled “Accident indemnity for total disability, at the rate of sixty dollars per month against total loss of time, not exceeding twenty-four consecutive months, resulting from bodily injuries effected directly and independently of all other causes through external, violent and accidental means, and which immediately, continuously and wholly, from date of accident, disable and prevent the assured from performing every duty pertaining to any business or occupation,” and Paragraph C, as follows: “Specified total losses. In event of any one of the following specific
The sole defense made to this claim in the court below, and in this court is that, in the application made by the assured, and on the faith of which the policy was issued, there is a false statement of a material warranty in regard to “income per month” of the assured. The application provides — that the policy “is to be based upon the following statements of facts, ■ which I warrant to be complete and true and material and binding upon me, and if any of the answers or statements made are not full, complete and true,......then the contract shall be null and void.” The clauses claimed to be controlling here are as follows: “4, I am employed by Studebaker Company. 5, My income per month exceeds the amount of the monthly indemnity herein applied for by at least 33 1-3 per cent. Yes. 6, The duties of my occupation are fully described as follows: Office only.” The defendant adduced evidence to show that the deceased, at the time of signing the application, as an item of his income per month received a salary of $43.34 per month for his services from 8: 30 a. m. to 5:30 p. m., of each working day, and offered no further proof to show any additional “income per month” of the deceased. This suit is not brought to recover the accident indemnity, provided for in paragraph A, “at the rate of sixty dollars per month against total loss of time,” but, is brought by the administrator of the decedent under the provisions of paragraph C, to recover the specific total loss of life, the principal sum of six hundred- dollars, which is stated in the application to be “in lieu of any other indemnity.”
The answers to the questions in the application, are evidently intended to relate to every phase of the various indemnities mentioned, and the clauses quoted, on which
The judgment is affirmed.