Coming straight from Latin, de jure is a term used mostly, but not always, in legal writing. Sometimes it's not enough to have something written into law; if a law isn't enforced, it might as well not exist. And if ordinary citizens are too scared of what would happen to them if they exercised their rights, then they don't really have those rights at all. Unfortunately, many countries have constitutions and laws that sound good but turn out not to have much effect. So de jure is almost always used in contrast to something else; its opposite is de facto.
Example Sentences
Recent Examples on the WebMore representative of the benshengren majority who feel little attachment to the land of their distant ancestors, the DPP is seen as favoring de jure independence from China. William Han, CNN, 15 July 2022 Once Russia has completed the de jure annexation of its conquered lands, re-taking them will become a risky endeavor. Grayson Quay, The Week, 2 Aug. 2022 This is not a de jure limitation on the court’s majority opinion, to be clear. Matt Ford, The New Republic, 23 June 2022 Who could deny that slavery, Jim Crow and de jure and de facto segregation were not racist, or would argue that their effects could have disappeared entirely?WSJ, 19 Nov. 2021 Regardless, activist courts ignored the letter of the law at the urging of liberal elites and began signing off on school-integration plans that equated any racial imbalance in classrooms with de jure segregation. Jason L. Riley, WSJ, 12 Oct. 2021 The list most closely tied to President Alberto Fernández and Vice President Cristina Fernández, the de jure and de facto leaders of the FdT, was headed by Tanya Bertoldi (spouse of the FdT mayor of Centenario, Javier Bertoldi). Baker Institute, Forbes, 13 Sep. 2021 In Brown, the Supreme Court struck down de jure segregation in the United States. Bryan Greene, Smithsonian Magazine, 30 Aug. 2021 After a brutal civil war, which still simmers in a few parts of the country, some of these same people have been de facto or de jure labeled in the West as war criminals — first and foremost among them is Assad. David W. Lesch, CNN, 12 June 2021 See More