Squat″ter (–tẽr), n. 1. One who squats; specifically, one who settles unlawfully upon land without a title. In the United States and Australia the term is sometimes applied also to a person who settles lawfully upon government land under legal permission and restrictions, before acquiring title.
In such a tract, squatters and trespassers were tolerated to an extent now unknown. Macaulay.
2. (Zoöl.) See Squat snipe, under Squat.
Squatter sovereignty, the right claimed by the squatters, or actual residents, of a Territory of the United States to make their own laws. Bartlett.