amendment
Americannoun
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an alteration of or addition to a motion, bill, constitution, etc.
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a change made by correction, addition, or deletion.
The editors made few amendments to the manuscript.
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Horticulture. a soil-conditioning substance that promotes plant growth indirectly by improving such soil qualities as porosity, moisture retention, and pH balance.
noun
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the act of amending; correction
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an addition, alteration, or improvement to a motion, document, etc
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of amendment
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English word from Old French word amendement. See amend, -ment
Explanation
An amendment is a change made to an original, usually a document or statement. You might propose an amendment to your environmental club's bylaws requiring that all official club documents be printed on recycled paper. Can you spot the word amend, meaning "to make better" or "to cure of faults and errors," hidden in amendment? If so, you'll grasp the notion that an amendment is something intended to improve whatever preceded it. It pops up most often in formal legal contexts, where it refers to a written change to a bill, law, contract, or the U.S. Constitution.
Vocabulary lists containing amendment
U.S. Government Lingo
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American History I
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13th Amendment (1865)
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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.
See Examples For:
“Most trusts contain terms about how to effect an amendment to the trust,” according to McLane Middleton, a law firm with offices in New Hampshire and Massachusetts.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 30, 2026
The charter amendment ballot measure approved Tuesday would avoid that result and restore the inadvertently repealed funding.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026
By a vote of 217-212, the House killed the amendment sponsored by Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo.
From Salon ● Jul. 22, 2026
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries opposed the amendment, but his deputy Katherine Clark voted for it, as did former speaker Nancy Pelosi, one of Congress's longest-serving defenders of the alliance.
From Barron's ● Jul. 17, 2026
He also released a statement saying that he “frankly and earnestly” supported the amendment “as an act of right and justice to the women of the country and of the world.”
From "Votes for Women!" by Winifred Conkling
Your friend would need to ensure that the trust’s terms and governing amendments are rock solid.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 30, 2026
The resulting case, In re: Turner, helped end the practice of racialized child “apprenticeship” and shaped the meaning of the 13th and 14th amendments.
From Slate ● Jul. 25, 2026
They were joined by Kimberlyn King-Hinds of the Northern Mariana Islands and James Moylan of Guam, nonvoting delegates who can debate and cast votes on amendments but not on actual legislation.
From Salon ● Jul. 22, 2026
A series of amendments adopted by the Senate’s Privacy, Digital Technologies and Consumer Protection Committee sought to address some of those concerns.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 20, 2026
“You get paid to teach government. The first, second, and third amendments to the Constitution. Stuff like that. Why don’t you just dive right in?”
From "Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe" by Benjamin Alire Saenz
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.
