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ATTORNEY
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A professional person authorized to practice law; conducts lawsuits or gives legal advice
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("attorney" is a kind of...):
professional; professional person (a person engaged in one of the learned professions)
Domain category:
jurisprudence; law (the collection of rules imposed by authority)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "attorney"):
trial attorney; trial lawyer (a lawyer who specializes in defending clients before a court of law)
solicitor (a British lawyer who gives legal advice and prepares legal documents)
referee (an attorney appointed by a court to investigate and report on a case)
public defender (a lawyer who represents indigent defendants at public expense)
prosecuting attorney; prosecuting officer; prosecutor; public prosecutor (a government official who conducts criminal prosecutions on behalf of the state)
divorce lawyer (a lawyer specializing in actions for divorce or annulment)
defense attorney; defense lawyer (the lawyer representing the defendant)
conveyancer (a lawyer who specializes in the business of conveying properties)
barrister (a British or Canadian lawyer who speaks in the higher courts of law on behalf of either the defense or prosecution)
ambulance chaser (an unethical lawyer who incites accident victims to sue)
advocate; counsel; counsellor; counselor; counselor-at-law; pleader (a lawyer who pleads cases in court)
Instance hyponyms:
Abul-Walid Mohammed ibn-Ahmad Ibn-Mohammed ibn-Roshd; Averroes; ibn-Roshd (Arabian philosopher born in Spain; wrote detailed commentaries on Aristotle that were admired by the Schoolmen (1126-1198))
Boy Orator of the Platte; Bryan; Great Commoner; William Jennings Bryan (United States lawyer and politician who advocated free silver and prosecuted John Scopes (1925) for teaching evolution in a Tennessee high school (1860-1925))
Clarence Darrow; Clarence Seward Darrow; Darrow (United States lawyer famous for his defense of lost causes (1857-1938))
Arthur Garfield Hays; Hays (United States lawyer involved in several famous court trials (1881-1954))
Hays; Will Hays; William Harrison Hays (United States lawyer and politician who formulated a production code that prescribed the moral content of United States films from 1930 to 1966 (1879-1954))
Hoover; J. Edgar Hoover; John Edgar Hoover (United States lawyer who was director of the FBI for 48 years (1895-1972))
Francis Scott Key; Key (United States lawyer and poet who wrote a poem after witnessing the British attack on Baltimore during the War of 1812; the poem was later set to music and entitled 'The Star-Spangled Banner' (1779-1843))
Abraham Lincoln; Lincoln; President Abraham Lincoln; President Lincoln (16th President of the United States; saved the Union during the American Civil War and emancipated the slaves; was assassinated by Booth (1809-1865))
Holonyms ("attorney" is a member of...):
attorney-client relation; lawyer-client relation (the responsibility of a lawyer to act in the best interests of the client)
Derivation:
attorneyship (the position of attorney)
Context examples:
A power of attorney is a legal document that gives one person (such as a relative, lawyer, or friend) the authority to make legal, medical, or financial decisions for another person.
(DPA, NCI Dictionary)
“And I have a power of attorney from him in my pocket, to act for him in all matters.”
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
I think I have heard you say that their uncle is an attorney in Meryton.
(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)
I had no occasion of bribing, flattering, or pimping, to procure the favour of any great man, or of his minion; I wanted no fence against fraud or oppression: here was neither physician to destroy my body, nor lawyer to ruin my fortune; no informer to watch my words and actions, or forge accusations against me for hire: here were no gibers, censurers, backbiters, pickpockets, highwaymen, housebreakers, attorneys, bawds, buffoons, gamesters, politicians, wits, splenetics, tedious talkers, controvertists, ravishers, murderers, robbers, virtuosos; no leaders, or followers, of party and faction; no encouragers to vice, by seducement or examples; no dungeon, axes, gibbets, whipping-posts, or pillories; no cheating shopkeepers or mechanics; no pride, vanity, or affectation; no fops, bullies, drunkards, strolling whores, or poxes; no ranting, lewd, expensive wives; no stupid, proud pedants; no importunate, overbearing, quarrelsome, noisy, roaring, empty, conceited, swearing companions; no scoundrels raised from the dust upon the merit of their vices, or nobility thrown into it on account of their virtues; no lords, fiddlers, judges, or dancing-masters.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
Also called durable power of attorney.
(DPA, NCI Dictionary)
Whether sea-going people were short of money about that time, or were short of faith and preferred cork jackets, I don't know; all I know is, that there was but one solitary bidding, and that was from an attorney connected with the bill-broking business, who offered two pounds in cash, and the balance in sherry, but declined to be guaranteed from drowning on any higher bargain.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
There were some very strong objections against the lady, were Colonel Fitzwilliam's words; and those strong objections probably were, her having one uncle who was a country attorney, and another who was in business in London.
(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)
In the course of my stumbling upstairs, I fancied I heard a pleasant sound of laughter; and not the laughter of an attorney or barrister, or attorney's clerk or barrister's clerk, but of two or three merry girls.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
The idea of those Devonshire girls, among the dry law-stationers and the attorneys' offices; and of the tea and toast, and children's songs, in that grim atmosphere of pounce and parchment, red-tape, dusty wafers, ink-jars, brief and draft paper, law reports, writs, declarations, and bills of costs; seemed almost as pleasantly fanciful as if I had dreamed that the Sultan's famous family had been admitted on the roll of attorneys, and had brought the talking bird, the singing tree, and the golden water into Gray's Inn Hall.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
But at no time of my life,” said Mr. Micawber, “have I enjoyed a higher degree of satisfaction than in pouring my griefs (if I may describe difficulties, chiefly arising out of warrants of attorney and promissory notes at two and four months, by that word) into the bosom of my friend Copperfield.”
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
