Prorogate

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To bring a legislative session to an end for a time without dissolving the assembly ; to put something off until a later date, an older sense now rarely used
2. To halt a parliament's sitting for a period while keeping the body in existence ; to defer or delay something, a usage that has largely fallen out of use
3. Describing the act of suspending the sittings of a legislature without ending its existence ; or, in older English, postponing an action to a later time

Etymology: Prorogue is a Parliamentary term whose meaning has been fixed for centuries, but its roots are simple: Latin "prorogare" combines "pro-", meaning "forth" or "forward", with "rogare", "to ask". In Rome the verb meant to extend or postpone a period of time, and in English it was first used in the 15th century in the sense of deferring a legal session to a later date. Its English history is tied to Parliament's own calendar. A prorogation ends a session but, unlike a dissolution, does not end the Parliament itself, so the same members return when it reconvenes. The sense of "asking forward" in the Latin root explains the logic: the session is asked to continue at a later date rather than being brought to a close. The word is also a doublet of "prorogate", which comes from the same Latin verb but entered English through a different route, and the two are now used interchangeably in legal and political writing.

Synonyms: adjourn, suspend, prorogue

Antonyms: convene, reconvene