This U.S. Supreme Court case involved a dispute between Aetna Life Insurance Company and the France family. The France family had taken out a life insurance policy with Aetna, and when the insured died, the family attempted to collect the benefits. Aetna refused to pay, claiming that the policy had lapsed due to nonpayment of premiums. The France family argued that the policy had been paid in full and that Aetna had wrongfully refused to pay the benefits. The Supreme Court ultimately sided with the France family, ruling that Aetna had wrongfully refused to pay the benefits. The Court held that the policy had been paid in full and that Aetna had no right to deny the claim. The Court also held that Aetna had failed to provide sufficient evidence to support its claim that the policy had lapsed due to nonpayment of premiums. As a result, the Court ordered Aetna to pay the benefits to the France family.

In Aetna Life Insurance Co. v. France et al., the Supreme Court was asked to decide whether a life insurance policy issued in Louisiana by an out-of-state company was valid under state law. The majority of the court held that it was not, finding that such policies were prohibited by Louisiana's constitution and statutes at the time of issuance. Justice Field dissented from this opinion, arguing that there had been no clear statement from either the legislature or courts of Louisiana prohibiting such contracts and thus they should be considered valid under general contract principles. He further argued that even if some form of prohibition did exist, it would have only applied prospectively rather than retroactively invalidating existing contracts like this one which had already been formed prior to any prohibition being enacted into law or declared by judicial decision.