ELECTIVE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Elective

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/ɪlˈɛktɪv/ Listen

adjective

Elective adj.

Exerting the power of choice; selecting; as, an elective act.

Pertaining to, or consisting in, choice, or right of choosing; electoral. "The independent use of their elective franchise."

Bestowed or passing by election; as, an elective office. "Kings of Rome were at first elective;... for such are the conditions of an elective kingdom."

Dependent on choice; that can be refused; as, an elective college course. Opposite of required or mandatory.

Elective affinity or Elective attraction (Chem.), a tendency to unite with certain things; chemism.

noun

Elective n. In an American college, an optional study or course of study; a course that is not required. (Colloq.)

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Etymology of 'Elective'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Elective" Quotes from Famous Books

... possible now, or at any time henceforward, whence came the dross? If nature be bullion that can be melted and thus purified by the conjoint action of heat and elective attraction, I pray Mr. Noble to tell me to what name or 'genus' he refers the dross? Will he tell me, to the Devil? Whence came the Devil? And how was the pure bullion so thoughtlessly made as to have an ...

— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... mean called nemesis, because "they both proceed from the same character" (Rhet. ii, 9). Now the Philosopher proposes these means not as virtues, but as passions, because, even as passions, they are praiseworthy. Yet nothing prevents them from proceeding from some elective habit, in which case they assume the character ...

— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... vote in town meeting, can strike out any names inserted by the authorities, and insert others; thus making jurors elective by the people, and, of course, representatives only of a majority ...

— An Essay on the Trial By Jury • Lysander Spooner

... Further, love is a kind of movement. But every movement tends towards something else. Therefore it seems that an angel cannot love himself with either natural or elective love. ...

— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... a question of stopping a money Bill or of knocking out a few taxes obnoxious to particular classes; the rejection of the Budget by the House of Lords would mean the claim of the House of Lords—that is, the claim of a non-elective and unrepresentative Chamber—to make and to unmake Governments; and a recognition of that claim by the country would unquestionably mean that the House of Lords would become the main source and origin of all political ...

— Liberalism and the Social Problem • Winston Spencer Churchill

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