rubber stampn.
/ˌrʌbə ˈstamp/, U.S. /ˌrəbər ˈstæmp/ 1. A hand-held device having an incised rubber printing surface which is inked and used to stamp a message or design on a surface ; (also) the imprint of such a stamp.Associated especially with the endorsement of official documents, etc.
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society > communication > indication > marking > imprinting > [noun] > with a stamp or device > that which
printa1393
handstamp1676
die1699
brickstamp1837
rubber stamp1873
society > communication > indication > marking > imprinting > [noun] > imprint > of a stamp or device
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charactc1384
characterc1384
incuse1818
punching1838
rubber stamp1873
by-stamp1884
1873 Galveston (Texas) Daily News 20 Aug. For rubber stamps see card of Fred A. Smith.
1880 Bazaar, Exchange & Mart 10 Dec. 1889/1 (advt.) Rubber stamp making apparatus... With this apparatus any person can make rubber stamps.
1935 A. Blackwood Adventures of Miss De Fontenoy in Shocks (1936) 279 A doss-house ticket in the name of John Doe, the date stamped on it by a rubber stamp.
1954 A. Koestler Invisible Writing iv. xxxix. 420 Queuing up each time..to obtain the rubber-stamp which granted a further stay of a day or a week.
1989 L. Deighton Spy Line xiii. 187 Werner's livelihood had depended upon East Berlin signatures and rubber stamps.
2007 Stamp & Coin Mart Jan. 73/3 As the RAF had a double-oval rubber stamp with the squadron and Task Force names registered mail is readily identifiable as having come from St Kilda.
2. figurative. A person or institution whose power is formal but not real; a person who or body which endorses uncritically.
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the mind > language > statement > ratification or confirmation > [noun] > uncritical
rubber stamp1910
the mind > language > statement > ratification or confirmation > [noun] > uncritical > one who
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1910 Post-Standard (Syracuse, N.Y.) 9 Feb. 4/6 No man can go to the Legislature as a ‘rubber stamp’ and become a pillar of the state.
1956 A. Wilson Anglo-Saxon Attitudes ii. i. 196 The danger of the oldest of all representative bodies becoming a mere rubber stamp.
1976 Survey Winter 66 The governmental assemblies..are most certainly not rubber stamps for the decisions of their respective executives.
2007 U.S. News & World Rep. 26 Feb. 32/1 Civil libertarians and many defense attorneys view the court..as a rubber stamp because there is no opposing counsel present.
Compounds
General attributive (in sense 2).
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the mind > language > statement > ratification or confirmation > [adjective] > uncritically
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1910 Olean (N.Y.) Evening Times 14 Apr. 2/2 The convention system..results in the ‘rubber stamp’ legislator, with a boss and without a will.
1953 Manch. Guardian Weekly 8 Oct. 7 The President does not want a ‘rubber-stamp’ Congress.
1992 E. Johnson & W. Novak My Life xviii. 279 I had already read the commission's reports, so I knew that this was not a rubber-stamp group. These folks were serious.
Derivatives
rubber ˈstampish adj. describing or characteristic of a body which endorses uncritically.
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1932 L. C. Douglas Forgive us our Trespasses ix. 183 An hour and a half was spent..in a rubber-stampish approval of the ‘tentative suggestions’ sent from the faculty ‘as a basis of discussion’.
2008 St Petersburg (Florida) Times (Nexis) 3 Feb. (Neighborhood Times section) 8 To categorize this council as somehow rubber stampish is wrong.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, March 2011; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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