Ritter v. Mutual Life Ins Co of New York’s Empirical Analysis
169 U.S. 139 · 1898
Citation profile
40 federal appellate · 8 district · 109 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 223 later decisions (15 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 2012 · most notably Helvering v. Le Gierse (1941), Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance v. McCue (1912)
40 federal appellate · 8 district · 109 state decisions — followed in 27 states
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Appellate journey
reviewedthe decision below (from Third Circuit Court of Appeals)
Relationships
Relies on Vicksburg v. Putnam · Davis v. United States · New York Mutual Life Insurance v. Armstrong · Travellers' Insurance v. McConkey
Most-quoted passages
The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 223 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““WJien the policy is silent as to suicide, it is to do taken that the subject of the insurance; that is, the life of the assured, shall not be intentionally and directly, with whatever motive, destroyed by him when in sound mind. To hold otherwise is to say that the occurrence of the event upon the happening of which the company undertook to pay, was intended to be left to his option. That view is against the very essence of the contract. There is another consideration supporting the contention that death intentionally caused by the act of the assured when in sound mind — the policy being silent as to suicidé-is not to be deemed to have been within the contemplation of the parties; that is, that a different view would attribute to them a purpose to make a contract that could not be enforced without injury to the public. A contract, the tendency of which is to endanger the public, interests or injuriously affect the public good, or which is subversive of sound morality, ought never to receive the sanction of a court of justice or be made the foundation of its judgment. If, therefore, a policy — taken out by the person whose life is insured, and in which the sum named .is made payable to himself, his executors, administrators or assigns — expressly provided for the payment of the sum stipulated when or if the assured, in sound mind, took his own life, the contract, even if not prohibited by statute, would be held to be against public policy, in that it tempted or encouraged the”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority““Life insurance imports a mutual agreement, whereby the insurer, in consideration of the payment by the assured of a named sum annually, or at certain times, stipulates to pay a larger sum at the death of the assured.””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority“[u]pon principles of public policy and morals, the fraud, or the criminal misconduct of the assured is, in contracts of marine or of fire insurance, an implied exception to the liability of the insurer.”
2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.