facto : Idioms & Phrases

Index

De facto

  • adjective existing in fact whether with lawful authority or not
    • de facto segregation is as real as segregation imposed by law
    • a de facto state of war
  • adverb in reality or fact
    • the result was, de facto, a one-party system
WordNet
  • . (Law) See De facto.
Webster 1913

de facto segregation

  • noun segregation (especially in schools) that happens in fact although not required by law
WordNet

ex post facto

  • adjective satellite affecting things past
    retro; retroactive.
    • retroactive tax increase
    • an ex-post-facto law
    • retro pay
WordNet

Ex post facto law

  • a law which operates by after enactment. The phrase is popularly applied to any law, civil or criminal, which is enacted with a retrospective effect, and with intention to produce that effect; but in its true application, as employed in American law, it relates only to crimes, and signifies a law which retroacts, by way of criminal punishment, upon that which was not a crime before its passage, or which raises the grade of an offense, or renders an act punishable in a more severe manner that it was when committed. Ex post facto laws are held to be contrary to the fundamental principles of a free government, and the States are prohibited from passing such laws by the Constitution of the United States.
Webster 1913

expost facto

Ex"post` fac"to, Ex"post`fac"to (Also<
  • Expost facto
  • Expostfacto
)
Etymology
L., from what is done afterwards.
Definitions
  1. (Law) From or by an after act, or thing done afterward; in consequence of a subsequent act; retrospective. Burrill. Kent.
Webster 1913

ipso facto

  • adverb by the fact itself
    • ipso facto, her innocence was established
WordNet