public law

noun

1

: a legislative enactment affecting the public at large

2

: a branch of law concerned with regulating the relations of individuals with the government and the organization and conduct of the government itself compare private law

Examples of public law in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The meeting was authorized by public law and supported with federal funds. —Michael Barnes, Austin American-Statesman, 18 Nov. 2024

Stephen Woolpert is professor emeritus of public law and former dean of the School of Liberal Arts at Saint Mary’s College of California. —Stephen Woolpert, The Mercury News, 3 Oct. 2024

The project enhances community space by adding a new public law library, ground-floor retail spaces and a parking garage. —Jane Tyska, The Mercury News, 10 July 2024

He’s been implicated in covert endeavors like trying to transform a broke liberal arts college into a capitalist incubator and rename a public law school after one of the Supreme Court’s staunchest right-wingers. —Nina Burleigh, The New Republic, 16 May 2023

Word History

First Known Use

1531, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Legal Definition

public law

noun

1

: an enactment of a legislature that affects the public at large throughout the entire territory (as a state or nation) which is subject to the jurisdiction of the legislature or within a particular subdivision of its jurisdiction : general law

called also public act, public statute

compare local law sense 1a

2

a

: the area of law that deals with the relations of individuals with the state and regulates the organization and conduct of government compare private law

b

: international law regulating the relations among sovereign states or nations as distinguished from private international law