Talk:opposable

Tea room discussion

Note: the below discussion was moved from the Wiktionary:Tea room.

...seems to have some specific meaning in law which I can't quite pin down. Can anyone explain it? Here are a few instances:

• Under Belgian law, pledgor and pledgee establish a valid and opposable security over the credit claim...
• ...the retention title should be valid, or more correctly, opposable only to the creditors of the purchaser, only if it has a sure date and earlier in reference with any distraint.
• Under the same conditions there shall also be opposable against third parties the real rights obtained by State...

And so on. Something along the lines of ‘able to be enforced’..? Ƿidsiþ 11:45, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

It seems to mean something like "(of a right) Able to be enforced against competing claims (of)". I found this b.g.c. hit very helpful; it uses "[a] right [that is] opposable (to)" in parallel fashion with "[a] duty [that is] owed (to)". More explicit, though oddly not as helpful IMHO, is this b.g.c. hit, which seems to define "opposable (to)" as "(of a situation) Which can be legally invoked (against)", and ibid, which defines it very explicitly but as (of a unilateral act taken by one State (relative to another)). —Ruakh_TALK 20:12, 31 December 2008 (UTC)