mandate

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See also: Mandate, mandaté, and man date

English

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Wikipedia

Etymology 1

Noun is borrowed from Latin mandātum (a charge, order, command, commission, injunction), neut of. mandātus, past participle of mandāre (to commit to one's charge, order, command, commission, literally to put into one's hands), from manus (hand) + dare (to put). Compare command, commend, demand, remand, countermand.

The verb is from the noun.

Pronunciation

Noun
A map showing Middle Eastern and African mandates.
Verb

Noun

mandate (plural mandates)

  1. An official or authoritative command; an order or injunction; a commission; a judicial precept; an authorization.
    Synonyms: compulsion, obligation
    • 1830, Jeremy Bentham, Constitutional code: for the use all nations and all governments ..., volume 1, page 251:
      Enactive. Expositive. / Art. 57. XIII 2. The Registrative, or say Recordative: exercised, by the arrangements and operations, by which, in conformity to corresponding ordinances and mandates, the accounts, given at different periods by the exercise of the statistic function, are kept in contiguity, and in a regular series, for the purpose of reference and comparison.
    • 2017 March 27, “The Observer view on triggering article 50”, in The Observer:
      Instead, May, more sheep than shepherd, has feebly allowed herself to be driven ever further towards an extreme, inflexible, take-it-or-leave-it stance for which she has neither mandate nor credible grounds.
  2. (politics) The order or authority to do something, as granted to a politician by the electorate.
    • 2002, Leroy G. Dorsey, The Presidency and Rhetorical Leadership, Texas A&M University Press, →ISBN, page 30:
      John Tyler and James K. Polk both regarded the election results as a mandate for the annexation of Texas.
  3. (Canada) A period during which a government is in power.
    • 2000 October 6, John Richards, “Pierre Elliott Trudeau: 1919-2000”, in The Globe and Mail, archived from the original on 9 October 2019:
      Throughout his last mandate, from 1980 to 1984, Mr. Trudeau insisted that we see ourselves solely as Canadians, that we set aside the historic compromises that underlie Canada as a federation.
  4. (historical) An order by the League of Nations to a member nation to establish a government responsible for a conquered territory, as the colonies of Germany after World War I.
    1. (historical) Such a territory.
Derived terms
Translations

Verb

mandate (third-person singular simple present mandates, present participle mandating, simple past and past participle mandated)

  1. (Discuss(+) this sense) To authorize.
  2. To make mandatory.
    • 2009 March 7, Walecia Konrad, “Hanging On to Health Coverage, if the Job Goes Away”, in The New York Times:
      Federal law mandates that at least one nongroup insurer in your state must provide coverage to everyone, regardless of health issues.
    • 2021 August 15, Stephanie Elizalde, “Why I'm Mandating That Austin Schools Must Be Masked When Classes Start”, in Time:
      As the Superintendent of Austin, TX, schools I have mandated that our kids must be masked when they start school on Tuesday.
    • 2024 June 13, Clare Foran and Ted Barrett, “Senate GOP blocks bill to guarantee access to IVF nationwide”, in CNN:
      The bill seeks to make IVF treatment more affordable by mandating coverage for fertility treatments under employer-sponsored insurance and certain public insurance plans.
Derived terms
Translations

Etymology 2

From man +‎ date.

Pronunciation

Noun

mandate (plural mandates)

  1. (uncommon) Alternative form of man date: a date between two men.
    • 2007 September 7, Graham Linehan, The IT Crowd, Season 2, Episode 3:
      Moss: Oh, he's long gone, although Roy's got a mandate with him.
      Roy: It is not a mandate. I am not a man-woman. We are not married. I am not your wife!

References

French

Pronunciation

Verb

mandate

  1. inflection of mandater:
    1. first/third-person singular present indicative
    2. first-person singular present subjunctive
    3. second-person singular imperative

Italian

Noun

mandate f

  1. plural of mandata

Verb

mandate

  1. inflection of mandare:
    1. second-person plural present indicative
    2. second-person plural imperative
    3. feminine plural past participle

Anagrams

Latin

Participle

mandāte

  1. vocative masculine singular of mandātus

Spanish

Verb

mandate

  1. second-person singular voseo imperative of mandar combined with te
  2. inflection of mandatar:
    1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
    2. third-person singular imperative