How to Use functionary in a Sentence

functionary

noun
  • He was a party functionary during the political campaign.
  • Ms Suu Kyi could, after all, have sent a drab functionary to present Myanmar’s case.
    The Economist, 11 Dec. 2019
  • Some city functionary has taped a paper on the wall with the number to call for the key in off hours, which in this case is anytime before 8 p.m.
    Washington Post, 5 Feb. 2022
  • But few had ever bothered to get inside the mind of the shady functionary who swindled the public garbage fund.
    New York Times, 17 May 2021
  • Stola is guilty simply of being a scholar and a thinker, rather than a functionary.
    Masha Gessen, The New Yorker, 23 Sep. 2019
  • In my case, as a functionary in the script, Rasputin has to be like this oncoming weather system that is darkening the world of The King’s Men.
    Simon Thompson, Forbes, 23 Dec. 2021
  • In 1934, Sergei Kirov, a leading Bolshevik functionary, was shot dead in Leningrad.
    The New Yorker, 18 Oct. 2021
  • However, the people who are most to blame for Afghanistan aren’t these functionaries.
    Elliot Ackerman, Time, 10 Dec. 2019
  • Without a single hand going up or down, the functionary announced that the motion had passed 14–1.
    Alejandro Varela, Harper's magazine, 16 Sep. 2019
  • Basically, the functionary told Green that the city wanted that streetlight installed, and Green had to pay for it.
    Deroy Murdock, National Review, 30 Aug. 2019
  • But one of the most startling moments of the book is a description of the tsunami by a government functionary named Teruo Konno.
    Lisa Levy, New Republic, 9 Oct. 2017
  • Thomas grieves but must interact with the businesslike functionaries of death.
    Jeffrey Arlo Brown, New York Times, 17 Jan. 2024
  • Prison rules required that her writings be kept as evidence against her, and no functionary dared to dispose of them.
    Lian Xi, WSJ, 13 Apr. 2018
  • As far as the sergeant could tell, the mess-up was entirely Hertz’s fault: likely some functionary had mistyped my car’s VIN or license plate number.
    Lauren Groff, Harper's magazine, 1 Mar. 2020
  • When Leshchenko arrived at headquarters, a functionary told him that the plans were already scrambled.
    Franklin Foer, The Atlantic, 8 Sep. 2022
  • In the film, a functionary of the Spanish government waits at a remote South American outpost for new orders.
    Mark Olsen, latimes.com, 29 Apr. 2018
  • Soon, most of Stalin’s functionaries were killed in the purges, including Iofan’s neighbors and his friend and patron Rykov.
    Deyan Sudjic, Foreign Affairs, 20 Dec. 2022
  • The Red leaders were driven by a righteousness that ran as deep as that of any Inquisition functionary.
    Adam Hochschild, The Atlantic, 7 Oct. 2022
  • The response by a functionary was widely thought of as absurdly anachronistic: A scene in which hooligans stone to death a baby in a pram could not be publicly staged.
    Benedict Nightingale, New York Times, 6 Mar. 2024
  • Hence the state attorneys general rise to check the president and his functionaries.
    Charles Krauthammer, The Denver Post, 2 Mar. 2017
  • Hence the state attorneys general rise to check the president and his functionaries.
    Charles Krauthammer, Orange County Register, 3 Mar. 2017
  • Hence the state attorneys general rise to check the president and his functionaries.
    Charles Krauthammer, The Mercury News, 2 Mar. 2017
  • Then the famous 2016 Trump Tower meeting with Russian functionaries was supposed to be proof of collusion, but nothing more has come of that.
    The Editorial Board, WSJ, 29 Nov. 2018
  • Then the famous 2016 Trump Tower meeting with Russian functionaries was supposed to be proof of collusion, but nothing more has come of that.
    The Editorial Board, WSJ, 29 Nov. 2018
  • For all the wit and care of the performances, Malcolm and JB register as one-note ciphers because the adaptation cuts them down to little more than plot functionaries.
    David Benedict, Variety, 5 Apr. 2023
  • The founders of a museum that exposes the horrors of the Gulag are fired and replaced by a government functionary, and the museum’s exhibits are censored.
    Sophie Pinkham, The New York Review of Books, 20 Aug. 2020
  • The founders of a museum that exposes the horrors of the Gulag are fired and replaced by a government functionary, and the museum’s exhibits are censored.
    Sophie Pinkham, The New York Review of Books, 3 Aug. 2020
  • Futawatari is a career functionary, in other words: an invisible man.
    David L. Ulin, Los Angeles Times, 12 Nov. 2020
  • Everyone else, from cabinet members to party functionaries, is kept on a long leash.
    Constanze Stelzenmüller, Foreign Affairs, 20 Apr. 2021
  • Think about your last price negotiation—with a car dealer, a potential new hire's salary demands or your least favorite procurement functionary.
    Danny Ertel, Forbes, 10 Dec. 2024

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'functionary.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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