Also 6–7 in-. [f. as prec. + -MENT.] The action of enfranchising; the state or fact of being enfranchised.
1. Liberation from imprisonment, servitude, or political subjection. Also fig.
1595. Shaks., John, IV. ii. 52. My selfe and them … heartily request Th’infranchisement of Arthur. Ibid. (1601), Jul. C., III. i. 81. Cry out Liberty, Freedome, and Enfranchisement.
a. 1626. Bacon, Max. & Uses Com. Law, vi. (1636), 30. An instrument of manumission, which is an evidence of my enfranchisement.
1630. Prynne, Anti-Armin., 147. He hath procured an absolute enfranchisement from hell, from death.
1693. Dryden, Persius, Sat. V. 104/64 (R.).
| That false Enfranchisement, with ease is found: | |
| Slaves are made Citizens, by turning round. |
1848. trans. Mariotti’s Italy, II. i. 7. The enfranchisement of Italy formed the text of all their proclamations.
1852. Mrs. Stowe, Uncle Tom’s C., II. xxviii. 126. He had commenced the legal formalities for his enfranchisement.
1872. Morley, Voltaire (1886), 4. The enfranchisement of the individual from bondage to a collective religious tradition that had lost its virtue.
2. a. Admission to the ‘freedom’ of a city, borough, or corporation, or to the citizenship of a state; admission to political rights, now esp. to the electoral franchise. b. The conferring of privileges (now chiefly the right of parliamentary representation) upon a town.
1628. Coke, On Litt., I. 137 a–b. Enfranchisement.… the incorporating of a man to bee free of a Company or body politique.
1630. Wadsworth, Sp. Pilgr., viii. 83. His … Maiestie … would confirme vnto me my Patent of Infranchisement.
1654. W. Mountague, Devout Ess., II. i. § 3. 19 (R.). The amplitude and infranchisement of humane reason cannot be said properly to be impair’d by these limits and regulations.
1685. Baxter, Paraphr. N. T., Acts xvi. 37. Paul was a Roman by enfranchisment.
1753. Melmoth, Cicero, I. III. xxxiv. 317 (R.). Certain cities … of which he is desirous to procure the enfranchisement.
1794. S. Williams, Vermont, 232. The same privileges, immunities, and enfranchisements.
1869. Seeley, Lect. & Ess., i. 13. It was not enfranchisement that they wanted, it was simply military protection.
3. The action of making lands freehold.
1876. Digby, Real Prop., x. 396. Enfranchisement … consists in the conveyance of the freehold by the lord to his copyhold tenant.
