issue

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun A point or matter of discussion, debate, or dispute.
• noun A matter of public concern.
• noun A misgiving, objection, or complaint.
• noun A problem or difficulty.
• noun A personal problem.
• noun The act of circulating, distributing, or publishing by a business, government, or organization.
• noun An item or set of items, as stamps or coins, made available at one time by a business, government, or organization.
• noun A single copy of a periodical.
• noun A distinct set of copies of an edition of a book distinguished from others of that edition by variations in the printed matter.
• noun Proceeds from estates or fines.
• noun Something proceeding from a specified source.
• noun A culminating point leading to a decision.
• noun A final result or conclusion, as a solution to a problem.
• noun The act or an instance of flowing, passing, or giving out.
• noun A place of egress; an outlet.
• noun A discharge, as of blood or pus.
• noun A lesion, wound, or ulcer producing such a discharge.
• noun Offspring; progeny.
• intransitive verb To flow, go, or come out: synonym: appear.
• intransitive verb To proceed from a source; emerge or come forth: synonym: stem.
• intransitive verb To have as a consequence; result.
• intransitive verb To accrue as proceeds or profit.
• intransitive verb To be born or be descended.
• intransitive verb To be circulated or published.
• intransitive verb To circulate or distribute in an official capacity.
• intransitive verb To publish.
• intransitive verb To pour forth or send out; emit.
• idiom (at issue) In question; in dispute.
• idiom (at issue) At variance; in disagreement.
• idiom (join issue) To enter into controversy.
• idiom Law (join issue) To submit an issue for decision.
• idiom (take issue) To take an opposing point of view; disagree.

from The Century Dictionary.

• noun A going, passing, or flowing out; passage from within outward; an outgoing, outflow, or flux.
• noun Means of egress; an opening or outlet; a passage leading outward; a vent.
• noun Specifically, in medicine, a vent for the passage of blood or morbid matter; a running sore, accidental or made as a counter-irritant.
• noun An outcome; a result; the product of any process or action; that which occurs as a consequence; ultimate event or result; as, a happy issue of one's labors; the issues of our actions are hidden from us.
• noun Offspring; progeny; a child or children; descendant or descendants: as, he had issue a son; issue of the whole or of the half blood.
• noun Produce or proceeds; yield, as of land or other possessions: as, the issues, rents, and profits of an estate.
• noun The act of sending or giving out; a putting or giving forth; promulgation; delivery; emission: as, the issue of commands by an officer, or of rations to troops; the issue of a book, or of bank-notes.
• noun That which is sent out, promulgated, or delivered; the quantity sent forth at one time, or within a certain period: as, a large issue of bank-notes; the daily issues of a newspaper.
• noun A matter of which the result is to be decided; that which is to be determined by trial or contention; a conclusion held in abeyance for consideration or debate; a choice between alternatives: as, the issues of the day; a dead issue.
• noun In law: The close or result of pleadings in a suit, by the presentation of a controverted point to be determined by trial. It is either an issue of law, to be determined by the court, or of fact, to be determined by a jury or by the court.
• noun The controversy on any material fact, affirmed on one side and denied on the other, in a trial.
• noun The sending out or authoritative delivery of a document: as, the issue of execution.