suicide

If the assured, being in the possession of his ordinary reasoning faculties, from anger, pride, jealousy, or a desire to escape from the ills of life, intentionally takes his own life, the proviso attaches, and there can be no recovery. If the death is caused by the voluntary act of the assured, he knowing and intending that his death shall be the result of his act, but when his reasoning faculties are so far impaired that he is not able to understand the moral character, the general nature, consequences, and effect of the act he is about to commit, or when he is impelled thereto by an insane impulse, which he has not the power to resist, such death is not within the contemplation of the parties to the contract, and the insurer is liable

Self-destruction and suicide are synonymous and mean the voluntary destruction of one's self. 29 111. App. 439. If a person who is incapable, by reason of unsoundness of mind, of resisting an insane impulse to take his own life, or to understand the general nature or consequences and effects of his act, kills himself, it is not suicide. 209 111. 33. At common law, suicide was a felony entailing forfeiture of estate. 1 Hale, P. C. c. 27. Since the abolition of forfeitures, punishment of suicide is, of course, impossible, but an attempt to commit suicide is indictable (9 Cox, C. C. 247); and one who persuades another to suicide is guilty of murder (4 Bl. Comm. 189; 123 Mass. 422), though, if he be not present at the commission of the suicide, it is held that he cannot be punished, because he is an accessory before the fact, and the prior conviction of the principal is impossible (9 Car. & P. 79).

The intentional destruction of one's self, by a person of years of discretion and of sound mind; in a larger sense, the voluntary killing of one's self, from whatever cause.

Killing one's self; the intention of taking one's own life. Suicide is a crime, subject to substantially the same limitations as other forms of homicide. It is true that the successful attempt escapes penalty; but this is because the offender is practically beyond the reach of society, not because a voluntary act of self-destruction by a sane person is deemed other than criminal. Its criminality was expressed in the old rules under which forfeiture and disgrace in burial were imposed, as penal consequences of the act; also, in rules now I'ecoguized, that one who adaccessory before the fact in murder; and that one who attempts suicide unsuccessfully is chargeable with a criminal attempt. See Rep. N. Y. Penal Code, §§ 227-235. But the existence of insanity in the subject may take from self-destruction its criminal quality, just as it may from homicide. It will be seen by the cases cited below that authorities differ whether the word suicide necessarily imports criminality. One view is, that, like homicide, and the other words of same formation, it merely alleges the act of killing, leaving the question of criminality to be determined when the circumstances and any alleged excuse are taken into account. The other view is that it imputes an intentional killing; a termination of one's own life by accident is not included; and this mu.5t be a competent, sane intention, the purpose of a sound mind. Hence, as selfdestruction planned by a sound mind is always criminal; can have no excuses of self-defence or official duty, such as distinguish justifiable homicide; the woi'd necessarily imports crime. The term suicide has no technical or legal meanmg. It clearly does not include an accidental or unintentional killing of one's self. Neither ought it to be construed, in an exception in a policy of life insurance, " if the insured sliall commit suicide," as including death caused by the person's own act, committed while unable to distinguish between right and wrong, and to appreciate the nature and moral quality of the act, so as to be a responsible moral agent. The word suicide is almost always used in a criminal sense, as importing a selfkilling, which is criminal. Per Wrightman, J. Clift V. Schwabe, 3 Com. B. 437, 458. The word suicide is not necessarily of the same import as felo de se, nor has it a fixed legal meaning imputing crime. As a person may commit homicide without involving crime, so, taking suicide as meaning homicide of one's self, it does not necessarily involve either guilt or moral responsibility; it may be used as designating the mere act of self-destruction. In common language, every act of self-destruction is described by the word suicide, if it is the intentional act of a party knowing the probable consequences of what he is about. Per Rolfe, B. lb. 461. The word suicide has not a technical meaning importing felony; it is not equivonly killing one's self. The circumstances attending the act cannot affect the literal meaning of the word. No stronger meaning can be insisted on than this, that the deceased killed himself knowing the probable consequences of his act, and did that act Toluntarily, in tending such consequences to follow. Per Patteson, J. lb. 464. Suicide, in an exception in a life policy, includes all cases of voluntary self-destruction. It does not embrace cases in which the will is not exercised at all, as where death results from accident or delirium; but all where tl)e self-destruction is voluntary, though the will may be perverted. It is proper to use the expression, " the causes of suicide are twofold, — insanity and crime." Per Alderson, B. lb. 467. The phrase " commit suicide " is not a legal technical term; an inquisition stating that the deceased committed suicide would be clearly informal and bad. In ordinary use, it includes any one who has purposely killed himself, whether from tmdium of life, from grief, or in a fit of temporary insanity. It embraces all cases of voluntary selfdestruction, and may well be so construed when used in an exception in a life policy. Per Parke, B. lb. 468. The word suicide, considered merely as an English word, fairly implies a criminal taking away of one's own life. It seems never to have been used, except in this sense, by legal writers. To couple it with "commit" strengthens the presumption that it is used of a criminal act; for commit is equivalent to perpetrate, and appropriate to a crime. And when the phrase " commit suicide " is found in an exception in a policy, coupled with death by duelling and death by the hand of justice, the reason is still stronger for believing that the parties intended only to except a criminal taking of one's own life. Per Pollock, C. B. lb. 471. The terms " suicide " and " dying by one's own hand" are generally used as synonymous. They have the same meaning. " Dying by one's own hand " is but another form of expression for suicide. Neither term, in an exception in a policy, ought to be construed as embracing all the cases in which the death of the assured is the consequence of his own act. Death by accident or mistake — as when one kills himself by drinking poison, not knowing that it is poison — is not suicide; neither is death self-caused by an insane person. Insanity is a disease; and death, the result of insanity, is death by disease. Eastabrook V. Union Mut. Life Ins. Co., 54 Me. 224. Suicide does not, necessarily, imply a wrongful act, or self-nrarder. It means self-killing, just as " homicide " means killing any one else. But there may be excusable liomicide, as well as felonious; and suicide was only cognizable at common law when the person v/nsfelo de se, or guilty of crime.

