Life insurance death claim denied

I hope this is question is ok to post. I am new to Reddit. It is really weighing heavy on my mind today…

This is from a couple of years ago…but I am currently taking a CE course on life insurance for my current employment. It brought all of this back up for me and I wanted to put the situation out there to see if we were wronged or not…

My dad died in a car accident on Jan 31 of that year. On Jan 8th he wrote a check for the initial premium on a Legionnaires Insurance Trust Travel Accident Life lnsurance policy and mailed the check with the application around that same time. The policy was written Jan 26th and the check cleared the bank on Jan 29th. Dad passed on Jan 31st. Mom received the policy document Feb 1st, which they said was the effective date of the policy. Since he died before the effective date of the policy, they denied the claim. I was told to appeal it by a service rep of the company. We did and spelled out the details above in the appeal and it was denied again. He lived in the state of South Dakota, if that matters.

What I read today states “When the initial premium is paid with the application, the applicant has made an offer. If the insurance company issues the policy, it has accepted the offer. If the insured died before the policy was actually delivered, a death claim would be payable.”( Source: Kaplan.com, Life Insurance Policy Comparison and Understanding,3rd Edition Online Course.)

Should we have fought this harder? The lawyer we met with to update Mom’s Will said it wasn’t worth the fight…we likely would not win. It makes me mad still to this day. The pay out would have been $200k.

Thanks!