Crossword clues for carpetbagger
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Carpetbagger \Car"pet*bag`ger\, n. An adventurer; -- a term of contempt for a Northern man seeking private gain or political advancement in the southern part of the United States after the Civil War (1865). [U. S.]
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
also carpet-bagger, 1868, American English, scornful appellation for Northerners who went South after the fall of the CSA seeking private gain or political advancement. The name is based on the image of men arriving with all their worldly goods in a big carpetbag. Sense later extended to any opportunist from out of the area.\n
Wiktionary
n. 1 (context politics history chiefly US English) An immigrant from the Northern to the Southern States after the American Civil War of 1861–5, especially one who went South to gain political influence; hence, someone intervening in the politics of an area with which they are thought to have no real connection. 2 (context pejorative by extension English) One who comes to a place or organisation with which they have no previous connection with the sole or primary aim of personal gain, especially political or financial gain.
WordNet
n. an outsider who seeks power or success presumptuously; "after the Civil War the carpetbaggers from the north tried to take over the south"
Wikipedia
In United States history, a carpetbagger was a Northerner who moved to the South after the American Civil War, during the Reconstruction era (1863–1877). Many white Southerners denounced them fearing they would loot and plunder the defeated South and be politically allied with the Radical Republicans. Sixty carpetbaggers were elected to Congress, and they included a majority of Republican governors in the South during Reconstruction. Historian Eric Foner argues:
"Carpetbagger" was a pejorative term referring to the carpet bags (a form of cheap luggage at the time) which many of these newcomers carried. The term came to be associated with opportunism and exploitation by outsiders. The term is still used today to refer to a parachute candidate, an outsider who runs for public office in an area where they do not have deep community ties, or have lived only for a short time.
In an unrelated usage, in the United Kingdom, the term was adopted to refer informally to those who join a mutual organization, such as a building society, in order to force it to demutualize, that is, to convert into a joint stock company, solely for personal financial gain.
Carpetbagger is an alt-country, Americana band based in Austin, Texas. The band was formed in spring of 2012. Carpetbagger consists of lead vocalist and guitarist Greg Loftus, lead guitarist Cody Brown, bassist John Tranum, and drummer Bryan McGrath.
Usage examples of "carpetbagger".
These trees were the carpetbaggers of an ecological society smashed and in disarray: thorn, mesquite, cabbage palm, winding lianas.
The keener-sighted of the Northerners began to suspect that Reconstruction in the South often amounted to little more than the looting of the governments of the Southern States by the greedy freedmen and the unscrupulous carpetbaggers, with the troops of the United States standing by to protect the looters.
All the old stories-he was expelled from West Point, his own father had disowned him for his wild behavior, he was known to have made money in disreputable ways, as a professional gambler on Mississippi riverboats, in the brawling gold fields of California, and worst of all through consorting with scallywags and carpetbaggers.
I'm just sick of asshole carpetbaggers coming down here and fucking up the place.
Then some carpetbagger comes along and decides to cheat, steal, hoodwink, make out like a bandit, and give an innocent business and its people a bad name.
Before the week was up he had become an expert chicken thief, being able to rob a roost as quietly as the most finished carpetbagger on the sunny side of Mason and Dixon's line.
But if you’d been there much, you’d know there’s a mighty rough bunch of Scallawags and Republicans and Carpetbaggers been runnin’ things recently.