Discharge

The opposite of charge, hence te release; liberate; annul; unburden; disincumber. In the law of contracts. To cancel or unioose the obligation of a contract; to make an agreement or contract null and inoperative. As anoun, the word means the act or instrument by which the binding force of a contract is terminated, irrespective of iW discharge is the result of performance) or is broken oif before complete execution. Discharge isa generic torm; its principal species are rescission, release, accord and satisfaction, performauce, judgment, composition, bankruptcy, merger, (g.v.) Leake, Cont. 413. As applied to demands, claims, rights of action, incumbrances, etc., to discharge the debt or claim is to extinguish it, to annul its obligatory force, to satisfy it. And here also the term is generic; thus a debt, a mortgage, alegacy, may bedischarged by payment or performance, or by any act short of that, lawful in itself, which the creditor accepts as sufficient. Todischarge a person is to liberate him trom the binding force of an obligation, debt, or claim. Discharge by operation of law is where the discharge takes place, whether it was intended by the parties or not; thus, if a creditor appoints his debtor his executor, the debt is discharged by operation of law, because the executor canuot have an action against himself.

Co. Litt. 264), note 1; Williams, Ex'rs, 1216; Chit. Cont. 714.

In civil practice, To discharge a rule, #n order, an injunction, a certificate, process of execution, or in general any proceeding in a court, is to cancel or annul it, or to revoke it, or to refuse to confirm its original provisional force. To discharge a jury is to relieve them from any further consideration of a cause. This is done when the continuance of the trial is, by any cause, rendered impossible; also when the jury, after deliberation, cannot agree on a verdict.

In equity practice

In the process of accounting before a master in chancery, the discharge igs a statement of expenses and eounter-claims brought in and filed, by way of set-off, by the accounting defendant; which follows the charge in order. In criminal practice. The act by which a person inconfinement, held on an accusation of some crime or misdemeanor, is set at liberty. The writing containing the order for his being so set at liberty is also called a “discharge.” In bankruptey practice. The discharge of the bankrupt is the step which regularly tollows the adjndication of bankruptey and the administration of his estate. By it he is released from the obligation of all his debts which were or might be proved in the proceedings, so that they are no longer a charge upon him, and so that he may thereafter engage in business and acquire property with- In maritime law. The unlading or unlivery of a cargo from a vessel.

Story, J., 2 Sum. 589, 600.