assigns

1. 1
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of assign.

   The court assigns a guardian when no relative is willing to serve.

   The system automatically assigns each request to the next available server.

   Note

   Every meaning of the verb passes through this present-tense form: a court assigns a guardian, a teacher assigns homework, a system assigns a request to a server. In law it also means transferring property or a right, and whoever receives it becomes one of the owner's assigns, the legal transferees. Use assigns with a singular subject (she assigns, the court assigns). With I, you or a plural subject, use assign.

2. 2
   noun

   Plural of assign.

   The contract binds the owner, her heirs, and her assigns.

   Rights under this lease pass to the tenant and the tenant's assigns.

   Note

   The noun behind the legal formula "heirs and assigns": an assign is an assignee, someone to whom property or a right is transferred. It is the only noun sense still in use. An assign once also meant an appurtenance, an appointment or a design, but those meanings are obsolete. The same spelling is also the present-tense verb, so "the owner assigns" and "the owner's assigns" mean different things: one transfers, the others receive.

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