Trending: ‘codify’

Lookups for codify spiked on May 16-17, 2019, after several Democratic presidential candidates expressed their intent to protect Roe v. Wade. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand made news with her announcement about abortion rights in the context of the recent law banning abortions passed in Alabama:

First, as president, I will codify Roe v. Wade. I will make it clear beyond a shadow of a doubt that women in this country have a guaranteed right to an abortion.

Senator Cory Booker also affirmed that he would "protect the rights afforded by Roe, codify those protections in federal law."

Another candidate, Senator Elizabeth Warren, also released her reproductive rights policy proposal:

New: @ewarren has released a multi-part abortion rights platform in the wake of AL, GA, MO and other state restriction laws. It includes a framework for how to codify Roe (which Booker and Gillibrand called for earlier this week), + more. https://t.co/LJp9jnLJym

— Elana Schor (@eschor) May 17, 2019

Codify literally means "to reduce to a code," with code referring to "a systematic statement of a body of law."

Another way of expressing this meaning is "to put (laws or rules) together as a code or system."

Codify shows the influence of such words as classify, and both of these terms date from the late 1700s when thinkers during the Enlightenment were busy putting ideas about knowledge, philosophy, and laws into order. It was during this period that the first truly modern dictionaries and encyclopedias were written.

Code itself derives from Middle French, from the Latin terms caudex, codex meaning "trunk of a tree" or "document formed originally from wooden tablets."