unfettered

adjective

un·​fet·​tered ˌən-ˈfe-tərd 

: not controlled or restricted : free, unrestrained

unfettered access to the Senate.

—Joshua Miller

… an approach to reading which combined passion and empathy with free-ranging enthusiasm and unfettered curiosity.

—Jonathan Keates

If popular government is about anything, it is about the unfettered right of the voters to choose their leaders.

—Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

… few voices in modern American intellectual life have challenged the primacy of the unfettered individual.

—Walter Shapiro

Did you know?

A fetter is a chain or shackle for the feet (such as the kind sometimes used on a prisoner), or, more broadly, anything that confines or restrains. Fetter and unfetter both function as verbs in English with contrasting literal meanings having to do with the putting on of and freeing from fetters; they likewise have contrasting figurative extensions having to do with the depriving and granting of freedom. The adjective unfettered resides mostly in the figurative, with the word typically describing someone or something unrestrained in progress or spirit. This is how Irish author James Joyce used the word in his 1916 autobiographical novel A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man when the character of Cranly recalls to his best friend Stephen what he (Stephen) said he wishes to do in life: "To discover the mode of life or of art whereby your spirit could express itself in unfettered freedom."

Examples of unfettered in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Its breathability is excellent, and that moisture control—along with the unfettered feel of four-way stretch fabric and articulated seams that allow the arms to move freely—made the Proton Hybrid testers’ favorite midlayer for sweat-producing adventures. —Kelly Bastone, Outside Online, 4 Nov. 2024

This bipartisan consensus reflects a growing trend among economists and experts, who are now revising the unfettered free-trade and laissez-faire attitudes that defined U.S. economic policymaking for decades. —Steven Tian, Fortune, 21 Oct. 2024

The suit paints a picture of Phillips as someone to whom WWE gave unfettered access to kids and the means to abuse them, such as private locker rooms. —David Bixenspan, Rolling Stone, 23 Oct. 2024

But that unfettered access to new and vintage content comes at a price for Hollywood. —Cynthia Littleton, Variety, 18 Oct. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1602, in the meaning defined above

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