Dictionary entry

Enfranchise

Webster's Dictionary 1913

En‐fran″chise (?), v. t. [imp. & p. p.Enfranchised (?); p. pr. & vb. n.Enfranchising (?).] [Pref. en- + franchise: cf. F. enfranchir.] 1. To set free; to liberate from slavery, prison, or any binding power. Bacon.

2. To endow with a franchise; to incorporate into a body politic and thus to invest with civil and political privileges; to admit to the privileges of a freeman.

3. To receive as denizens; to naturalize; as, to enfranchise foreign words. I. Watts.