Pettifogger

4 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  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]

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  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}]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  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
  
  

From Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856) [bouvier]:

  PETTIFOGGER. One who pretends to be a lawyer, but possessing neither 
  knowledge, law, nor conscience.