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misdemeanor
CIDE DICTIONARY
misdemeanor, n.
- Ill behavior; evil conduct; fault. Shak. [1913 Webster]
- A crime less than a felony. Wharton. [1913 Webster]" As a rule, in the old English law, offenses capitally punishable were felonies; all other indictable offenses were misdemeanors. In common usage, the word crime is employed to denote the offenses of a deeper and more atrocious dye, while small faults and omissions of less consequence are comprised under the gentler name of misdemeanors.
Blackstone.
The distinction, however, between felonies and misdemeanors is purely arbitrary, and is in most jurisdictions either abrogated or so far reduced as to be without practical value. Cf.Felony .Wharton.
[1913 Webster]
Syn. -- Misdeed; misconduct; misbehavior; fault; trespass; transgression.
DEVIL DICTIONARY
misdemeanor
n. An infraction of the law having less dignity than a felony and constituting no claim to admittance into the best criminal society.
By misdemeanors he essays to climb
Into the aristocracy of crime.
O, woe was him! -- with manner chill and grand
"Captains of industry" refused his hand,
"Kings of finance" denied him recognition
And "railway magnates" jeered his low condition.
He robbed a bank to make himself respected.
They still rebuffed him, for he was detected.
S.V. Hanipur
THESAURUS
misdemeanor
atrocity, badness, breach, crime, crime against humanity, criminal tendency, criminality, criminosis, deadly sin, delict, delinquency, dereliction, discourtesy, disorder, disorderliness, disorderly conduct, disruption, disruptiveness, enormity, error, evil, evil courses, evildoing, failure, fault, feloniousness, felony, frowned-upon behavior, genocide, guilty act, heavy sin, hooliganism, horseplay, illegality, impropriety, indiscretion, inexpiable sin, iniquity, injury, injustice, lapse, lawbreaking, malefaction, malfeasance, malpractice, malum, malversation, minor wrong, misbehavior, misconduct, misdeed, misdoing, misfeasance, misprision, misprision of treason, mortal sin, naughtiness, nonfeasance, nonsanctioned behavior, offense, omission, outrage, peccadillo, peccancy, positive misprision, roughhouse, rowdiness, rowdyism, ruffianism, sin, sin of commission, sin of omission, sinful act, slip, thou scarlet sin, tort, transgression, trespass, trip, unutterable sin, vandalism, venial sin, vice, viciousness, violation, wrong, wrong conduct, wrongdoingROGET THESAURUS
misdemeanor
Disorder
N disorder, derangement, irregularity, anomaly, anarchy, anarchism, want of method, untidiness, disunion, discord, confusion, confusedness, mishmash, mix, disarray, jumble, huddle, litter, lumber, cahotage, farrago, mess, mash, muddle, muss, hash, hodgepodge, hotch-potch, hotch-pot, imbroglio, chaos, omnium gatherum, medley, mere mixture, fortuitous concourse of atoms, disjecta membra, rudis indigestaque moles, complexity, turmoil, ferment, to-do, trouble, pudder, pother, row, rumble, disturbance, hubbub, convulsion, tumult, uproar, revolution, riot, rumpus, stour, scramble, brawl, fracas, rhubarb, fight, free-for-all, row, ruction, rumpus, embroilment, melee, spill and pelt, rough and tumble, whirlwind, bear garden, Babel, Saturnalia, donnybrook, Donnybrook Fair, confusion worse confounded, most admired disorder, concordia discors, Bedlam, all hell broke loose, bull in a china shop, all the fat in the fire, diable a' quatre, Devil to pay, pretty kettle of fish, pretty piece of work, pretty piece of business, disorderly person, disorderly persons offence, misdemeanor, slattern, slut (libertine), disorderly, orderless, out of order, out of place, out of gear, irregular, desultory, anomalous, acephalous, deranged, aimless, disorganized, straggling, unmethodical, immethodical, unsymmetric, unsystematic, untidy, slovenly, dislocated, out of sorts, promiscuous, indiscriminate, chaotic, anarchical, unarranged &c (arrange), confused, deranged, topsy-turvy, shapeless, disjointed, out of joint, troublous, riotous, complex, irregularly, by fits, by fits and snatches, by fits and starts, pellmell, higgledy-piggledy, helter-skelter, harum-scarum, in a ferment, at sixes and sevens, at cross-purposes, upside down, the cart before the horse, hysteron proteron, chaos is come again, the wreck of matter and the crush of worlds.Guilt
N guilt, guiltiness, culpability, criminality, criminousness, deviation from rectitude, sinfulness, misconduct, misbehavior, misdoing, misdeed, malpractice, fault, sin, error, transgression, dereliction, delinquency, indiscretion, lapse, slip, trip, faux pas, peccadillo, flaw, blot, omission, failing, failure, break, bad break!, capital crime, delictum, offense, trespass, misdemeanor, misfeasance, misprision, malefaction, malfeasance, malversation, crime, felony, enormity, atrocity, outrage, deadly sin, mortal sin, deed without a name, corpus delicti, guilty, to blame, culpable, peccable, in fault, at fault, censurable, reprehensible, blameworthy, uncommendable, illaudable, weighed in the balance and found wanting, exceptionable, in flagrante delicto, red-handed, in the very act, with one's hand in the cookie jar, cui prodest scelus in fecit, culpam paena premit comes, O would the deed were good!, responsibility prevents crimes se judice nemo noce, so many laws argues so many sins.For further exploring for "misdemeanor" in Webster Dictionary Online