In one sense, the man dies by his own hands who kills himself, whether sound or frenzied. But a condition in a policy will not be construed to cause a forfeiture for an act of self-destruction not involving an evil will. The clause forfeiting the insurance for self-destruction must be construed as a penal clause, when it is associated with other forfeitures which involve voluntary wrong-doing; such as death by duelling, or by the hands of justice, or in the violation of the laws, or impairing health by vice or intemperance. When an act which is to cause forfeiture is classed among such wrongful conduct, it is fairly to be inferred that it is regarded as ejusdem generis, and depending on the same reasons; and a construction which punishes a person who is not in fault is not to be favored, if it can be allowed at all. The very object of life insurance is to provide for death by disease or in the ordinary course of nature; and death by one's own hands, in the case of a person nan compos, is as much the result of disease as death by fever or consumption. John Hancock Mut. Life Ins. Co. V. Moore, 34 Mich. 42. The terra suicide is sometimes used in a strict technical sense, as meaning, in a legal sense, an act of criminal self-destruction; to which is necessarily attached the moral responsibility of taking one's life voluntarily, and in the full exercise of sound reason and discretion. Dean v. American Mut. Life Ins. Co., 4 Allen, 96. Suicide is the wilful and voluntary act of a person who understands the physical nature of the act, and intends by it to accomplish the result of self-destruction. Nimick V. Mut. Ins. Co., 10 Am. L. Reg. s. s. 101. Suicide is the deliberate termination of one existence, while in the possession and enjoyment of his mental faculties. Selfkilling by an insane person is not suicide. Breasted v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co., 4 HiU (N. Y.), 73; 8 iV. Y. 2991