Word.ws English Dictionary

tow the line

tow the line verb: eggcorn of toe the line.

Verb

tow the line (third-person singular simple present tows the line, present participle towing the line, simple past and past participle towed the line)

  1. (nonstandard) Eggcorn of toe the line.
    • Some metaphors now current have been twisted out of their original meaning without those who use them even being aware of the fact. For example, toe the line is sometimes written as tow the line.[1946 April, George Orwell, “Politics and the English Language”, in Cyril Connolly, editor, Horizon, volume 13, number 76, London: Horizon, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 255
    • This isn't the first time this week where Cheney has slammed Republicans for towing the line for Trump.2024 February 6, Brad Reed, “'Inexcusable betrayal': Liz Cheney buries her party for following 'Trump's orders'”, in MSN, archived from the original on 06 Feb 2024, Politics

Forms of tow the line

third-person singular presenttows the line
present participletowing the line
past participletowed the line
pasttowed the line

Questions about tow the line

What does tow the line mean?
Tow the line means eggcorn of toe the line.
What part of speech is tow the line?
Tow the line is a verb.
What is the past tense of tow the line?
The past tense of tow the line is towed the line.

Words near tow the line in the dictionary

  1. TOW missiles
  2. tow ring
  3. tow rings
  4. tow rope
  5. tow ropes
  6. tow the line
  7. tow truck
  8. tow trucks
  9. tow'r
  10. tow-away zone
  11. tow-away zones

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: tow the line (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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