Fraternity (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 14, No. 8, Ed. 1 Sunday, August 1, 1915 Page: 1 of 8
eight pages : ill. ; page 14 x 11 in. Digitized from 35 mm. microfilm.View a full description of this newspaper.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
o
o
o
m
volv&3
^PUBUCAM
'OFFICIAL. ORGAN OF THE ORDER'
Volume XIV
it
1Nothing
FORT WORTH, TEXAS, AUGUST, 1915
Imposaiblm"
Number 8
PREMIUMS PAID PROMPTLY PROCURED PAST PARTICIPANTS $835,971.35
WHOLE FAMILY INSURANCE.
By N. J. Wade,
Attorney-at-Law, Fort Worth, Texas.
The Family fireside, which we call the
Home, is the only institution which is
sovereign above its constituents. All
other institutions, including the govern-
ment itself, exist at the courtesy of man.
In every case, their perpetuity is based
upon the fabric of an argument, and the
showing they make in the service of
man. Across their faces in letters of
fire never to be effaced, man has writ-
ten the express reservation of his sov-
ereignty above, and independent of
them all. But not so with the Home.
On the contrary it prescribes its own
limitations, defines its own powers, es-
tablishes its own perpetuity and en-
forces its own mandates with an
avowed autocracy which has never
known a challenge.
Can any other form of life insurance
offer as fascinating a field as Family
Insurance? In a former article the
Home was discussed as man's alter ego;
that the appeal of humanity, its needs,
its wants, its emotions and its senti-
ments, are expressed by the Home
rather than by the man as an individual.
Man is so constituted that he combats
everything but the Home. For every-
thing else he has but one test, and that
is the "acid test." For the Home and
its decrees he prescribes no test at all.
For these reasons, in all matters of
social activity, into which emotionalism
or benevolence enters, the Home can-
not and will not be excluded. Then,
considering the office work, and the
indestructibility of the Home, or family,
ought it not to be protected with life in-
surance, as well as the tenement which
shelters it, by fire insurance? The only
reason the Family is not insured is be-
cause attention has not been called to
the fact. It is not the doing of the
thing so much as knowing how to pro-
ceed about it.
Commercial, or what we call old line
life insurance, is advancing into the field
of Family insurance more rapidly than
are Fraternal orders. And this ought
not so to be. That it is so, however, is
by "permission" of the fraternal orders,
whose position is every way more ad-
vantageous for writing Family insur-
ance. During the past decade the
growth of fraternal insurance societies
has been, and is now, phenomenal. So
much so that Family insurance is a point
they have, "in the rush of business," so
to speak, overlooked; while old line
companies have been giving it atten-
tion. Some fraternal insurance orders
have already, as it were, "seen the new
light," and placed whole families as well
as individuals on their membership
rolls. This movement will never retro-
grade. It will advance until hundreds
of fraternal insurance societies have
taken the family from its secondary
place and given it first place. Relative-
ly the family is much more a perma-
nency, considered from any point of
view, than is man himself individually.
It stands to reason that that order
which exalts the family most is propor-
tionately more stable than the order
which neglects to do so.
The bane 6fe>«insurance societies is
lapsation. Will a family lapse? We
know by common observation, which
need not cover more than a*very few
years, that individuals are as fickle in
their lodge affiliations as a young swain
in his coutrships. Joining and lapsing,
until the practice almost becomes a dis-
ease. ' The membership of one society
today was the lapsed membership of
some other society yesterday. And, so
it goes. All fraternal orders are looking
about for a remedy. The betterment of
the lodge system, the standardizing of
the ritual, the improvement of the laws
and attractions offered and the weeding
out of undesirable and incapable mem-
bers and officials are all vital. But,
while these matters are receiving t he
attention their importance demands, and
will ever be momentous problems to all
aggressive and thrifty orders, in my
opinion, second to none is the new
problem of adequate and complete
family insurance. Speaking practically,
the family will not lapse. After having
entered its membership, it will as a rule
require the collective judgment and
unanimous consent of all the constitu-
ents of that home before it will be
allowed to lapse its membership. In
the very nature of the case there will be
special reasons against lapsation of the
whole family, varying with each case,
reasons which stand in the order's
. favor, and reasons the order could never
avail itself of in holding individual
members.
The rarest, and most desirable com-
bination of organized industry is the
blending of emotionalism and business.
In every case where this combination
obtains there is always successful
growth. It is this law of business that
has made insurance societies outstrip in
achievement and growth the fondest
dreams of their proponents. It is rea-
sonable that if Family insurance adds to
this quality it will prove an invaluable
asset to the fraternal societies. Does
it? It certainly does. Family insurance,
far above everything else, opens a wide
door to this very combination of emo-
tionalism and business, linked together.
The great difficulty, as a rule, with busi-
ness enterprises is they do not appeal
o
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Schmidt, Henry C. Fraternity (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 14, No. 8, Ed. 1 Sunday, August 1, 1915, newspaper, August 1, 1915; Fort Worth, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth233213/m1/1/: accessed April 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting The Dolph Briscoe Center for American History.