constitutionalize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to incorporate in a constitution; make constitutional.
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to provide a constitution for.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of constitutionalize
First recorded in 1825–35; constitutional + -ize
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:
The 14th Amendment was intended to constitutionalize, not alter, the Civil Rights Act.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 31, 2026
The struggle to constitutionalize equal rights was one of the most important for the Black community after the Civil War.
From Salon ● Feb. 16, 2024
The court should decline the fruit producers’ plea to constitutionalize a sweeping power to exclude “unwanted persons” — and remind them of the rights they already enjoy.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 18, 2021
Anything less, he wrote, “would constitutionalize the views of the 20th-century eugenics movement.”
From Slate ● May 28, 2019
One of the aims is to "constitutionalize the free university" and give students an education based upon what they, rather than the faculty, regard as contemporary and relevant.
From Time Magazine Archive
Still, the hammer didn’t drop until the court quietly released a follow-up in June that constitutionalized Callais and proclaimed, without equivocation, that the Constitution is “color-blind.”
From Slate ● Jun. 22, 2026
The Equal Rights Amendment, which would have constitutionalized prohibitions on sex discrimination, died on the vine after failing to acquire ratification by three-quarters of state legislatures.
From Slate ● May 8, 2024
I think it’s how issues that certainly were around for a long time, whether it’s women’s rights or African-American rights, became constitutionalized.
From The New Yorker ● Sep. 9, 2019
The 14th constitutionalized the principles of birthright citizenship and equality before the law.
From New York Times ● Sep. 7, 2019
That is the status which is to be recognized, constitutionalized by these articles.
From A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention For Proposing Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, Held at Washington, D.C., in February, A.D. 1861 by Chittenden, L. E. (Lucius Eugene)
Together, they also examine what the constitutionalizing of corporate rights can tell us about the current gun debate.
From Slate ● Mar. 3, 2018
It doesn’t mean that we’re constitutionalizing things like drone strikes in Pakistan or all sorts of other national security operations that I think everyone agrees are within the apex of presidential power.
From Slate ● Mar. 14, 2017
The 14th Amendment’s birthright citizenship clause was widely viewed as constitutionalizing this guarantee.
From Slate ● Jun. 6, 2016
Lev is confronted several times by Justice Samuel Alito, who is worried about constitutionalizing what is essentially a judicial ethics issue.
From Slate ● Feb. 29, 2016
The proposals include constitutionalizing traditional forms of indigenous community justice as well as the national "recuperation" of natural resources like lumber, silver, water, gas and oil.
From Time Magazine Archive
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.
