retributive
Americanadjective
Other Word Forms
- retributively adverb
- unretributive adjective
- unretributory adjective
Etymology
Origin of retributive
1670–80; obsolete retribute to make retribution (< Latin retribūtus; retribution ) + -ive
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
By saying Blacks can’t be racist, Sheryl Swoopes opened up a lane to the basket for a difficult, yet essential, conversation, and a path to restorative rather than retributive justice.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 10, 2024
Wednesday’s brief, according to the Post report, made other charges about the trial, saying the judge’s “closing remarks demonstrated that Mr. Smollett’s sentencing took on a personal retributive tone.”
From Washington Times • Mar. 2, 2023
It develops here as an agonizing moral question, one that our retributive correctional culture would rather not have to debate.
From Washington Post • Nov. 23, 2022
The ruling drew on the Eighth Amendment and common law, concluding that “such an execution has questionable retributive value, presents no example to others, and thus has no deterrence value, and simply offends humanity.”
From Slate • Oct. 24, 2022
I have gone to each officer of that Regiment demanding that they send a retributive expedition, but none evinces the slightest interest in the undertaking.
From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves" by M.T. Anderson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
