Sun Mutual Insurance v. Saginaw Barrel Co.

Citations

• 114 Ill. 99
• 29 N.E. 477

Syllabus

<p>1. Insurance — payment of premium to insurance broker—question of agency, and of evidence in respect thereto. A party desiring to insure certain property, applied to an insurance agent of his place to procure the insurance, leaving him to select the company. He forwarded the application to certain insurance brokers in Chicago, who procured the policy in a company with which they had considerable dealing, and sent the same to the assured through the first named agents, and he sent the premium to the agents in Chicago, who never forwarded the same to the insurance company. The policy contained the usual clause that it should not be binding until the actual payment of the premium. A loss occurred, and payment was refused, when suit was brought on the policy, and a • recovery had: Held, that the liability of the insurance company depended upon the fact whether the Chicago agents were its agents, or were authorized to receive payment in its behalf.</p> <p>2. Where insurance brokers procuring a policy of insurance received payment of the required premium, and failed to return the same to the insurance company, it was held, that the correspondence between the brokers and the company was proper evidence for the purpose of showing their previous relations and methods of business in respect to insurance effected through them, and as tending to show they were, in fact, agents of the company, and as such authorized to receive payment of the premium.</p> <p>3. Appeal—reviewing questions of fact. This court, in reviewing ordinary cases tit law coming to it through the Appellate Court, sits simply to correct errors of law committed in the lower court. If the trial court makes no improper ruling, and the judgment is affirmed in the Appellate Court upon mere issues of fact, this court will not reverse on the ground that the issues were improperly decided. And this is.equally so although there may be no conflict in the testimony on which the issues are found.</p>