abolition
Americannoun
-
the act of abolishing or the state of being abolished: the abolition of capital punishment;
the abolition of war;
the abolition of capital punishment;
the abolition of unfair taxes.
- Synonyms:
- repeal, revocation, invalidation, nullification, elimination, eradication, annihilation
- Antonyms:
- establishment
-
the legal prohibition of slavery, especially the institutional enslavement of Black people in the U.S.
noun
-
the act of abolishing or the state of being abolished; annulment
-
(often capital) (in British territories) the ending of the slave trade (1807) or the ending of slavery (1833): accomplished after a long campaign led by William Wilberforce
-
(often capital) (in the US) the emancipation of the slaves, accomplished by the Emancipation Proclamation issued in 1863 and ratified in 1865
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of abolition
First recorded in 1520–30; from Latin abolitiōn- (stem of abolitiō ), equivalent to abolit(us) “effaced, destroyed,” past participle of abolēre “to destroy, efface” + -iōn- noun suffix; see abolish, -ion
Explanation
Abolition is the act of getting rid of something, like the abolition of slavery. One of the greatest moments in the history of the United States was the abolition of slavery: when we ended slavery as an institution. That's a dramatic and important case, but abolition can refer to getting rid of any system, practice, or institution. Sports leagues would love to achieve the abolition of performance-enhancing drugs. Everyone would probably like to see the abolition of rats from all cities. When there's an abolition, something is abolished — it's gone.
Vocabulary lists containing abolition
American History I
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The American Civil War
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Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
But Mr. Popkin has shown how much the abolition debate mattered at every stage of the French Revolution.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 27, 2026
The Marquis de Condorcet and Jacques Pierre Brissot were Girondins who lost their lives in the Terror before the abolition of slavery, for which they had long campaigned.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 27, 2026
This has all the technical detail required to formalise the abolition of NHS England and the move of its functions to the Department of Health and Social Care.
From BBC • May 15, 2026
Recently, survivors of the Hiroshima atomic bomb pressed for the abolition of nuclear arms at the United Nations, calling to build a human society free from nuclear weapons and war.
From BBC • May 7, 2026
In Philadelphia, the Female Anti-Slavery Society is founded by, among others, Charlotte Forten, granddaughter of black abolition pioneer James Forten, and Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, two future leaders of the women’s rights movement.
From "In the Shadow of Liberty" by Kenneth C. Davis
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
