nugatory

• And, apart from the merit of style, great campaigns lose interest in a third, if not in a second generation; their historical consequence effaced through lapse of years; their policy seen to have been nugatory or mischievous; their chronicles, swallowed greedily at the birth like Saturn's progeny, returning to vex their parent; relegated finally to an honourable exile in the library upper shelves, where they hold a place eyed curiously, not invaded: —  Biographical Study of A W Kinglake
• All my efforts have been rendered nugatory, and my attempts even to collect and form an army frustrated, by the continual plundering of my supplies and means by other Generals, and your and their deliberate efforts to disgust and alienate the Indians. —  The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War
• As soon as the lords were out of Henry's reach, the Scots Estates demanded modifications in the proposed treaty which would have made it nugatory from the English point of view. —  England under the Tudors
• If this influence is so great as to render the pre-determined plan completely nugatory, then, as a rule, a new one must be substituted in its place; but at the moment the necessary data are often wanting for this, because in the course of action circumstances press for immediate decision, and allow no time to look about for fresh data, often not enough for mature consideration But it more often happens that the correction of one premise, and the knowledge of chance events which have arisen, are not sufficient to overthrow our plans completely, but only suffice to produce hesitation. —  On War — Volume 1
• The decision of the Supreme Court of the United States practically made these provisions nugatory, and indirectly legalized the crassest frauds The original grants excluded mineral lands, but by a subsequent fraudulent official construction, coal and iron were declared not to be covered by the term mineral Commissioner Sparks of the U. S. General Land Office estimated in 1885 that, in addition to the tens of millions of acres the railroad corporations had secured by fraud under form of law, they had overdrawn ten million acres, "which vast amount has been treated by the corporations as their absolute property, but is really public land of the United States recoverable to the public domain." —  Great Fortunes from Railroads

Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the Same Context