Wiktionary
n. 1 A political entity whose political status is less than that of a fully sovereign nation-state, as with the former Congo Free State and the former Irish Free State. 2 A Federal state, with allegiance to a larger entity, as currently with Germany, and earlier, the relationship between the states of the Holy Roman Empire and the Emperor, and later, the states of the German Empire under the Hohenzollerns. 3 An independent or autonomous political entity whose formal status and relationship to other states is undefined. 4 An approximate synonym for republic or commonwealth, as with the former Orange Free State, and especially as used for the current United Kingdom to refer to the Commonwealth period under http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver%20Cromwell. 5 (context engineering English) A condition of not being supported or constrained by outside forces. 6 (context US historical English) Prior to the American Civil War, any of the states in which the owning of slaves was not legal.
Wikipedia
The Free State (, ; before 1995, the Orange Free State) is a province of South Africa. Its capital is Bloemfontein, which is also South Africa's judicial capital. Its historical origins lie in the Orange Free State Boer republic and later Orange Free State Province. The current borders of the province date from 1994 when the Bantustans were abolished and reincorporated into South Africa. It is also the only one of the four original provinces of South Africa not to undergo border changes, excluding the reincorporation of Bantustans.
Free state is a term occasionally used in the official titles of some states.
In principle the title asserts and emphasises the freedom of the state in question, but what this actually means varies greatly in different contexts:
- Sometimes it asserts sovereignty or independence (and with that, lack of foreign domination).
- Sometimes it asserts autonomy within a larger nation-state.
- Sometimes it is used as a synonym for republic but not all "free states" have been republics. While the historical German free states and the Orange Free State were republican in form, the Congo and Irish Free States were governed under forms of monarchy. The republican sense derives from libera res publica (literally, "free state")', a term used by Roman historians for the period of the Roman republic.
Free state may refer to:
Usage examples of "free state".
Missouri, it was agreed, would be allowed to join the Union as a slave state, but simultaneously, Maine (hitherto a part of Massachusetts) would be admitted as a free state.