Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To charge with a shortcoming or error.
- intransitive verb To charge formally with a wrongdoing.
- intransitive verb To make a charge of wrongdoing against another.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To make an imputation against, as of a crime, fault, or error; charge with guilt or blame; affect with specific censure: used either absolutely or with of before the thing charged, and sometimes with for before the subject of censure: as, to
accuse one of high crimes, or as an accomplice in crime; to accuse nature for our misfortunes. - To indicate; evince; show; manifest; show signs of.
- Synonyms Accuse, Charge, Indict, Arraign, Impeach, Incriminate, criminate, inculpate, tax with, taunt with, impute to. Of these words charge is the most general, and may be the weakest, being used of any sort of imputation, large or small, against persons or things formally or informally, publicly or privately. Accuse commonly, though not invariably, expresses something more formal and grave than charge. Indict is a purely legal term, restricted to the action of a grand jury when it makes a formal complaint against a supposed offender, in order that he may be brought to trial. Arraign has primarily the same meaning with indict, but is freer in figurative use: as, to
arraign a political party at the bar of public sentiment. Impeach is to bring to answer before some legislative body for wrong-doing in a public office, and has been so long associated with the peculiar dignity, solemnity, and impressiveness of such trials that it has been lifted into corresponding importance in its figurative uses. Incriminate is obsolescent except in the special meaning of involving another with one's self: as, in his confession he incriminated several persons hitherto unsuspected. To charge with a fault; to accuse of dishonesty; to indict for felony and arraign before the court; to impeach a magistrate or one's motives or veracity; to incriminate others with one's self in a confession of guilt. - noun Accusation.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb (Law) To charge with, or declare to have committed, a crime or offense.
- transitive verb To charge with a fault; to blame; to censure.
- transitive verb rare To betray; to show.
- noun obsolete Accusation.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb transitive To find
fault with, toblame , tocensure . - verb transitive To
charge with havingcommitted acrime oroffence . - verb intransitive To make an accusation against someone.
- noun obsolete An
accusation - Shakespeare
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb bring an accusation against; level a charge against
- verb blame for, make a claim of wrongdoing or misbehavior against
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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Clinton and MCcain accuse Obama of offering nothing but pretty speaches but, you know, Speaches motivate, speaches galvanises, speaches unite disparate groups into actions that can change the world.
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If I used the word Israeli, you would accuse me of using a code word for Jews.
"We terminated the most precious American asset which vowed to defeat [the] mujahadeen." Ann Althouse 2007
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(Come on Beck, I dare you call accuse Taft of being a progressive communist.)
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(Come on Beck, I dare you call accuse Taft of being a progressive communist.)
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(Come on Beck, I dare you call accuse Taft of being a progressive communist.)
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(Come on Beck, I dare you call accuse Taft of being a progressive communist.)
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(Come on Beck, I dare you call accuse Taft of being a progressive communist.)
The Full Feed from HuffingtonPost.com Les Leopold 2010
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(Come on Beck, I dare you call accuse Taft of being a progressive communist.)
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(Come on Beck, I dare you call accuse Taft of being a progressive communist.)
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The politicians seeking to deny him a second term accuse him of "charity" economics and of trying to lure voters with handouts, such as much-publicised distribution of "surplus production" potatoes in different locations earlier this year.
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