PREROGATIVE • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Prerogative

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/prɪrˈɑgətɪv/ /pˈərˈɑgətɪv/ Listen

noun

Prerogative n.

1.

An exclusive or peculiar privilege; prior and indefeasible right; fundamental and essential possession; used generally of an official and hereditary right which may be asserted without question, and for the exercise of which there is no responsibility or accountability as to the fact and the manner of its exercise. "The two faculties that are the prerogative of man the powers of abstraction and imagination." "An unconstitutional exercise of his prerogative."

2.

Precedence; preeminence; first rank. (Obs.) "Then give me leave to have prerogative." Note: The term came into general use in the conflicts between the Crown and Parliaments of Great Britain, especially in the time of the Stuarts.

Prerogative Court (Eng. Law), a court which formerly had authority in the matter of wills and administrations, where the deceased left bona notabilia, or effects of the value of five pounds, in two or more different dioceses.

Prerogative office, the office in which wills proved in the Prerogative Court were registered.

Synonyms: Privilege; right. See Privilege.

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Etymology of 'Prerogative'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Prerogative" Quotes from Famous Books

... the palate equally well, but it is the proud prerogative of the kingly grape to minister also to the mind." This served to provide one of the earliest offerings to the Deity, seeing that "Bread and wine were brought forth to Abraham by Melchisedec, the Priest of the Most ...

— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie

... tribe of Judah, with their supplementary section of Benjamin, as unduly favoured in the national economy. Secretly there is little doubt that they murmured even against God for ranking this powerful tribe as the prerogative tribe. The jealousy had evidently risen to a great height; it was suppressed by the vigilant and strong government of Solomon; but at the outset of his son's reign it exploded at once, and the Scriptural account of the case shows that it proceeded upon old grievances. ...

— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... children, and his wife was reckoned in the number of his children: the domestic judge might pronounce the death of the offender, or his mercy might expel her from his bed and house; but the slavery of the wretched female was hopeless and perpetual, unless he asserted for his own convenience the manly prerogative of divorce. [1231] The warmest applause has been lavished on the virtue of the Romans, who abstained from the exercise of this tempting privilege above five hundred years: [124] but the same fact evinces the ...

— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon

... the grant in an act of congress was nugatory: if the constitution did not give it, the attempt to confer it by law was improper. If it belonged conjointly to the President and senate, the house of representatives should not attempt to abridge the constitutional prerogative of the other branch of the legislature. However this might be, they were clearly of opinion that it was not placed in the President alone. In the power over all the executive officers which the bill proposed to confer upon the President, the most alarming dangers to liberty were perceived. ...

— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall

... upon me as pert as a sparrow, but with a black look that is the prerogative of man; and taking his pipe ...

— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson

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