The Collaborative International Dictionary
Estate \Es*tate"\ ([e^]s*t[=a]t"), n. [OF. estat, F. ['e]tat, L. status, fr. stare to stand. See Stand, and cf. State.]
-
Settled condition or form of existence; state; condition or circumstances of life or of any person; situation. ``When I came to man's estate.''
--Shak.Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate.
--Romans xii. 16. -
Social standing or rank; quality; dignity.
God hath imprinted his authority in several parts, upon several estates of men.
--Jer. Taylor. -
A person of high rank. [Obs.]
She's a duchess, a great estate.
--Latimer.Herod on his birthday made a supper to his lords, high captains, and chief estates of Galilee.
--Mark vi. 21. -
A property which a person possesses; a fortune; possessions, esp. property in land; also, property of all kinds which a person leaves to be divided at his death.
See what a vast estate he left his son.
--Dryden. -
The state; the general body politic; the common-wealth; the general interest; state affairs. [Obs.]
I call matters of estate not only the parts of sovereignty, but whatsoever . . . concerneth manifestly any great portion of people.
--Bacon. pl. The great classes or orders of a community or state (as the clergy, the nobility, and the commonalty of England) or their representatives who administer the government; as, the estates of the realm (England), which are (1) the lords spiritual, (2) the lords temporal, (3) the commons.
-
(Law) The degree, quality, nature, and extent of one's interest in, or ownership of, lands, tenements, etc.; as, an estate for life, for years, at will, etc.
--Abbott.The fourth estate, a name often given to the public press.
Wikipedia
The Fourth Estate is a 1996 novel by Jeffrey Archer. It chronicles the lives of two media barons, Richard Armstrong and Keith Townsend, from their starkly contrasting childhoods to their ultimate battle to build the world's biggest media empire. The book is based on two real life media barons – Robert Maxwell and Rupert Murdoch, who fought to control the newspaper market in Britain. (Murdoch had bought The Sun and News of the World and later Times Newspapers Ltd and Maxwell bought the Daily Mirror and the other newspapers in its group.).
The concept of the fourth estate is in essence the press as a watchdog on other powerful institutions or " estates", the original three estates in England and later the United Kingdom being the Lords Spiritual (of the Church of England), the Lords Temporal, and the commons. The fourth estate is charged with keeping an honest watch on activities of the other states and itself. These duties would help democratic societies function properly, openly, and honestly. Debate still flourishes as to whether or not this ever operated (or operates) as it was intended.
It also shows a battle between two strong characters from differing backgrounds, who are willing to take endless risks.
The Fourth Estate is a famous picture painted by Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo in 1901, originally entitled The Path of Workers.
The Fourth Estate: A Film of a British Newspaper is a 1940 documentary film directed by Paul Rotha. The film was sponsored by the owners of The Times, and depicts the preparation and production of a day's edition of the newspaper.
The film is notable for the fact that it went unreleased (apart from a small number of private screenings for the sponsor and critics). The Second World War broke out while it was in production, and the explanation for The Fourth Estate having been buried most commonly given by historians of the Documentary Movement is that following the film's completion, the Ministry of Information were reluctant to sanction its release on the grounds that it depicted life in peacetime London, which would no longer be accepted by viewers as realistic. However, Rotha himself claimed that the film's sponsor was reluctant to release The Fourth Estate in the belief that it implicitly criticised The Times from a leftist perspective, portraying it as the mouthpiece of the establishment.
Another point of interest is that Carl Mayer, the Jewish and prominent Weimar screenwriter, who by this time was living in Britain as an exile from the Nazis, acted as a 'scenario consultant' to the film.
In 2012, the first public screening of the full film was at the University of Leeds using film print from the archive of the British Film Institute (BFI).
Usage examples of "the fourth estate".
Hearst, the Fourth Estate to a level quite unheard of in any time .
Meanwhile, according to Marx, the third estate (the bourgeoisie) was growing richer and richer and the fourth estate (the proletariat) was growing poorer and poorer, and he predicted that in the end, one man would possess all the wealth of the world while the others would be his employees and dependent upon his good will.
I expect the suicide attempt will bring it back into focus for a while, but then a period of quiescence can be expected as the vultures of the fourth estate feast on new carrion.
It has been said that while there just might be honor among thieves, there is absolutely none among journalists, at least insofar as beating a fellow member of the fourth estate out of a storygetting it firstis concerned.
But John Apgar appeared to be entirely fascinated by the Fourth Estate in all its woolly splendour.
He also believed fervently in a philosophy expounded by a certain contingent of the Fourth Estate: Sensationalism sells better than dull facts, so don’.
I convinced them how tough that could be, if you had any sort of lawyer of your own, once you threw the case so comically, with members of the fourth estate in court to describe the hilarity on the front pages of the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News in an election year.
He was to begin by saying that he welcomed the opportunity to meet with the men and women of the fourth estate upon whom the electorate depended for all information concerning their government.