Prader v. National Accident Ass'n

78 N.W. 60, 107 Iowa 431
CourtSupreme Court of Iowa
DecidedJanuary 30, 1899
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 78 N.W. 60 (Prader v. National Accident Ass'n) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Iowa primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Prader v. National Accident Ass'n, 78 N.W. 60, 107 Iowa 431 (iowa 1899).

Opinion

Robinson, C. J.

[433]*4331 [432]*432In December, 1889, the defendant association issped to Christian Prader a certificate of membership, by which the association agreed to pay to the widow and child of said Prader, in case of his death, the sum of five thousand dollars, or so much thereof as an assessment of two dollars levied upon all of its members in good standing at the time of his death would pay. He died on the eighth day of November, 1892, while the certificate was in force. The association denied liability on the certificate, and an action in equity was commenced thereon in the district court of Jones county by the plaintiff, as widow, and as guardian of the child, to recover the amount of the certificate. The district court adjudged that she was entitled to recover five thousand and twenty-five dollars, and ordered that the association and its officers make and collect an assessment of two dollars upon all members of the association assessable at the date of the accident which caused the death of Prader, to-wit, October 30, 1892, and on the day of his death, and pay the proceeds, not exceeding the sum of five thousand dollars, to the plaintiff, and the further sum of [433]*433twenty-five dollars as weekly indemnity by reason of the total incapacity of the decedent from the time of the accident to tbe time of bis death. An appeal from that decree was taken, and on the twenty-eighth day of May, 1895, this court filed an opinion which held that the recovery allowed by the district court, above the sum of five thousand dollars, was excessive, but that its decree in other respects was correct. The amount of the recovery was accordingly reduced to five thousand dollars, and the decree was in other respects-affirmed. See 95 Iowa, 149. The decree of the district, court was rendered in December, 1893. In August, 1894,, while the case was pending in this court on appeal, a judge* of the district court of J ones county, on a showing made> found that J. A. Doverman, Alf Wingate and B. L. Glarke were the proper officers of tire association for levying and collecting the assessment for which the decree of the district court provided; that they had failed to levy and collect the assessment, and were in contempt. The judge therefore ordered that they be committed to the jail of Jones county until they should obey the decree. The persons thus found to be in contempt, and ordered to be imprisoned, thereupon applied to a judge of this court for a writ of certiorari, to the end that the order of the district court might be reviewed and annulled. On the hearing had in August, 1894, the judge to whom the application was presented made an order, a copy of which is as follows: “* * * It is now further ordered that the proceedings for contempt be stayed pending this action, upon petitioners executing a bond, in the sum of five thousand dollars, to be approved by the clerk of this court, conditioned that they will perform and obey any order or decree that may be entered in the supreme court in the case of Ursula Prader v. National Masonic Accident Association, pending on appeal in this court.” A bond was then executed to the plaintiff by the three persons found to be in contempt, as principals, and George E. Pear sell, surety, in the penal sum of five thousand [434]*434dollars, upon the following conditions: “If the National Masonic Accident Association shall and will perform the decree of the supreme court of Iowa, when rendered by it, the said supreme court, in the case of Ursula Prader v. The National Masonic Accident Association, then this bond to be null and void; otherwise, to remain in full force and effect.” After the case then pending on appeal was determined by this court, and after a petition for a rehearing had been overruled, a procedendo was issued to the district court. On the thirtieth day of November, 1895, the association made an assessment from which one thousand seven hundred and ninety-six dollars were realized and paid to the plaintiff. The t association reported to the court that nothing more could be realized from the assessment, and asked to be discharged from further liability on account of the decree. The plaintiff filed objections to the report, which were sustained. She alleges that the association did not comply with the terms and conditions of the decree, in that it did not make an assessment upon all members who were members at the time of the death of Prader. She demands judgment for the difference between the sum received from the assessment made and the amount to which she was found to be entitled, with interest. The jury returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff for three thousand one hundred and seventy-two dollars, and judgment was rendered in her favor for that sum, with costs. This case is entitled as against the association and the four signers of the bond. The petition commences with the averment, that “the plaintiff claims of the defendants the sum of $4,400,” and then follows a ■statement of the cause of action. The formal prayer of the petition is a demand for “judgment against the defendant •association on said bond” in the sum specified. The verdict was in favor of the plaintiff, but did not state whether it was ■against one defendant or more than one. The record states that judgment was entered “against the defendant,” without naming him. We find, however, that by an amendment to [435]*435the petition filed April 15, 1897, the plaintiff made the association a party defendant, and asked that judgment be rendered against it and against the defendants on the bond. The record shows that the original petition was treated by all parties as asking judgment against the signers of the .bond, and the arguments treat the judgment as against all the defendants. We therefore conclude that it was so entered, and the statement that the judgment was rendered against the “defendant,” rather than the “defendants,” is a mere ■clerical error. We also conclude that the statement .in the record as to the formal demand for relief in .the original petition is also a clerical error. By so doing we treat the case as it was treated by all parties in the district court and in this court.

2 [436]*4363 [435]*4351. This action, as' originally commenced, was an action •on the bond given in the certiorari proceeding. In September, 1896, the signers of the bond filed an application to transfer the cause to Polk county, and in support of the application showed that all of the signers were, when the action was brought, and continued to be at that time, residents of Polk county. At the same time the association filed a similar application, based on the ground that its principal place of business was in Polk county, and that it did not have, and had not had, an office or agency in Jones county. The applications were overruled in December, 1896. Whether that ruling was correct, as to the signers of the bond, is the first question presented to us in argument. The original petition was based wholly upon the bond, and to that 'the association was not a party, although it voluntarily appeared in the case. The amendment filed in April, 1897, contained allegations which were designed to show liability on the part of the association for its alleged failure to perform the requirements of the decree against it, and was not grounded on the bond. We first consider the case as it stood when the application of the signers of the bond for a change of venue was denied. At that [436]*436time, as already stated, the action was on the bond alone.

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Bluebook (online)
78 N.W. 60, 107 Iowa 431, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/prader-v-national-accident-assn-iowa-1899.