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/ətˈeɪndər/ Listen

noun

Attainder n.

The act of attainting, or the state of being attainted; the extinction of the civil rights and capacities of a person, consequent upon sentence of death or outlawry; as, an act of attainder. Note: Formerly attainder was the inseparable consequence of a judicial or legislative sentence for treason or felony, and involved the forfeiture of all the real and personal property of the condemned person, and such "corruption of blood" that he could neither receive nor transmit by inheritance, nor could he sue or testify in any court, or claim any legal protection or rights. In England attainders are now abolished, and in the United States the Constitution provides that no bill of attainder shall be passed; and no attainder of treason (in consequence of a judicial sentence) shall work corruption of blood or forfeiture, except during the life of the person attainted.

A stain or staining; state of being in dishonor or condemnation. (Obs.) "He lived from all attainder of suspect."

Bill of attainder, a bill brought into, or passed by, a legislative body, condemning a person to death or outlawry, and attainder, without judicial sentence.

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Etymology of 'Attainder'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Attainder" Quotes from Famous Books

... wholly reopening the case. Pym and Hampden remained convinced of the sufficiency of the impeachment; but the House broke loose from their control. Under the guidance of St. John and Lord Falkland the Commons resolved to abandon these judicial proceedings, and fall back on the resource of a Bill of Attainder. The bill passed the Lower House on the 21st of April by a majority of 204 to 59; and on the 29th it received the assent of the Lords. The course which the Parliament took has been bitterly censured by some whose opinion in such a matter is entitled to respect. But the crime ...

— History of the English People, Volume V (of 8) - Puritan England, 1603-1660 • John Richard Green

... continued intermittently to make petty war on each other. At last, in 1638, Calvert took the island by main force and hanged for piracy a captain of Claiborne's. The Maryland Assembly brought the trader under a Bill of Attainder; and a little later, in England, the Lords Commissioners of Foreign Plantations formally awarded Kent Island to the Lord Proprietor. Thus defeated, Claiborne, nursing his wrath, moved down ...

— Pioneers of the Old South - A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings, Volume 5 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Mary Johnston

... exceedingly occupied with quelling the ardour of the House of Lords, who were requesting that the Holy Maid of Kent and her companions might have an opportunity of defending themselves before the Act of Attainder ordered by the King was passed against them; but he found time to tell his agent that trouble was impending over More and Fisher; and to request him to hand in any evidence that he ...

— The King's Achievement • Robert Hugh Benson

... the Queen restored to her cousin the title of Earl of Devon (forfeited by his father's attainder), and soon after all his lands that remained in her possession, and also showed him other favours. In fact, 'it was reported that she carried some good affections towards the Earl, from the first time that ...

— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote

... speak of: and if we can divine the future out of what we collect from the past, no person living would look with more scorn and horror on the impious parricide committed on all their ancestry, and on the desperate attainder passed on all their posterity, by the Orleans, and the Rochefoucaults, and the Fayettes, and the Vicomtes de Noailles, and the false Perigords, and the long et cetera of the perfidious sans-culottes of the ...

— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. V. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

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