principled
Americanadjective
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of principled
Explanation
If you decide to take a lower grade rather than cheat on a test, you are making a principled decision, or one that is based on moral rightness. Most people have a set of principles or basic moral rules that they follow. These might include not stealing, not cheating, and treating people as you would like to be treated. Decisions made following these rules are principled, as are people who follow their principles often. If you take a principled stance on censorship, your defend or refute it actively based on your convictions.
Vocabulary lists containing principled
President Trump's Second State of the Union Address (2019)
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They Called Us Enemy
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Obama's State of the Union Address, 2014
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
"I don't think it has anything to do with what is principled or what's right or what's just."
From Barron's ● Nov. 3, 2026
On Sunday, Stevens characterized her flip-flop as “a personal and private decision” in the middle of a press conference talking about it, which made the whole thing look more petty than principled.
From Slate ● Nov. 2, 2026
At the time of her resignation she blamed burnout; she didn’t cite a principled reason until the New Yorker ran a gushing profile in November 2020.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 28, 2026
They're very principled in the way they play, probably the most principled team in the Premier League in the way that they build from the back.
From BBC ● Aug. 27, 2026
And the very notion that a candidate should openly solicit votes violated the principled presumption that such behavior itself represented a confession of unworthiness for national office.
From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
