Hamilton v. Liverpool London Globe Insurance Company/Opinion of the Court

by Horace Gray

United States Supreme Court

136 U.S. 242

Hamilton  v.  Liverpool London Globe Insurance Company

The conditions of the policy in suit clearly and unequivocally manifest the intention and agreement of the parties to the contract of insurance that any difference arising between them as to the amount of loss or damage of the property insured shall be submitted, at the request in writing of either party, to the appraisal of competent and impartial persons, to be chosen as therein provided, whose a ward shall be conclusive as to the amount of such loss or damage only, and shall not determine the question of the liability of the company; that the company shall have the right to tk e the whole or any part of the property at its appraised value so ascertained; and that until such an appraisal shall have been permitted, and such an award obtained, the loss shall not be payable, and no action shall lie against the company. The appraisal, when requested in writing by either party, is distinctly made a condition precedent to the payment of any loss, and to the maintenance of any action. Such a stipulation, not ousting the jurisdiction of the courts, but leaving the general question of liability to be judicially determined, and simply providing a reasonable method of estimating and ascertaining the amount of the loss, is unquestionably valid, according to the uniform current of authority in England and in this country. Scott v. Avery, 5 H. L. Cas. 811; Viney v. Bignold, 20 Q. B. Div. 172; Delaware & Hudson Canal Co. v. Pennsylvania Coal Co., 50 N. Y. 250; Reed v. Insurance Co., 138 Mass. 572, 576; Wolff v. Insurance Co., 50 N. J. Law, 453, 14 Atl. Rep. 561; Hall v. Insurance Co., 57 Conn. 105, 114, 17 Atl. Rep. 356. The case comes within the general rule long ago laid down by this court: 'Where the parties, in their contract, fix on a certain mode by which the amount to be paid shall be ascertained, as in the present case, the party that seeks an enforcement of the agreement must show that he has done everything on his part which could be done to carry it into effect. He cannot compel the payment of the amount claimed unless he shall procure the kind of evidence required by the contract, or show that by time or accident he is unable to do so.' U.S. v. Robeson, 9 Pet. 319, 327. See, also, Railroad Co. v. March, 114 U.S. 549, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1035. Upon the evidence in this case, the question whether the defendant had duly requested, and the plaintiff had unreasonably refused, to submit to such an appraisal and award as the policy called for, did not depend in any degree, as in Uhrig v. Insurance Co., 101 N. Y. 362, 4 N. E. Rep. 745, cited for the plaintiff, on oral testimony or extrinsic facts, but wholly upon the construction of the correspondence in writing between the parties, presenting a pure question of law to be decided by the court. Turner v. Yates, 16 How. 14, 23; Bliven v. Screw Co., Yates, 16 How. 14, 23; Bliven v. Secrew Co., 23 How. 420, 433; Smith v. Faulkner, 12 Gray, 251. That correspondence clearly shows that the defendant explicitly and repeatedly, in writing, requested that the amount of the loss or damage should be submitted to appraisers, in accordance with the terms of the policy, and that the plaintiff as often peremptorily refused to do this, unless the defendant would consent in advance to define the legal powers and duties of the appraisers, which the defendant was under no obligation to do, and that the plaintiff throughout, against the constant protest of the defendant, asserted, and at last exercised, a right to sell the property before the completion of an award according to the policy, thereby depriving the defendant of the right, reserved to it by the policy, of taking the property at its appraised value, when ascertained in accordance with the conditions of the policy. The court therefore rightly instructed the jury that the defendant had requested in writing, and the plaintiff had declined, the appraisal provided for in the policy, and that the plaintiff, therefore, could not maintain this action. If the plaintiff had joined in the appointment of appraisers, and they had acted unlawfully, or had not acted at all, a different question would have been presented. Judgment affirmed.

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