Majority

The rank of a major in the army.

2.

The civil condition or status of one who has attained full age. Twenty-one years of age is the period of complete legal majority for both sexes throughout the United States. In this respect there is no distinction between citizens and aliens domiciled in the United States as to all acts done within the United States.

8 Op. Att.-Gen. 62. sidered as joining in an election, or a vote.

With reference to elections, majority is usually distinguished from plurality. A candidate has a plurality of votes ■when he has more than any other one person: he has a majority, only when he has more than all his competitors combined. Mr. Gushing says that majority is sometimes used in the sense of plurality {Cush. Leg. Ass. § 117). But such use is not to be commended; the distinction is important, and should be preserved in the use of the terms. Whether a majority is necessary to an election, or a plurality will suffice, must be determined by the law governing the election. Judge Bouvier says that " some question exists as to whether a majority of any body is more than one-half the whole number, or more than the number acting in opposition. Thus, in a body of one hundred voters, in which twenty did not vote on any particular question, on the former supposition, fifty-one would be a,majority; on the latter, fortyone. The intended signification is generally denoted by the context, and where it is not, the second sense is generally intended; a majority on a given ques-' tion being more than one-half the number of those voting." We do not understand that the parliamentary question here presented turns on any doubt or variance in the meaning of the word majority. In a body of one hundred voters, fifty-one is a majority, — is a majority at all times, not only if twenty do not vote, but when no voting is under way. While debate is proceeding, fiftyone is a majority just as truly as when the vote is taken. If a question is put, and forty-one vote " aye," thirty-nine "no," and twenty are silent, it may weU be, that the whole number being one hundred, and there being no positive law requiring a majority of all competent votes to be cast, the forty-one votes will carry the question; but this is not because the word majority means " more than the number opposing," but because the will of the majority is inferred from the proportions of the vote.

Those who those who vote

It is on the presumption that the largest number of votes cast show the will of the majority, and not on any idea that less than half compose the majority, that the forty-one votes carry the day. The expression "a majority of the body," used in a charter speaking of a corporate body, can only mean a majority of the individuals comprising that body.

Taylor v. Griswold, 14 N. J. L. 222, 239.

The phrase " a majority of the electors," in constitutional provisions that elections shall be determined by vote of a majority of the electors, means a majority of the electors actually voting, not of all qualified to vote.

Everett v. Smith, 22 Minn. 5.3.

Construction of the word majority, as used in the bankrupt act, explained.

Re Gilday, 11 Bankr. Reg. 108.