avowable

It would not be an avowable reason that we hoped Wilde would write new plays and books, would it?

Oscar Wilde, His Life and Confessions 2007

Moreover the chancellor of the exchequer saw before him an inevitable addition of ten millions of pounds sterling to his budget, the only avowable reason for which was the rectification of the Canadian frontier.

Albert Gallatin American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII John Austin Stevens

It would not be an avowable reason that we hoped Wilde would write new plays and books, would it?

Oscar Wilde Harris, Frank 1916

When a man of his wealth and position took the trouble to pay a girl of Virginia's station such marked attention, capping the climax with this present invitation to dine at his house, either his intentions were not avowable or else he was very much in love and wanted to marry her, which last hypothesis sent a thrill down the good sister's back.

Bought and Paid For From the Play of George Broadhurst Arthur Hornblow 1903

The latter-day leisure-class festivities and entertainments may continue in some slight degree to serve the religious need and in a higher degree the needs of recreation and conviviality, but they also serve an invidious purpose; and they serve it none the less effectually for having a colorable non-invidious ground in these more avowable motives.

The theory of the leisure class; an economic study of institutions 1899

The traditions of the Christian Church, which overspread the whole of Europe, and set up for worship a Divine Virgin and her Divine Son, both of whom it elaborately disengaged from personal contact with sexuality effectually crushed any attempt to find a sacred and avowable ideal in married love.

Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 Sex in Relation to Society Havelock Ellis 1899

The more precise statistics of the causes of prostitution seldom assign seduction as the main determining factor in more than about twenty per cent. of cases, though this is obviously one of the most easily avowable motives (see _ante_, p. 256).

Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 Sex in Relation to Society Havelock Ellis 1899

Hence the coldness, the cause of which is scarcely avowable.

The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning Browning, Elizabeth B 1898

It seemed an open response to a secret instigation or impulse which was unconnected with any recognized or avowable principle.

The Inside Story of the Peace Conference Emile Joseph Dillon 1894

It would not be an avowable reason that we hoped Wilde would write new plays and books, would it?

Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) His Life and Confessions Frank Harris 1893