armenian genocide and new york life and ottoman empire and martin marootian

By 1919 a New York Life executive wrote that the outstanding life insurance amounts on Armenians in the Ottoman Empire was more than $7,000,000. Interestingly enough, a New York statute provided that if the beneficiaries did not come forth to claim the money after a certain period of time, the proceeds should escheat to the State of New York. Nevertheless, NY Life did nothing about the issue in the 1920s. Indeed, the Ottoman Empire was eliminated in 1920, the Caliphate was extinguished by 1923 and Turkey was trying to become a "Western democracy." No one was interested in pursuing possible claims of Armenians to life insurance proceeds.

No one except one Yegsa Marootian. She had fled Turkey during WWI and ended up in NYC around 1920. Her brother, who held a NY Life life insurance policy, died in the genocide. She knew that she had been the named beneficiary in his policy. She began to inquire of NY Life about the proceeds of the policy but because she was unable to provide the death certificate and because the statute of limitations on her claim had run, she was turned down. The issue died, seemingly forever.

The Issue Surfaces Again

History is a very funny thing. Why do issues that were ignored at one time become "big issues" in another? Why is it that the civil rights movement, the feminist movement and other "liberation" movements seemed to "suddenly" emerge in the 1960s and 1970s? Weren't African-Americans facing significant discrimination in 1890? 1900? Why did it take until 1963 and 1964 for some of their rightful complaints to be "recognized?"

The same question had been asked by generations of Armenians. I recall when I was a student in the 1970s that some of the more progressive people were trying to get recognition for the "Armenian Genocide," but no one wanted to listen to them. The whole world was caught up in the "Holocaust" of the Jews in WWII.* There wasn't enough "stomach" in the culture to allow two

[*Putting a term in quotation marks is not meant to emphasize that the word is inappropriate or unhelpful--indeed, I think holocaust is a very useful term to describe the horrendous acts against Jews and other minority groups by the Nazis in WWII. It only stresses that what we call things is "up for grabs" and a matter of intense public debate and scrutiny.]

holocausts at once, I suppose. But these people did not give up. The Armenian community did what many groups do--they began to endow chairs in major universities (six of them now) in Armenian studies; they commissioned publications on the "genocide," they passed the story to their children.

Fast Forward to Today

One of the "children" who decided to do something about it was Martin Marootian. He was the son of Yegsa and, along with a dozen other plaintiffs, decided in 1999 to file a lawsuit when he was 85 years old in the CDC Federal Court against NY Life demanding THE LIST of Armenian life insurance policy holders as well as compensation by NY Life to the beneficiaries or heirs of beneficiaries of these policies. What is probably not amazing is that NY Life still had the list. Of course they objected to producing it, but naturally they had to turn it over after a bit of legal wrangling. That list is now available online, and you can read it to your heart's content--learning about professors and business people and other Armenians in the Ottoman Empire who had life insurance policies with NY Life.

Once this fascinating class action lawsuit began to gain steam the politicians began to enter the issue. Adam Schiff, while a CA State Senator, introduced SB 1915, which passed in 2000 and gave survivors and heirs of the Armenian Genocide a right of action to sue on unrecovered insurance claims. Charles Poochigian is a CA state senator, obviously of Armenian descent, who successfully introduced resolutions in the CA Senate in 2001 and then again a joint resolution in 2004 naming April 24 as the Day of Remembrance of the Armenian Genocide of 1915-23. When Adam Schiff was elected to Congress, he began to push for Congressional recognition of the Armenian genocide. He has run into hard sledding there, as passing that kind of recognition would piss Turkey off, and since we may want to use Turkey as a staging ground for some of our Middle East troops and military operations, Congress will be slow in getting to the issue.

But the lawsuit went ahead. Finally, in 2004, after extensive negotiations, for which John Garamendi (CA insurance commissioner) takes some credit, a settlement was reached in which $20 million will be paid off to beneficiaries/descendants of the Armenian policy holders, $4 million will go to the lawyers and another $3 milion will go to various Armenian social service agencies, many of whom tried to help Armenian after WWI. No money has yet been paid out. I think the claimants (those who did not "opt out" of the class action) have until the end of March 2005 to submit their claims.

Conclusion

This does not "conclude" the issue. There are a few life insurance policies outstanding issued by other companies (Equitable) that might be adjudicated. The Armenian community still wants federal recognition of the "genocide." Indeed, they want to press the Turkish government for "reparations" still. But it is interesting to me that the issue that broke the logjam on the "Armenian Genocide" was a lawsuit that was triggered by a rather pedestrian issue in insurance law: collecting on life insurance policies. So, when your friends begin to ask you in about five years (because I think this issue will take about that long to be a topic of general conversation in our culture) if you know anything of the "Armenian Genocide," you can calmly look at them and say, "Oh, sure. An insurance law case triggered the issue in our day." They will look at you blankly, but you will know why you are right.

Finally, it also teaches us that history, that subject that often doesn't enter into law school deliberations, is alive and well in law. As one of the lawyers in the case said, "The past is not dead, nor even is it past." When you recognize that 1915 is 2005, from the perception of law, you realize that the past is still alive, still with us.