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." In contrast with

annexation Annexation (Latin ''ad'', to, and ''nexus'', joining), in international law, is the forcible acquisition of one state's territory by another state, usually following military occupation of the territory. It is generally held to be an illegal act ...

, where property is forcibly seized, cession is voluntary or at least apparently so.

Examples

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 The First Opium War (), also known as the Opium War or the Anglo-Sino War was a series of military engagements fought between Britain and the Qing dynasty of China between 1839 and 1842. The immediate issue was the Chinese enforcement of the ...

(18391842) and

Second Opium War The Second Opium War (), also known as the Second Anglo-Sino War, the Second China War, the Arrow War, or the Anglo-French expedition to China, was a colonial war lasting from 1856 to 1860, which pitted the British Empire and the French Emp ...

(18561860), Hong Kong ( Treaty of Nanking) and

Kowloon Kowloon () is an urban area in Hong Kong comprising the Kowloon Peninsula and New Kowloon. With a population of 2,019,533 and a population density of in 2006, it is the most populous area in Hong Kong, compared with Hong Kong Island and t ...

( Convention of Peking) were ceded by the Qing dynasty government of

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

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

Contract law

This is a yielding up, or release.''Balentine's Law Dictionary'', p. 72. 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

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

When an ecclesiastic is created bishop, or when a

parson A parson is an ordained Christian person responsible for a small area, typically a parish. The term was formerly often used for some Anglican clergy and, more rarely, for ordained ministers in some other churches. It is no longer a formal term d ...

rector Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to: Style or title *Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations *Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...

takes another benefice without dispensation, the first benefice becomes void by a legal cession, or surrender.

Retrocession

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

*The claimed "Taiwan retrocession" refers to the view that the sovereignty of Taiwan has been handed over in 1945 from Japan to the

Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast ...

, the widely-recognized government of

at the time, following Japan's loss in WWII. Whether this "retrocession" is legitimate under international law is a disputed issue in the complex

political status of Taiwan The controversy surrounding the political status of Taiwan or the Taiwan issue is a result of World War II, the second phase of the Chinese Civil War (1945–1949), and the Cold War. The basic issue hinges on who the islands of Taiwan, Peng ...

. See also:

Taiwan Retrocession Day Retrocession Day is the name given to the annual observance and a former public holiday in Taiwan to commemorate the end of Japanese rule of Taiwan and Penghu, and the claimed retrocession ("return") of Taiwan to the Republic of China on 25 Oct ...

. 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.

References

Civil law (common law) International law Judicial remedies Political geography Property law Reinsurance Sovereignty {{Autonomous types of first-tier administration