Keystone Mutual Benefit Ass'n v. Jones

Bryan, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. John W. Jones insured his life in the Keystone Mutual Benefit Association for the benefit of his wife, Celia Ann Jones. After his death she recovered a judgment on the policy for the amount insured. In the application for insurance the age of Jones was stated to be forty-three years.

According to the terms of the.policy, it was null and void if any statement in the application ³⁶⁴ was in any respect untrue. At the trial, evidence was offered th&t Jones was about sixty years old when he applied for insurance; and the question in the case related to the effect of this evidence on the validity of the policy. Undoubtedly the evidence, if true, would defeat the policy, unless circumstances exist which prevent the insurance company from making this defence. The evidence tended to show that the insured was a colored man, who could neither read nor write, and that the application for insurance was received by one Foxeraft, an agent of the insurance company, 'who wrote down the answers to the questions contain&d in the application.

Celia Jones, the plaintiff below, testified that at the time Foxcraft was filling up the application, he asked Jones if he knew his age, and Jones replied that he did not know it, and could not come anywhere near it, and that thereupon Foxcraft said that he would take him to be about forty-three years old, and so entered his age in the application, and that after the application was filled up, it was read to Jones by Foxcraft, and that Jones knew that his age was stated to be forty-three years, and that Foxcraft said that it was all right and that he would have no trouble at all. Mary Dashields, the daughter of Jones and the plaintiff, corroborates this testimony, and further states that Foxcraft said “I will put you in, anyhow, for forty-three years old, and make you younger than you are.” The testimony of these two witnesses was contradicted by the evidence given in behalf of the insurance