logrolling

Noun

logrolling (countable and uncountable, plural logrollings)

1. (US, countable) The rolling of logs from one place to another; an occasion when people meet to help each other roll logs.
   • As most of the county was covered with forest, it was necessary to clear the land of trees, in order to make way for farming operations. Clearing of the land was accomplished by means of logrollings, a practice whereby logs were heaped into great piles and burned. Much valuable timber was destroyed...1940 February, W. A. Davis, E. F. Goldston, “Agricultural History and Statistics”, in Soil Survey of Stokes County, North Carolina (Series 1934; no. 20), Washington, D.C.: United States Department of...
   • Logrollings, for example, which occurred during the winter and early spring, took place in a series until the logs on every neighbor's farm were piled. So with many other chores, for cooperative patterns of work form an integral part of productive organization.1983, Steven Hahn, “Bounds of Custom”, in The Roots of Southern Populism: Yeoman Farmers and the Transformation of the Georgia Upcountry, 1850–1890, New York, N.Y.; Oxford: Oxford University Press...
   1. (US, uncountable) The act of balancing on a log floating on a river to guide it downstream, often involving rolling it using one's feet; birling.
   2. (US, uncountable) A sport in which two people balance on a log floating in a body of water, each one aiming to cause the opponent to fall off by rolling or kicking the log.
      • Harkening back to the days when loggers had to break river jams free by carefully stepping out on floating logs, logrolling is all about maintaining balance. Also called birling, logrolling requires competitors to go head-to-head on a single log, trying to toss the other guy into the water by...2011, Lew Freedman, “Preface”, in Timber!: The Story of the Lumberjack World Championships, Madison, Wis.: Terrace Books, University of Wisconsin Press, →ISBN, page xv
2. (US, figuratively, uncountable) A concerted effort to push forward mutually advantageous legislative agendas by combining two items, either or both of which might fail on its own, into a single bill that is more likely to pass.
   • What, for instance, did the honorable member for North Melbourne (Mr. Curtain) care about the Horsham extension? Not twopence, unless it helped him to get the "outer circle" line. It was much the same with the honorable member for Crowlands (Mr. Woods), the honorable member for the Avoca (Mr....1873 October 22, “Railway Construction Bill”, in Victoria. Parliamentary Debates. Session 1873. Legislative Council and Legislative Assembly, volume XVII (Comprising the Period from August 27 to...
   • Thus far, by a resort to the familiar method of "log-rolling," all attempts to put an end to the Northern and Southern divisions have failed, because of the union of the opposing interests with those that want large appropriations in different parts of the State; and it is quite probable that the...1896, “Discussion of the Address of Mr. Courtney”, in Proceedings of the Illinois State Bar Association at Its Nineteenth Annual Meeting Held in the City of Springfield, January 23 and 24, 1896 with...
3. (figuratively, uncountable) Mutual recommendation of friends' or colleagues' services or products, such as book recommendations in literary reviews.
   • Near-synonym: backscratching
   • A few years ago, in a sudden fit of self-righteousness, the Sunday Times announced loudly that it would not permit the sort of back-scratching and log-rolling that infest other literary pages to pollute its own reviewing.1994, Francis Wheen, Lord Gnome's Literary Companion, Verso, →ISBN, page 2

   Synonyms:

   backscratching

4. (figuratively, uncountable) The exchanging of favors.