Word.ws English Dictionary

Baker Act

Baker Act verb: to invoke the Baker Act, i.e., the involuntary institutionalization and examination of an individual in the state of Florida, or (by extension) elsewhere in the United States.

Verb

Baker Act (third-person singular simple present Baker Acts, present participle Baker Acting, simple past and past participle Baker Acted)

  1. (US, intransitive, transitive) To invoke the Baker Act, i.e., the involuntary institutionalization and examination of an individual in the state of Florida, or (by extension) elsewhere in the United States.
    • Court records show he was previously ruled not competent for prosecution, Baker Acted 33 times and released back onto the street. The Baker Acts include the child molestation and prior indecent exposure arrests.2018 February 27, Kent Justice, “Jacksonville man charged with masturbating in front of kids”, in News4Jax

Forms of Baker Act

third-person singular presentBaker Acts
present participleBaker Acting
past participleBaker Acted
pastBaker Acted

Origin of Baker Act

The legislation was nicknamed the “Baker Act” after Florida Democratic state representative from Miami, Maxine Baker, who served from 1963 to 1972. She had a strong interest in mental health issues, served as chair of the House Committee on Mental Health, and was the sponsor of the bill.

Questions about Baker Act

What does Baker Act mean?
Baker Act means to invoke the Baker Act, i.e., the involuntary institutionalization and examination of an individual in the state of Florida, or (by extension) elsewhere in the United States.
What part of speech is Baker Act?
Baker Act is a verb.
What is the past tense of Baker Act?
The past tense of Baker Act is Baker Acted.

Words near Baker Act in the dictionary

  1. bakeoven
  2. bakeovens
  3. bakepan
  4. bakepans
  5. baker
  6. Baker Act
  7. Baker Acted
  8. Baker Acting
  9. Baker Acts
  10. Baker City
  11. Baker County

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Baker Act (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “Baker Act.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/baker_act. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.