DCHP-1 Online

permit

• 1 n. a licence to buy and consume a specified amount of liquor, often for medicinal purposes only, in areas where the sale of spirits is otherwise illegal.

  • 1883  After an interim of half a year you receive another permit.
  • 1934  Permits are issued by Ottawa, upon application, to every responsible white resident entitling him to import for medicinal purposes only two gallons of liquor each year.
  • 1964  [It] prohibited the importation of liquor into the [N.W.] Territories except for "medicinal" purposes, and then only by holders of government permits.

• 2a n. the quantity of liquor one is permitted to buy with the government permit.

  • 1883  I do not refer to clergymen, lawyers or doctors, neither to whites generally nor to half-breeds universally, but to a class that is always ready to drink any and every permit, no matter who it is that pays the piper.
  • 1928  The term "permit" as used in the North has no reference, as one might suppose, to hunting or fishing or mining licenses, but is rather the popularly accepted euphemism for the monthly case of liquor each legal resident is permitted to import from the nearest licensed vendor.
  • 1947  The Canadian Government allows each individual of the white population one permit of strong drink a year--two gallons.

• 2b n. liquor; a bottle of liquor.

  • 1909  It has been a full day, and by the way the "permits" are opening up in the settlement when we come back, promises to be a full night. These men have waited a whole year for a drink, and now the lids can't come off quick enough.
  • 1953  "You lie natural and easylike," Nat growled at the man, whom he had once raided for selling "permit" to Indians.
  • 1966  It was a wonderful dinner . . . and he was able to add to it, for in his load were two or three "permits" --bottles of rum. . . .