Constitutional

How to spell constitutional

14 letters · 5 syllables

How to pronounce constitutional

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does constitutional mean?

1. adjectiveRelating to or consistent with the fundamental laws and principles by which a state or organisation is governed.
2. nounA walk taken regularly for the benefit of one's health.

Constitutional in a sentence

• adjective

  The court ruled that the new tax was fully constitutional.

• noun

  Every morning he took a brisk constitutional around the park.

• adjective

  Lawyers debated whether the policy raised a constitutional question.

• noun

  A short constitutional after dinner helped her digestion.

Where does constitutional come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb statuere, meaning 'to set up' or 'to establish', which was built on status, the idea of a standing or condition, from stare 'to stand'. Adding the prefix con-, 'together', gave constituere, 'to set up together' or 'to establish', and the noun constitutio described the way a thing was arranged or made up. English took 'constitution' through Old French in the 1300s for the makeup of a body or a system, and by the 1600s and 1700s 'constitutional' had grown from it to mean 'relating to the fundamental laws by which a state is governed'. The same root explains the older sense of one's physical 'constitution', which is why a brisk walk taken for the good of the body came to be nicknamed a constitutional. The long unstressed middle, '-stitu-', is the spelling trap: the two unstressed vowels and the single 't' sound nothing like they look, and the ending is the plain '-tional', not '-tutional' doubled or otherwise tinkered with.

How the word is built

• con- (together)
• -stitu- (from Latin statuere, to set up or establish)
• -tion (noun-forming)
• -al (relating to)