Via Wiktionary, I saw a phrase which I don't think I have ever come across.
If necessary, I'll bull my way into the reception
This sounds like someone who intends to use physical force or maybe astuteness in order to reach their objective, which in this case is a reception, perhaps a wedding.
“Bull his way into [somewhere]” is strange to my ears but not to Google.
In one instance he was preparing to pull into a parking place at a tony shopping center and a man tried to bull his way into the same space. I witnessed the incident, and my son-in-law clearly was in the right. Yet the man berated him for not ceding the parking spot.
–R. Lee Harris, June 2024The slower traffic moves, the more likely a bus driver is to bull his way into an intersection and block it when the traffic lights change.
–Washington Post, 1979.
However, there seems a preference for "bull one's way through", it is attested across the net and by Google Books.
I do have, as you may be aware, a deep and intimate relationship with writer’s block. Often it just comes out of nowhere. There I am, happily pottering away, writing a thing, and then bam, no more words are available in my head.
[…] Sometimes I can bull my way through it, sometimes the malaise just magically lifts. This time, I wrote a post about how important it is to focus on what’s directly in front of you rather than fretting about things that are far away in the distance and, just like that, my block was gone.
–Fieldwork, Suw Charman-Anderson, 2024In addition, the sheer number of interesting books I discover every week are changing another long standing habit. I used to bull my way through a book no matter how bad it got. Now if I’m losing interest, I simply put it down and start another one. This is why almost every review I write is a positive one.
–Maine Crime Writers, 2015There was an open stand of pines around it but no real deer cover. I decided to bull my way through, hoping to spook a buck into the open. In several minutes of thrashing about in that willow patch I jumped quite a few deer.
–Things look up when you look down, Wayne Van Zwoll, 1987
Cambridge Dictionary defines “bull something through” as an American phrasal verb meaning: to make people accept your plans or ideas by being very determined and forceful.
Merriam-Webster, an American dictionary, has no entry for either “bull something through” or “bull one's way” but it does for the transitive verb ‘bull’ and includes an example, “bulled his way through the crowd”. It says the verb can be traced back to 1884 but that's only for the intransitive use. Etymonline confirms this date.
But which word or phrase did the ‘phrasal verb‘ spring from? Possibly, the noun phrase bull dose (later bulldoze) was its forefather, in the US it stood for a severe beating or lashing — a dose strong enough for a bull. But these lashings were not inflicted on bovines but to Black voters who were “punished” for attempting to cast their vote.
Green's Dictionary of Slang cites:
bulldose v.
- to intimidate, to coerce, to force through violence; thus bulldosing/bulldozing n. and adj.
1876 Chicago Daily Trib. 18 July 2: Their votes, unfortunately, make a Republican ward, and the white bulldozing, shot-gun riders from afar are ordered there to disturb, to kill, to make hell of a peaceful neighborhood, and the citizens are powerless to protect their colored neighbors, being themselves intimidated to such an extent that they dare not give the names of the Democratic Committee having charge of the killing.
One of the earliest instances I found in print is dated 1918. From the Journal of the United States Cavalry Association, the following extract is from a chapter dedicated to The Arab Horse. N.B. The words italicised are the author's.
A large horse, as most pure breds are, is not fitted by nature for rough and mountainous traveling. He is generally rather high strung, and instead of picking his way through difficulties, tries to bull his way through, expending twice the amount of energy necessary. We are all on the lookout for a good pony built thoroughbred with substance, breeding and speed, but there ain't no such animal.
- Is there an earlier attestation than 1918 for "bull one's way through"?
- It appears since its inception, the expression has a hyperbolic meaning. Was it derived from the bullwhip or to bulldose (bulldoze)–both of which contain references to slavery–or something else?
