The term abandonment has a multitude of uses, legal and extra-legal. This "signpost article" provides a guide to the various legal and quasi-legal uses of the word and includes links to articles that deal with each of the distinct concepts at greater length. Abandonment, in law, is the relinquishment or renunciation of an interest, claim, privilege, possession or right, especially with the intent of never again resuming or reasserting it. Such intentional action may take the form of a discontinuance or a waiver. This broad meaning has a number of applications in different branches of law. In common law jurisdictions, both common law abandonment and statutory abandonment of property may be recognized. Common law abandonment may be generally defined as "the relinquishment of a right [in property] by the owner thereof without any regard to future possession by himself or any other person, and with the intention to foresake [sic] or desert the right...." Common law abandonment is "the voluntary relinquishment of a thing by its owner with the intention of terminating his ownership, and without [the intention of] vesting ownership in any other person; the giving up of a thing absolutely, without reference to any particular person or purpose...." (emphasis added) [footnotes and citations omitted]. An example of statutory abandonment in a common law jurisdiction is abandonment by a bankruptcy trustee under 11 U.S.C. § 554). In Scots law, failure to assert a legal right in a way that implies abandonment of it is called taciturnity.

Noun

abandonment (plural abandonments)

1. The act of abandoning, or the state of being abandoned; total desertion; relinquishment.
   • 1790-1800, Edmund Burke, Letters on a Regicide Peace:

     To what are we reserved? An adequate compensation "for the sacrifice of powers the most nearly connected with us;"— an adequate compensation "for the direct or indirect annexation to France ot all the ports of the continent, from Dunkirk to Hamburgh;"— an adequate compensation "for the abandonment of the independence of Europe!"

2. (maritime law) The relinquishment by the insured to the underwriters of what may remain of the property insured after a loss or damage by a peril insured against.
3. (common law) The relinquishment of a right, claim or privilege, as to mill site, etc.
4. (common law) The voluntary leaving of a person to whom one is bound by a special relation, as a wife, husband or child; desertion.

   "Since he left her, she's suing him for divorce on grounds of abandonment."

5. The cessation of service on a particular segment of the lines of a common carrier by railroad.
6. A refusal to receive freight so damaged in transit as to be worthless and render carrier liable for its value.
7. (rare) Careless freedom or ease; abandon.

Related terms

• abandonable
• abandoned
• abandonee
• abandoner