Voluntary territorial transfer by treaty
The act of
cession
is the assignment of
property
to another entity. In
international law
it commonly refers to
land
transferred by
treaty
. Ballentine's Law Dictionary defines cession as "a surrender; a giving up; a relinquishment of jurisdiction by a board in favor of another agency."
[1]
In contrast with
annexation
, where property is forcibly seized, cession is voluntary or at least apparently so.
Examples
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In 1790, the U.S. states of
Maryland
and
Virginia
both ceded land to create the
District of Columbia
, as specified in the
U.S. Constitution
of the previous year. The Virginia portion was
given back
in 1847, a process known as "retrocession".
Following the
First Opium War
(1839?1842) and
Second Opium War
(1856?1860),
Hong Kong
(
Treaty of Nanking
) and
Kowloon
(
Convention of Peking
) were ceded by the
Qing dynasty
government of
China
to the
United Kingdom
; and following defeat in the
First Sino-Japanese War
,
Taiwan
was ceded to the
Empire of Japan
in 1895.
Territory
can also be ceded for payment, such as in the
Louisiana Purchase
and
Alaska Purchase
.
Specific areas of law
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Contract law
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This is a yielding up, or release.
[2]
France
ceded
Louisiana
to the
United States
by the treaty of Paris, of April 30, 1803. Spain made a cession of
East
and
West Florida
by the treaty of February 22, 1819. Cessions have been severally made of a part of their territory by New York, Virginia, Massachusetts, Connecticut, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia.
Civil law
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Under the
civil law system
, cession is the equivalent of
assignment
, and therefore, is an act by which a personal claim is transferred from the assignor (the
cedent
) to the assignee (the
cessionary
). Whereas
real rights
are transferred by delivery,
personal rights
are transferred by cession. Once the obligation of the debtor is transferred, the cessionary is entirely substituted. The original creditor (cedent) loses his right to claim and the new creditor (cessionary) gains that right.
Ecclesiastical law
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When an ecclesiastic is created
bishop
, or when a
parson
or
rector
takes another benefice without dispensation, the first benefice becomes void by a legal cession, or surrender.
Retrocession
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Retrocession
is the return of something (e.g., land or territory) that was ceded in general or, specifically:
Examples:
- District of Columbia retrocession
, the retrocession to Virginia, and potentially to Maryland, of the land ceded to create the District of Columbia
- Retrocession of
Louisiana (New Spain)
from Spain to France, formally accomplished just three weeks before the U.S. received the Louisiana Purchase lands from France
Disputed case
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In
insurance
, retrocessional arrangements generally are governed by a reinsurance or retrocessional agreement and the principles applicable to reinsurance also are applicable to retrocessional cover.
See also
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References
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]
- ^
Ballentine's Law Dictionary
, p. 72.
- ^
Balentine's Law Dictionary
, p. 72.