I have serveral old insurance policies from 1947 pass on the everyone one who died. I have all doucuments will

Question

Am I entitled to the benifits since I am next and have proof of my relatives that was insured and now deceased.

Answer 1

If the policy has never paid the benefit you could be next in line. Each state has a predetermined sequence of related people for cases where the beneficiary is not alive. No insurance company has ever gone out of business and not had the policies taken over by another company. All policies have always been honored, the insurance industry has worked together to make sure this does not happen. You can contact the insurance company but the odds are the policies were already paid out.

Answer 2

You don't say that you are a beneficiary on any of these policies. If you are not you would not be entitled to the death benefit just because you are "next". Do you know who the beneficiaries where? Do you know if they received the death benefit?

Are the companies that wrote the policies still in existence today? It may be very difficult to determine if the company was liquidated or perhaps bought out by successive  companies perhaps multiple times over the years.

Just the fact that you have a policy does not establish that the policy is still in effect. A policy could lapse for nonpayment but you could retain the original policy form though it would be worthless.

Answer 3

You are not automatically entitled, no.  

And it's highly possible that the policies were already cashed in, or that they were expired at the time of death.  You'll have to contact each of the companies and find out.