The Common Law - Page 253

232 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES

(1) What is an assignment

1. Under the English Law of Property, property is classified as Realty and Personality.

2. In connection with the transfer of rights over Realty, the word used is Conveyance. In connection with the transfer of rights over Personality, the word used is either Transfer or Assignment.

3. Assignment, therefore, means the transfer by a person of his rights over personal property and particularly one form of it, namely, chose in action.

(2) What is a chose in action

1. Under the English Nomenclature, Personality is divisible into two classes :

(i) Moveable goods of which one can take physical possession.

(ii) Personal rights of property which can only be claimed or enforced by action and not by taking physical possession.

2. The former are called :

(i) Choses in Possession—Things in Possession,

(ii) Choses in Action—Things in Action.

3. The definition of a chose in action—

( 1902 ) 2 K. B. 427 ( 430 )— Channell J.

It is really speaking a debt.

4. The word assignment is used in respect of chose in action. It is something which you can only sign it away if you want to transfer it. You cannot deliver possession of it.

(3) Necessity of Studying Equitable Assignment

1. An assignment is a transfer of a right by its owner, subsisting against another, to a third person to whom the person against whom it was subsisting, becomes bound.

Illustration. A is creditor. B is debtor. A assigns his right to debt against B to C : B becomes bound to C and C gets a right to recover it from B.