Legal Definitions - acquiesce

To acquiesce means to accept something or agree to a situation without openly protesting or actively opposing it. It implies giving consent through silence, inaction, or passive acceptance, rather than through an explicit statement or direct action.

Here are some examples illustrating this term:

• Imagine a small business owner who receives a revised contract from a supplier. The new contract includes a minor clause about late payment fees that the owner finds slightly unfavorable but not significant enough to dispute. Rather than negotiating or rejecting the clause, the owner simply signs the contract and returns it. By doing so, the business owner acquiesces to the new terms, accepting them without vocal objection.

• Consider a situation in a community meeting where a proposal is made to rezone a small parcel of land for commercial development. Several residents have private reservations about increased traffic, but when the moderator asks for objections, no one speaks up. The proposal then passes. The residents, by their silence and lack of formal opposition, acquiesced to the rezoning plan, allowing it to proceed.

• In a legal context, during a deposition, an attorney for one party asks a question that is arguably outside the scope of the agreed-upon topics. The opposing attorney, after a moment's consideration, decides not to object, perhaps to avoid prolonging the process or because the information sought is not critically damaging. By not raising an objection, the opposing attorney acquiesces to the question being asked, implicitly allowing it.