Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A lawyer whose practice involves petty matters or who lacks sound legal judgment or skills.
- noun One who quibbles over trivia.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun An inferior attorney or lawyer who is employed in small or mean business.
- noun The rockling.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun A lawyer who deals in petty cases; an attorney whose methods are mean and tricky; an inferior lawyer.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Someone who
quibbles overtrivia , andraises petty ,annoying objections . - noun An
unscrupulous orunethical lawyer , especially one of lesser skill.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a disputant who quibbles; someone who raises annoying petty objections
- noun a person (especially a lawyer or politician) who uses unscrupulous or unethical methods
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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He had long been reading law in his curious, spasmodically concentrated way, and he had practised a little as a "pettifogger," that is, an unlicensed practitioner in the inferior courts.
Abraham Lincoln Godfrey Rathbone Benson Charnwood 1904
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Before this I had ventured to try a few law cases before justices of the peace, both in the country, in villages, and in the city, and I had some professional triumphs, occasionally over a regular attorney, but more commonly meeting the "pettifogger," who was of
Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 A Political History of Slavery in the United States Together With a Narrative of the Campaigns and Battles of the Civil War In Which the Author Took Part: 1861-1865 Joseph Warren Keifer 1884
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The unintended consequence is empowerment of the moneyed few that can still afford the overpriced beltway pettifogger who knows the ropes.
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The chief pettifogger and Energizer Bunny for the pro-Clinton forces was political strategist James Carville, whose official title was Senior Political Adviser to the President.
Blood Sugar 2010
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The unintended consequence is empowerment of the moneyed few that can still afford the overpriced beltway pettifogger who knows the ropes.
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Wondering: why people watch entertainment tv. .still .... that, and why words like pettifogger aren't used in the everyday anymore.
stem-d Diary Entry stem-d 2009
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Although now I have to thank you Andy Pandy because I'm now aware that I'm a pettifogger sense 2.
Ambiguity: Mixed Messages and Style Overlap BikeSnobNYC 2009
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Giving new meaning to the terms “Philadelphia Lawyer”, “pettifogger”, “law monger”.
Watch Biden make a gaffe about a gaffe right in front of Obama... Ann Althouse 2009
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“Pray, who mentioned money, Mr. Meiklewham?” said her ladyship. — “That wretched old pettifogger,” she added in
Saint Ronan's Well 2008
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To do otherwise faces America with the stark choice of going to War with Russia because some pettifogger who is Head of State in one of those Countries has a bone to pick, and picks it because NATO is with us, or withdrawing from the NATO Treaty rather than go to War.
Ilan Goldenberg: The Powell Endorsement and the End of the Republican Foreign Policy Establishment 2008
bilby commented on the word pettifogger
I'm quite disappointed that, after all these years, the quality of your fogging hasn't improved.
November 21, 2009
yarb commented on the word pettifogger
Go fog yourself.
November 21, 2009
qms commented on the word pettifogger
A fellow I know is a blogger,
An alt-right conspiracy flogger.
No absence of facts
Or motive distracts
From work of a true pettifogger.
October 12, 2017