< French: literally, allow to pass
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
He carried a laissez-passer from the Eritrean government, allowing him a one-time entry into the country.
From New York Times ● Aug. 31, 2016
Unsuccessful asylum-seekers often cannot be sent back to their home countries if they do not have passports, and getting laissez-passer paperwork recognized often takes a long time.
From Reuters ● Oct. 23, 2015
An EU "laissez-passer" is suggested to aid procedures in home or transit countries and should become "the standard travel document for the expulsion of third-country nationals".
From Reuters ● Oct. 7, 2015
His so- called laissez-passer travel document issued by the United Nations will be given to his lawyers, who will turn it over to prosecutors, according to the filing.
From BusinessWeek ● May 19, 2011
With my laissez-passer you could have gone anywhere in Tibet.
From Beasts, Men and Gods by Ossendowski, Ferdinand
He was always decent to Americans, and he was shocked when he found that his laissez passer, which I obtained from him for the Hon. D. I.
From Ten Years Near the German Frontier A Retrospect and a Warning by Egan, Maurice Francis
I had all my papers in order—my passport, my "laissez passer," a letter from Mr. Bevan, explaining who I was and asking for "every facility" for me, and my photograph, properly stamped.
From My War Experiences in Two Continents by Salmon, Betty Keays-Young
Breaking with the traditions of the old régime, they take for their motto "laissez faire, laissez passer".
From The Stages in the Social History of Capitalism by Pirenne, Henri
On one of them was found a laissez passer in the name of Edward Seyer, of Badonviller.
From The New York Times Current History, A Monthly Magazine The European War, March 1915 by Various
Let human institutions conform to nature; enlarge the bounds of freedom; give play to the spirit of individualism; diminish the interference of government—"laissez faire, laissez passer."
From A History of French Literature Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. by Gosse, Edmund
Her hands were steady; she was even smiling as she produced two neat little packets that, on being unfolded, proved to have all the air of permits, laissez-passers, and police cards.
From The Firefly of France by Angellotti, Marion Polk
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.
