Re-public

Opinion

If 'public' indicates the presence of a plurality of individuals, the re-public is that which 're-presents' them.

Online Etymology Dictionary

Republic 1604, "state in which supreme power rests in the people," from Fr. république, from L. respublica (abl. republica), lit. res publica "public interest, the state," from res "affair, matter, thing" + publica, fem. of publicus "public" (see public). Republican (adj.) "belonging to a republic" is recorded from 1712; in noun sense of "one who favors a republic" it is recorded from 1697; and in sense of a member of a specific U.S. political party (the Anti-Federalists) from 1782, though this was not the ancestor of the modern Republican Party, which dates from 1854. Republicrat in U.S. political jargon usually meaning "moderate," is attested from 1940.

fr: republic. Dictionary.com. Online Etymology Dictionary. Douglas Harper, Historian. [1] accessed: August 24, 2007.

American Heritage New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition

A form of government in which power is explicitly vested in the people, who in turn exercise their power through elected representatives. Today, the terms republic and democracy are virtually interchangeable, but historically the two differed. Democracy implied direct rule by the people, all of whom were equal, whereas republic implied a system of government in which the will of the people was mediated by representatives, who might be wiser and better educated than the average person. In the early American republic, for example, the requirement that voters own property and the establishment of institutions such as the Electoral College were intended to cushion the government from the direct expression of the popular will.

fr: republic. Dictionary.com. The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005. https://dictionary.reference.com/browse/republic (accessed: August 24, 2007).

American Heritage Dictionary

Noun - re·pub·lic (rĭ-pŭb'lĭk)

• A political order whose head of state is not a monarch and in modern times is usually a president.
  • A nation that has such a political order.
  • A political order in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who are entitled to vote for officers and representatives responsible to them.
  • A nation that has such a political order.
• A political order in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who are entitled to vote for officers and representatives responsible to them.
  • A nation that has such a political order.
• Often Republic A specific republican government of a nation: the Fourth Republic of France.
• An autonomous or partially autonomous political and territorial unit belonging to a sovereign federation.
• A group of people working as equals in the same sphere or field: the republic of letters.

fr: republic. Dictionary.com. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. https://dictionary.reference.com/browse/republic (accessed: August 24, 2007).