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• n  a defense of some offensive behavior or some failure to keep a promise etc.
  his transparent self-justification was unacceptable

• Mostly the book is an exercise in self-justification and a series of mud pies flung at his family.
• Through the psychology of self-justification, he compulsively seeks power, coveting it not for what it can accomplish but for its own sake.
• But this display of mood-altering confession and self-justification was the real Nixon, in his TV marathon with Frost in 1977, three years after he left the White House in disgrace.

• excuse
• alibi
• exculpation

News & Articles

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• Medical examiner’s work shows that clinging to rules can lead to mistakes
  Self-justification, an unwillingness to be wrong or at the very least admit being unsure, appears to be at play in some of the decisions of the Jackson County Medical Examiner’s office.
  Nov. 11, 2013 - The Kansas City Star

Quotes

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• Jim McGinty in The Age
  That's pathetic, they're guilty of getting the facts wrong, misleading the public of Western Australia and unethical journalism,Mr McGinty told Southern Cross Broadcasting. "They're in denial at the moment, they're in self-justification...
• President Bush in Sify
  Bush, added the newspaper editorial, "cannot continue to obsess about self-justification and the need to color Iraq with the memory of 9/11. The nation does not want it and cannot afford it."
• Alex Salmond in Islamic Republic News Agency
  Scottish Nationalist leader, Alex Salmond said the prime minister's statement sounded "like a long self-justification for the horrors of the last four years, and at points almost like something prepared for the Day of Judgment."