bare-knuckled

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bare-knuck·le

(bâr′nŭk′əl) or bare-knuck·led (-əld)

adv.

Without boxing gloves: fighting bare-knuckle.

adj.

1. Wearing no boxing gloves: an undefeated bare-knuckle champion.

2. Unrestrained by scruples: bare-knuckle business tactics.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Adj.

bare-knuckled - characterized by disorderly action and disregard for rules; "a rough-and-tumble fight"; "rough-and-tumble politics"; "undisguised bare-knuckle capitalism"

bare-knuckle, rough-and-tumble

disorderly - undisciplined and unruly; "disorderly youths"; "disorderly conduct"

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References in periodicals archive ?

Known as King Tom, Pendergast's irreverence for federal statutes in favor of bare-knuckled local capitalism allowed Kansas City to emerge as the Paris of the Plains.

MoKan NAMA spends a night on the Tom's Town

Richardson Dilworth: Last of the Bare-Knuckled Aristocrats

Young Rodney, back from several tours in Iraq and very hyper, would rather bet on the horses and fight bare-knuckled for cash than work in the mill.

'Furnace' is bloody and joyless

In November 2011, the government decreed that Cubans could buy and sell homes for the first time since the early days of the revolution, paving the way for a real estate market that has become an exercise in bare-knuckled capitalism.