Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Under English common law, the state of having lost one's legal and civil personhood, as through losing the legal capacity to own or pass on property.
- noun Obsolete Dishonor.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The act of attainting, or the state of being attainted; the legal consequence of judgment of death or outlawry pronounced in respect of treason or felony: as, a bill of attainder; to remove an attainder.
- noun A bringing under some disgrace, stain, or imputation; the state of being in dishonor.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The act of attainting, or the state of being attainted; the extinction of the civil rights and capacities of a person, consequent upon sentence of death or outlawry.
- noun obsolete A stain or staining; state of being in dishonor or condemnation.
- noun a bill brought into, or passed by, a legislative body, condemning a person to death or outlawry, and attainder, without judicial sentence.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun law, rare The state a prisoner enters once a death sentence (usually for treason) had been issued; the state of being stripped of all civil rights.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun cancellation of civil rights
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Sunday's term was bill of attainder, which is defined as:
Legal Definitions 2008
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So they pass a bill which is an ex post facto bill as well as a bill of attainder, which is unconstitutional, so they're using the tax code to punish people.
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"I'm not surprised," said Drumcarro; "one of the old Douglas family before the attainder was as good as any one of their new-fangled dukes."
Kirsteen: The Story of a Scotch Family Seventy Years Ago Margaret 1891
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When Congress singles out someone or a group to penalize, it is a bill of attainder, which is as unconstitutional as you can get.
BusinessWeek.com -- 2010
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The Los Angeles Times reports that legal experts agree that the bill that passed the House on Friday would probably not be considered a bill of attainder, which is essentially a law that singles out one group for punishment and is prohibited by the Constitution.
Daily Kos 2009
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The Los Angeles Times reports that legal experts agree that the bill that passed the House on Friday would probably not be considered a bill of attainder, which is essentially a law that singles out one group for punishment and is prohibited by the Constitution.
Daily Kos 2009
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As such, it sounds an awful lot like something the Constitution expressly forbids -- a bill of attainder, which is a punishment of particular individuals imposed not by a court of law but by a legislative body.
Latest Articles 2009
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a bill of attainder, which is a punishment of particular individuals imposed not by a court of law but by a legislative body.
David Drake 2009
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- What 'attainder' is, and why it affects our fighting men in uniform.
Euphoric Reality 2008
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"attainder" clause and require it to continue to use their services?
chained_bear commented on the word attainder
Forfeiture of hereditary honors and dignities following a conviction for treason.
August 24, 2008