Holbrook

Action on a policy of fire insurance which contained a clause against double insurance as follows: “ This entire policy, unless otherwise provided by agreement .... shall be void if the insured now has or shall hereafter make or procure any other contract of insurance .... on property covered by this policy.” The defense relied on is that the insured committed a. breach of this condition by obtaining additional insurance without defendant’s consent.

Plaintiffs loaned a sum of money to one J. O. D. McMahan. In the course of the negotiation of such loan it was agreed that plaintiffs should have as security a mortgage upon land of the borrower in the city of Stockton and a policy of insurance on a building to be erected thereon. The mortgage was executed by McMahan on November 9, 1892; it provided, among other things,, that he would keep the buildings on the land insured to the amount of at least one thousand dollars and assign the policies of insurance to the plaintiffs. One Henderson negotiated the said loan as broker both of the mortgagor and the mortgagees; he was also the local agent for the defendant insurance company; on December 5, 1892, he filled out a blank form of…