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Ex post facto is Latin for "from a thing done afterward". Approval for a project that's given ex post facto—after the project already has been begun or completed—may just have been given in order to save face. An ex post facto law is one that declares someone's action to be criminal only after it was committed--a procedure forbidden by our Constitution.
Examples of ex post facto in a Sentence
Andrew George, The Hollywood Reporter, 3 Mar. 2023
Imposing new and coercive restrictions on existing properties purchased by owners based on a codified set of economic and land-use assumptions isn’t fair under a constitutional system that abhors ex post facto laws.
—WSJ, 20 June 2021
As a celebrity collector, he’s also found that, to his chagrin, some artists reveal an exploitative tendency to turn singular pieces he’s purchased into ex post facto series.
—Gary Baum, The Hollywood Reporter, 18 June 2022
That hasn’t stopped numerous analysts from retroactively calculating rankings and naming top teams ex post facto.
—Eddie Timanus, USA TODAY, 12 Jan. 2023
First, ex post facto citation would not undo the misconduct of plagiarism, if it were deemed to have occurred.
—Neuroskeptic, Discover Magazine, 17 July 2016
Much of the crypto industry is already subject to laws—the very ones that the SEC seeks to enforce and that the crypto industry broadly (not just Sam Bankman-Fried) seeks to evade by reducing the SEC’s jurisdiction ex post facto.
—Dylan Gyauch-Lewis, The New Republic, 23 Nov. 2022
In the complaint, Davis' attorney David Slade argues the change in interpreting the law is a violation of the ex post facto clause of the U.S. Constitution and the due process and equal protection clauses of the 14th Amendment.
—Neal Earley, Arkansas Online, 24 Nov. 2022
Lacenaire, with his inchoate, vaguely republican politics—which seemed to exist as a kind of ex post facto justification for his crimes—was a type Dostoevsky believed to be emerging among Russia’s youth: the student terrorist.
—Jennifer Wilson, The New Republic, 28 Dec. 2021
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These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'ex post facto.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
Dictionary Entries Near ex post facto
Cite this Entry
“Ex post facto.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ex%20post%20facto. Accessed 29 Sep. 2023.
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Kids Definition
ex post facto
1 of 2 adverb
ex post facto
2 of 2 adjectiveAdverb
Latin, literally, "from a thing done afterward"
Legal Definition
ex post facto
1 of 2 adverbex post facto
2 of 2 adjectiveL. H. TribeAdverb
Late Latin, literally, from a thing done afterward
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