abstentionistn.adj.

1857 Standard (London) 9 June To the satisfaction and joy of the Abstentionists, the Constitutionnel has come out with a thundering attack upon the non-Abstentionist journal.

1872 Bangor (Maine) Daily Whig & Courier 29 Mar. Few voters will rank themselves among the abstentionists.

1880 Blackwood's Edinb. Mag. June 810 We may expect other Conservative abstentionists to imitate the good example set by Lord Carnarvon.

1918 J. Abadie in A. Keogh Med. & Surg. Therapy III. ii. iii. 322 Is it astonishing that Chevassu, hitherto an interventionist, rendered an abstentionist only by necessity, should now become an abstentionist by conviction?

1992 Utne Reader Mar. 34/3 Like the Greens, the [National Front] cast their net to snare the abstentionists, the disillusioned, the protest voters, [etc.].

1857 Standard (London) 15 June The sum of the abstracts given in certain Abstentionist papers would go to establish a system of prefectorial terrorism very little in accordance with the instructions of..the [French] Minister of the Interior.

1872 Littell's Living Age 1 June 575/2 If the Poles had followed the abstentionist example of the Czechs, the Reichsrath would have been stricken with incompetence from the first.

1927 Glasgow Herald 10 Aug. 10/2 The exhilarating risks of a forward, as distinct from a cautious and abstentionist, policy.

1955 Times 14 July 6/4 The break-away ‘abstentionist’ group of the Argentine Conservative..Party has issued a declaration demanding the resignation of President Perón.

2000 Guardian 14 Jan. i. 10/5 Sinn Fein has refused to acknowledge Westminster's jurisdiction over Ireland,..which means that its candidates stand on an abstentionist ticket.