secede
Americanverb (used without object)
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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secedesimple
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secedessimple
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have secededperfect
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has secededperfect
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am secedingprogressive
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are secedingprogressive
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is secedingprogressive
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have been secedingperfect progressive
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has been secedingperfect progressive
Past
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secededsimple
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had secededperfect
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was secedingprogressive
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were secedingprogressive
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had been secedingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of secede
First recorded in 1695–1705, secede is from the Latin word sēcēdere to withdraw. See se-, cede
Explanation
To secede is to go your own way, breaking off ties. Usually, this refers to one part of a country that wants to become independent, like the South during the U.S. Civil War. The Latin word secedere means “go apart” and that's where secede comes from. Don't confuse it with the much more common succeed. Your plan to secede from the state of New Jersey and found a kingdom named Rusty, after your dog, is not likely to succeed.
Vocabulary lists containing secede
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
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The American Civil War
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100 SAT words Beginning with "S"
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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:
The last time the city took up a large-scale update of the charter was in 1999, amid an effort by some San Fernando Valley civic leaders to secede from Los Angeles.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 18, 2026
It’s not that Greenlanders don’t want to secede from Denmark—they just don’t want to become a U.S. state in turn.
From Slate ● Mar. 28, 2025
He was a leader of the Freedom County movement that sought to secede from Snohomish County in the late 1990s.
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 17, 2024
With Belgian support, the mineral-rich Katanga province was encouraged by Belgian mining interests to secede, and the white-dominated Force Publique, the Belgian colonial army, revolted.
From New York Times ● Feb. 21, 2024
Katanga had once tried to secede, after all.
From "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver
If Scotland secedes, the UK itself could be the next to change what it calls itself.
From The Guardian ● Sep. 30, 2016
By a popular referendum attended by some 80 percent of eligible state voters, Maloney’s Texas secedes on April 1, 2013.
From Slate ● Sep. 6, 2013
Q. Will the Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans still be eligible to play in the NFL once Texas secedes from the United States?
From Washington Post ● Jan. 20, 2013
It is a countdown to January 9th, the day a referendum is scheduled to decide whether the southern part of this country secedes from the north and becomes its own nation.
From New York Times ● Dec. 9, 2010
North Carolina: 26, 27, 194; secedes with Virginia, 229, 435-7, 452.
From Abraham Lincoln by Charnwood, Godfrey Rathbone Benson, Baron
And it was because of his White House dinner—at which there was no dinner, only “passed apps”—that 11 Southern states seceded from the union.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 25, 2026
In December, Israel became the first to recognise Somaliland's independence since it seceded from Somalia in 1991, drawing angry condemnation from the federal government in Mogadishu, even though it has been self-governing for 35 years.
From Barron's ● Feb. 25, 2026
In 1861, two weeks after South Carolina seceded from the Union, Morris Jacob Raphall, the Orthodox rabbi of B’nai Jeshurun synagogue in New York, gave a sermon proclaiming that the Hebrew Bible endorsed slavery.
From Slate ● Apr. 10, 2025
California and Texas have seceded, becoming unlikely allies in a campaign to retake the capital.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 11, 2024
As other states seceded, the number of stars was increased to thirteen.
From "Lincoln's Last Days: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever" by Bill O'Reilly
To pay the soldiers, the seceding government and its president, Jefferson Davis, printed reams of Confederate dollars.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 12, 2025
South Sudan is an oil-rich nation that became the world's newest country in 2011 after seceding from Sudan.
From BBC ● Nov. 13, 2025
In the fourth and third centuries BCE, plebeians won more concessions by again seceding from the patrician state.
From Textbooks ● Apr. 19, 2023
A Latin inscription on the monument cites the Confederacy’s “Lost Cause” rationale for seceding.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 14, 2022
He had heard talk of tariffs, of slave states and free ones, of a violent old man named John Brown, and during the past winter, of states seceding from the Union.
From "Across Five Aprils" by Irene Hunt
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.
