Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To make and administer the public policy and affairs of (a state, for example); exercise sovereign authority over.
- intransitive verb To control the speed or magnitude of; regulate.
- intransitive verb To control the actions or behavior of.
- intransitive verb To keep under control; restrain.
- intransitive verb To exercise a deciding or determining influence on.
- intransitive verb Grammar To require (a specific morphological form) of accompanying words.
- intransitive verb To exercise political authority.
- intransitive verb To have or exercise a determining influence.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To exercise a directing or restraining power over; control or guide: used of any exertion of controlling force, whether physical or moral.
- Specifically To rule or regulate by right of authority; control according to law or prescription; exercise magisterial, official, or customary power over: as, to
govern a state, a church, a bank, a household, etc. - In grammar, to cause or require to be in a particular form: as, a transitive verb or a preposition governs a noun or pronoun in the objective case; the possessive case is governed by the thing possessed; the subject governs the verb in number and person.
- To exercise or have control; practise direction or guidance; especially, to exercise legal or customary authority.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- intransitive verb To exercise authority; to administer the laws; to have the control.
- transitive verb To direct and control, as the actions or conduct of men, either by established laws or by arbitrary will; to regulate by authority.
- transitive verb To regulate; to influence; to direct; to restrain; to manage
- transitive verb (Gram.) To require to be in a particular case; ; or to require (a particular case).
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb transitive To make and administer the public policy and affairs of; to exercise sovereign authority in.
- verb transitive To control the actions or behavior of; to keep under control; to restrain.
- verb transitive To exercise a deciding or determining influence on.
- verb transitive To control the speed, flow etc. of; to regulate.
- verb intransitive To exercise political authority; to run a government.
- verb intransitive To have or exercise a determining influence.
- verb transitive To require that a certain preposition, grammatical case, etc. be used with a word; sometimes used synonymously with
collocate .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb bring into conformity with rules or principles or usage; impose regulations
- verb direct or strongly influence the behavior of
- verb exercise authority over; as of nations
- verb require to be in a certain grammatical case, voice, or mood
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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Here is the authority, from God himself, to hold men and women, and their increase, in slavery, and to transmit them as property forever; here is plenary power to govern them, whatever measure of severity it may require; provided only, that _to govern_, be the object in exercising it.
Cotton is King, and Pro-Slavery Arguments Comprising the Writings of Hammond, Harper, Christy, Stringfellow, Hodge, Bledsoe, and Cartrwright on This Important Subject E. N. [Editor] Elliott
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A wise person once said that "to govern is to choose."
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He knows Republicans can't govern from the House, so his challenge will be picking the issues on which he might be able to succeed, or at least frame the agenda for the election of 2012.
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American politics is turning right because Democratic leaders tried to govern from the hard ideological left, even over the objections of their own rank and file and the larger public.
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And if we are going to govern well, we will govern from a conservative perspective, Scott said.
Tea Party Winners Take Ambitious Promises To Washington AP 2010
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"This may infuriate his base, but to win back independents he has to govern from the center."
Obama Is Dealt a Tough Hand Neil King Jr. 2010
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"Not an ideal candidate, Brady's personal views veer to the right of our tastes and the well-being of the state, but we take him at his word that he won't push a social agenda as governor and we call on him to govern from the middle."
Bill Brady Is Conservative, But Says He Won't Push Social Agenda The Huffington Post News Team 2010
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Four times Democrats have won control of both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, and four times they have attempted to govern from the left.
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The remedy: govern from the center, try even harder to be bi-partisan, and stop criticizing Wall Street and bring some CEOs onto the White House team.
Derek Shearer: Bridging the Enthusiasm Gap: Obama and the Conventional Wisdom Derek Shearer 2010
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But the local officials 'connection to the people they govern is thin.
Marjah Insurgency Full-Blown AP 2010
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