29 Conn. 374 | Conn. | 1860
In this case the plaintiffs claim to recover upon the policy of insurance recited in their declaration. The instrument is in the usual form. It is on its face a written contract between the defendants and “ Smith, Beecher & Beers, of Naugatuck, Connecticut,” in which the defendants acknowledge the receipt of the stipulated premium from the “ assured hereinafter named,” and by which the defendants insure the said Smith, Beecher & Beers, against loss or damage by fire, to the amount of $3,000, on their two and a half story frame building, &c., situated in said Naugatuck. The plaintiffs held a mortgage on the property described in the policy, and upon the trial they sought to show that the contract of insurance was in fact made with them, instead of Smith, Beecher & Beers, and that they alone, as original promisees, were entitled to all the benefits of the insurance. For that purpose they introduced parol evidence of a cotemporaneous oral agreement between them and the defendants, by which the defendants undertook to insure the plaintiffs’ mortgage interest in the name of Smith, Beecher & Beers, for the sole benefit of the plaintiffs, and to insure the plaintiffs as Smith, Beecher
There is no rule more firmly imbedded among the elementary principles of our jurisprudence, than the one already alluded to, but more fully expressed by Mr. Starkie, in his Treatise on the Law of Evidence, vol. 3, p. 1002, that “ where the terms of an agreement are reduced to writing, the document itself, being constituted by the parties as the true and proper expositor of their admissions and intentions, is the only instrument of evidence which the law will recognize, so long as it exists, for the purposes of evidence.”
It is equally well settled also that the terms of every written instrument are to be understood in their plain, ordinary and popular sense, and that where the language of an instrument has a settled legal construction, parol evidence is not admissible to contradict that construction. 1 Greenl. Ev., §§ 277, 278.
In view of these elementary principles we think the admission of the parol evidence can not be vindicated. The policy is the foundation of the plaintiffs’ claim. By that, and by that alone, the defendants assumed their obligations. They say, “ By this policy of insurance the Charter Oak Eire and Marine Insurance Company do insure,” &c. It is expressed in plain, unambiguous language, and no doubt or difference of opinion has beep expressed, or can be entertained, in regard to
The plaintiffs’ disclaimer could not render the evidence admissible, because the oral contract which they proposed to prove, was when made intended to operate directly upon the written instrument, varying and controlling its effect, and in no other way could operate at all.
If a written contract be made for the conveyance of black-acre, may it be proved by parol that white-acre instead of black-acre was the property really bargained for and intended to be conveyed, and that the parties made a cotemporaneous oral agreement that, for the purposes of that transaction, black-acre should be understood to mean white-acre ? And would the party’s disclaimer of an intention to affect the written instrument render such evidence admissible ? In that case as in this, the purpose of the party would not be to substitute the words or terms of the oral agreement in the place of those employed in the written contract, but only to make black in that contract signify white, and nothing else.
In the case of Barnett v. Union Mutual Fire Ins. Co., 7 Cush., 175, the by-laws of the,company provided that the insurance should be void unless all prior insurances were mentioned in the policy, and, it appearing on the trial that a prior insurance not mentioned in the policy in fact existed, the plaintiffs offered parol evidence that the fact was made known to the defendants before the issuing of the policy, that both parties expected that such prior insurance would be continued, and that the defendants made out the policy, and delivered it to the assured, who supposed that it was made according to the intention and expectation of the parties, and did not know that the prior insurance was not mentioned in
In the case of Grant v. Naylor, 4 Cranch, 224, Grant addressed a letter of credit to John and Joseph Naylor & Co., in which he says: — £ £ I will guarantee their ” (Hacket & Grant’s) ££ engagements, should you think it necessary for any transaction they may have with your house.” The letter was designed for John and Jeremiah Naylor, was delivered to them, and upon the faith of it they sold goods to Hacket & Grant on credit. Hacket & Grant failed, and John and Jeremiah Naylor brought their action on the guaranty in the letter against Grant, and offered parol evidence to prove that the letter was intended for, and was an assumpsit to them. The court held the evidence inadmissible, and Marshall, C. J., said: “ In such a case the letter itself is not a written contract between Grant, the writer, and John and Jeremiah Naylor, the persons to whom it was delivered. To admit parol evidence to make it such a contract, is going farther than courts have ever gone, where the writing is itself the contract, and not evidence of a contract, and where no pre-existing obligation bound the party to enter into it.”
So we say in this case, the policy of insurance is not a contract between the insurance company and the Woodbury Savings Bank & Building Association, and parol evidence is not admissible in a court of'law to make it one.
The case of Peck v. New London Mutual Ins. Co., 22 Conn., 575, was cited as an authority for the admission of this evidence. In that case the plaintiffs procured a joint insurance on a bark-mill owned by one of them, and personal property
Some other questions were made by the counsel, but we prefer to waive the consideration of them for the present, and advise the superior court to grant a new trial for the reasons already stated.
In this opinion the other judges concurred.
New trial advised.