Levi Woodbury

“ A false representation avoids the policy, because it either misleads or defrauds. Livingston et al. v. Mar. Ins. Co., 7 Cranch, 332.
In such a state of things, also, the insured-knowing that he is asked for representations to enable the underwriter to decide properly whether he will insure at all, and if so, at what premium must suppress nothing material to the risk, or the underwriter will not stand on equal grounds with himself, and will be forced to act in the dark more than himself, and probably to misjudge. ”

“ He instructed the jury, 'that they would be warranted in finding that the plaintiffs had adopted the representations made by Jonathan Stearns as a part of this policy, that if those representations were adopted by the plaintiffs, they formed a part of the present policy, in the same manner as if incorporated into it.' Thus the jury were left to decide, as a question of fact, whether the representations of Stearns were defunct and obsolete, or a living member of the defendants' contract of insurance. ”

“ The case in this aspect is, that the assured make no disclosure respecting the fact that lamps were used in the picker-room; that such use was a fact material to the risk; that such use then existed, and was known to the plaintiffs and unknown to the defendants, and was then intended by the plaintiffs to be, and in fact was, continued after the policy was issued, and that it occasioned the loss. A policy made under such circumstances is void. It is not necessary to show that a contract of sale, or any other contract, would be void for a similar cause. ”

“ That it clearly appearing, by the policy itself, that the original policy to the plaintiffs was issued upon the representation of Stearns, which thereafter was to be binding on the plaintiffs, and was referred to therein as the representation of the assured, and that the subsequent policies, including the one declared on, were merely continuations of that contract; and it further appearing that no representation was ever made except the one made by Stearns, and that therefore this important clause in the policy could refer to no other, and is senseless and void unless it refers to that ”

“ In April, 1834, when application was first made for insurance, the defendants, doing business in Boston (Mass.) , put numerous written interrogatories to Stearns, who lived in Malone (New York) , where the factory was situated, and to one of them he replied, that no lamps were 'used in the picking-room.' These interrogatories, and the answers to them, were not annexed to the policy, but were put on file in the office ”

“ Saratoga M. F. Ins. Co., 5 Hill (N. Y.) , 192.
It is true, that, from what is reasonable and just, some exceptions must exist to this general rule, though none of them are believed to cover the present case. ”