cease and desist

English

Etymology

From cease (“stop”), and desist (“to not do again”).

Verb

cease and desist (third-person singular simple present ceases and desists, present participle ceasing and desisting, simple past and past participle ceased and desisted)

  1. (law) To stop and not resume an action.
    We are told to cease and desist or we will cease to exist.

Translations

Noun

cease-and-desist

  1. (law, chiefly attributive) A written demand that a party stops and does not resume a certain behavior, such as copyright infringement, slander, or libel, threatening legal action if the recipient fails to do so.
    She received a cease-and-desist letter from his solicitors soon after the podcast.
  2. (US, law, chiefly attributive) An order by a government agency, sanctioned by a court, that one must stop and not resume a certain (usually illegal) behavior.
    His remarks did not stop the courts from issuing the cease-and-desist order.
This article is issued from Wiktionary. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.