English

Alternative forms

• 'fess up (with preceding apostrophe)

Verb

fess up ‎(third-person singular simple present fesses up, present participle fessing up, simple past and past participle fessed up)

1. (intransitive, slang) To confess to something; to admit something.
   • 1918, Rex Ellingwood Beach, The Winds of Chance ch. 26:

     "‛Fess up," she persisted. "Have you boys been quarreling again?"

   • 2008, Barack Obama, "Barack Obama's president-elect press conference - 18 December 2008":

     And you know, one of the things that I hope is that the American people will find when we make a mistake, we're willing to fess up to it and change.

   • 2009 February 26, Roy Furchgott, “You’ve Sold Your Stocks. Now What?”, in New York Times:

     “I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what was happening in the financial industry, and I came to the conclusion that people weren’t fessing up,” he said.

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