Word Power: Election

Today’s lesson in Word Power is to understand the etymology and history behind the word election.

Election (Noun): [e-lec-tion]

1. The act of choosing; choice; selection.
2. The act of choosing a person to fill an office, or to membership in a society, as by ballot, uplifted hands, or viva voce; as, the election of a president or a mayor.  (Websters Revised Unabridged Dictionary)

Etymology

With Election Day upon us today, I only thought it appropriate to discuss the etymology behind the word election.  The word election is directly derived from the Latin verb eligere, which means to choose, select, etc.  The four principle parts of this verb are eligo, eligere, elegi, and electum.  As was stated in my etymology of the word conservative post, most words that we use today are a form of the fourth principle part of verbs.  This idea holds true for the word election, however I aim to show you how the Latin word electum was constructed.  As always, we must get to the root word and in this case the root word happens to be lego.

Lego, legere, legi, lectum

Lego is a Latin verb which literally means to gather, to collect, etc.  Like many Latin verbs, lego can have multiple meanings when used in a certain context.  Another meaning it can have is to choose, to pick out, etc.  The word election was derived from the fourth principal part, lectum. There are many words that we use today with the Latin word lectum in them, such as neglect (to disregard, omit) and collect (to gather together).

Ex

Now that we have gotten the root word lect, we can begin reconstructing the word election.  First we must add the prefix e- back into the equation.  The prefix e- is derived from the Latin word ex, which means out of or from.  Through the evolution of languages, ex was shortened to a simple e.  We commonly see the shortened version of ex every day when we look at U.S. currency, which reads “e pluribus unum“.  The literal translation of this motto is “out of many, one”.  There are many other words in which we see the prefix ex used in our language today, such as exact (to force out) and excerpt (to take passages from a book).

Summary

Now that we have reconstructed the word elect, all that is left to do is add on the suffix -ion, which makes a word a noun.  Usually -ion, gives the meaning of an action or process to the root word preceding it, such as legislation or procrastination.  The meaning of election hasn’t changed much since the Romans used the word eligo two thousand years ago, but the literal translation of election would be the act of gathering out of. Thus, it is fair to say that to elect somebody or something is to choose one option (supposedly the best) from multiple options.

Extra Credit

The U.S. Presidential Election is taking place today for the fifty-fifth time in the United States’ short history.  Since the inception of the U.S. as an independent country there has been much turmoil regarding elections, ranging from Thomas Jefferson’s win over Aaron Burr in 1800, as well as George W. Bush’s win over Al Gore in 2000.  Unfortunately, the people are not the overriding deciding factor in elections, as the Electoral College was designed to be elected by the people to choose the proper candidate.  So remember, when you are entering your voting booth today, you are only choosing the elector that will inevitably vote for the candidate that you are endorsing.  Well, at least that’s what they are supposed to do.  Now Get Out and Vote!

Tune in this Thursday for the breakdown of the word Procrastination.

Image Used in this Post

2008 Presidential Election Sample Ballot image courtesy of Flickr user freeparking published under the CC license.