Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A skillful attorney, especially one who is knowledgeable about legal technicalities and their effective use.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun US A clever, crafty, or otherwise extremely
adroit practitioner oflaw .
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
[After Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.]
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Possibly derived from Andrew Hamilton's skillful defense of John Peter Zenger in 1735, though, as the phrase is not attested until 1788, this is uncertain.
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Examples
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