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commonwealth |
4 definitions found From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]: Commonwealth \Com"mon*wealth`\ (?; 277), n. [Common + wealth well-being.] 1. A state; a body politic consisting of a certain number of men, united, by compact or tacit agreement, under one form of government and system of laws. The trappings of a monarchy would set up an ordinary commonwealth. --Milton. Note: This term is applied to governments which are considered as free or popular, but rarely, or improperly, to an absolute government. The word signifies, strictly, the common well-being or happiness; and hence a form of government in which the general welfare is regarded rather than the welfare of any class. 2. The whole body of people in a state; the public. 3. (Eng. Hist.) Specifically, the form of government established on the death of Charles I., in 1649, which existed under Oliver Cromwell and his son Richard, ending with the abdication of the latter in 1659. Syn: State; realm; republic. From WordNet r 1.6 [wn]: commonwealth n 1: the official name of some states in the United States (Massachusetts and Pennsylvania and Virginia and Kentucky) and associated territories (Puerto Rico) 2: a politically organized body of people under a single government; "the state has elected a new president" [syn: {state}, {nation}, {country}, {land}, {res publica}, {body politic}] 3: a political system governed by the people or their representatives [syn: {democracy}, {republic}] [ant: {autocracy}] From U.S. Gazetteer (1990) [gazetteer]: Commonwealth, VA (CDP, FIPS 18792) Location: 38.07462 N, 78.48746 W Population (1990): 5538 (2584 housing units) Area: 3.1 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water) From THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY ((C)1911 Released April 15 1993) [devils]: COMMONWEALTH, n. An administrative entity operated by an incalculable multitude of political parasites, logically active but fortuitously efficient. This commonwealth's capitol's corridors view, So thronged with a hungry and indolent crew Of clerks, pages, porters and all attaches Whom rascals appoint and the populace pays That a cat cannot slip through the thicket of shins Nor hear its own shriek for the noise of their chins. On clerks and on pages, and porters, and all Misfortune attend and disaster befall! May life be to them a succession of hurts; May fleas by the bushel inhabit their shirts; May aches and diseases encamp in their bones, Their lungs full of tubercles, bladders of stones; May microbes, bacilli, their tissues infest, And tapeworms securely their bowels digest; May corn-cobs be snared without hope in their hair, And frequent impalement their pleasure impair. Disturbed be their dreams by the awful discourse Of audible sofas sepulchrally hoarse, By chairs acrobatic and wavering floors -- The mattress that kicks and the pillow that snores! Sons of cupidity, cradled in sin! Your criminal ranks may the death angel thin, Avenging the friend whom I couldn't work in K.Q.
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