Pettifogger \Pet"ti*fog`ger\, n.
A lawyer who deals in petty cases; an attorney whose methods
are mean and tricky; an inferior lawyer.
[1913 Webster]
A pettifogger was lord chancellor. --Macaulay.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
pettifogger
n 1: a person (especially a lawyer or politician) who uses
unscrupulous or unethical methods [syn: shyster]
2: a disputant who quibbles; someone who raises annoying petty
objections [syn: quibbler, caviller, caviler]
WordNet (r) 2.0
56 Moby Thesaurus words for "pettifogger":
Philadelphia lawyer, ambulance chaser, belittler, bunco artist,
bunco steerer, captious critic, cardsharp, cardsharper, carper,
carpetbagger, caviler, censor, censurer, common scold, con artist,
con man, confidence man, crimp, critic, criticizer, equivocator,
faultfinder, frondeur, hairsplitter, hedger, horse coper,
horse trader, jackleg, land pirate, land shark, land-grabber,
momus, mortgage shark, mystificator, mystifier, nitpicker,
obscurantist, palterer, picayune critic, pitchman, prevaricator,
pussyfoot, pussyfooter, quibbler, scold, shark, sharp, sharper,
sharpie, shortchanger, shuffler, shyster, slicker, smellfungus,
spieler, tergiversator
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0
PETTIFOGGER. One who pretends to be a lawyer, but possessing neither
knowledge, law, nor conscience.
Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856)
caviler, caviller, quibbler, shyster
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