carpetbagger
[kahr-pit-bag-er]
- U.S. History. a Northerner who went to the South after the Civil War and became active in Republican politics, especially so as to profiteer from the unsettled social and political conditions of the area during Reconstruction.
- a politician who takes up residence in a place and runs for office without having strong ties to the area.
- any opportunistic or exploitive outsider: Our bus company has served this town for years, but now the new one run by carpetbaggers from the city is stealing our business.
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Origin of carpetbagger
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for carpetbagger
Contemporary Examples
Bob Smith: unbalanced, inconstant, and even more of a carpetbagger than the other guy.
The two biggest hurdles executives entering politics face is being viewed as either a carpetbagger or egomaniac.
He was told that he was a carpetbagger, but he desperately wanted to serve the people, as I do.
Historical Examples
We'll hang the little Scalawag on the south side and the Carpetbagger on the north.
The Sins of the FatherThomas Dixon
The charge of corruption laid at the door of the Negro carpetbagger governments is to a large extent true.
Generally they came two together, arm in arm, a carpetbagger and a negro in close confab.
Two Wars: An Autobiography of General Samuel G. FrenchSamuel Gibbs French
But most Southerners preferred the rule of the army to the alternative reign of the carpetbagger, scalawag, and Negro.
The Sequel of AppomattoxWalter Lynwood Fleming
The carpetbagger had found that he could control the Negro without the help of the scalawag.
The Sequel of AppomattoxWalter Lynwood Fleming
carpetbagger
- a politician who seeks public office in a locality where he has no real connections
- British a person who makes a short-term investment in a mutual savings or life-assurance organization in order to benefit from free shares issued following the organization's conversion to a public limited company
- US a Northern White who went to the South after the Civil War to profit from Reconstruction
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Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for carpetbagger
n.
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.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper