Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The act or an instance of turning or applying to a person or thing for aid or security: have recourse to the courts.
- n. One that is turned or applied to for aid or security: His only recourse was the police.
- n. Law The right to demand payment from the endorser of a commercial paper when the first party liable fails to pay.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Resort for help or protection, as when in difficulty or perplexity.
- n. Resort; customary visitation or communication.
- n. Access; admittance.
- n. Return; new attack; recurrence.
- n. Repeated course; frequent flowing.
- n. In Scots law, the right of an assignee or disponee under the warrandice of the transaction to recur on the vendor or cedent for relief in case of eviction or of defects inferring warrandice.
- To return; recur.
- To have recourse.
Wiktionary
- n. The act of seeking assistance or advice.
- v. obsolete To return; to recur.
- v. obsolete To have recourse; to resort.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. obsolete A coursing back, or coursing again, along the line of a previous coursing; renewed course; return; retreat; recurence.
- n. Recurrence in difficulty, perplexity, need, or the like; access or application for aid; resort.
- n. obsolete Access; admittance.
- v. obsolete To return; to recur.
- v. obsolete To have recourse; to resort.
WordNet 3.0
- n. something or someone turned to for assistance or security
- n. act of turning to for assistance
Etymologies
- From Old French recours < Latin recursus, past participle of recurrō. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English recours, from Old French, from Latin recursus, a running back, from past participle of recurrere, to run back : re-, re- + currere, to run; see kers- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Is there either logic or morality in believing that if one side threatens to kill tens of millions of our people, our only recourse is to threaten killing tens of millions of theirs?”
“Seems their only recourse is an attempt to belittle and it just does not work.”
“Our only recourse is to set the same "trigger" to vote him out along with all the other politicians who are only working for the lobbyists and not the people they serve.”
“One recourse is to work for the election of representatives at all levels of government who know and follow The Constitution and Bill of Rights.”
“Most of all, I hope this does not distract from the issue I was asked about -- the desperate, tragic decision by some young people who feel that their only recourse is to take their own lives because they are being bullied or harassed because they are gay, or because others believe they are gay.”
“The recourse is that the House of Representatives should not count votes from the Electors that are for ineligible candidates for the Presidency.”
The Volokh Conspiracy » Blatant Unconstitutionality Started Early
“Non-recourse is the effective termination clause of the contract.”
“P.S. By "us" I mean individuals or small groups who are adversely affected by policies and whose recourse is extremely limited.”
Preferring Ignorance, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“When you are too incompetent or self absorbed to actually do something for REAL, the only recourse is to make a video game out of it in NextLife, create a Facebook page to let everyone know what a genius/player you are and then tell each other how amazing you are by Twitter and Blogs.”
“Since you are incapable of holding up your end I am afraid my only recourse is to laugh at you.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘recourse’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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EN - eloquence in public speaking
Key words from "The Training of a Public Speaker" by Grenville Kleiser (New York and London, 1920)
beget, imago, approbation, orator, peroration, Cicero, eloquence, elocution, rhetoric, premeditate, plead, Isocrates and 264 more...
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Words
teeter, headlong, reprobate, canard, ersatz, prevaricate, trenchant, minatory, fatuous, stultify, vitiate, fulminate and 135 more...
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Words
My list of words.
veritable, facetious, nadir, quixotic, apropos, acquiesce, ostensible, insipid, egregious, inveterate, coax, adroit and 409 more...
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Personal Vocabulary List
All my favourite words that I come across!
veritable, incongruence, rigamorole, letcherous, revolting, repulsive, reputrid, rapatious, forays, guise, placate, paradigm and 1162 more...
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Aequoria's list
affect, deleterious, nuance, pliant, verbatim, pertinent, latter, municipality, provincial, voyeuristic, circumlocution, wane and 798 more...
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ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
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Misc. Words.
Words I like to use, words I like but may forget.
corrosion, astonish, solace, ferment, continuum, kinesthetic, permeate, repose, caprice, cardinal, discourse, surrender and 610 more...
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samoritan's Words
moxie, zarf, crepuscular, serenity, halcyon, powerfuller, instant classic, abecedary, trilobite, doomsters, 'da bome, evanescence and 149 more...
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just words.
coquette, solecism, peripherally, recrudescence, viscid, turpitude, sententious, light-heeled, interminably, unflappable, palpably, solicitous and 215 more...
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GRE 3500 Q
quadruped, quaff, quaint, quandary, quarry, quay, queasy, quell, querulous, quibble, quietude, quip and 89 more...
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Words That Populate My Mind
This is a collection of words I love, old ones that I love the sound of when I repeat them for years and new ones coined in news articles on up and coming trends and technologies - most of them I k...
aroma, mojo, blithely, fringe, fray, synchronicity, doublespeak, buzzword, thoughtcrime, portmanteau, newspeak, oldspeak and 963 more...
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conglomeration
wherewithal, wan, zoonotic, zoonosis, nebulous, nefarious, nascent, quiescent, quell, undercroft, unwitting, unutterable and 658 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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Go over
mollify, obstinate, obviate, occlude, onerous, obscure, paragon, pedantic, perfunctory, placate, placid, prodigal and 364 more...
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ash
ash
abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abide, abject, abjure and 4874 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for recourse.

Nicoh Before I discovered this awesome website my best recourse was Wikipedia. May 3, 2012