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The act of advocating, defending, or supporting, a cause by arguments.

In a pleading manner.

The mutual pleas and replies of the plaintiff and defendant, or written statements of the parties in support of their claims, proceeding from the declaration of the plaintiff, until issue is joined, and the question made to rest on some single point. Blackstone.

An error in pleading.

The act of pleading for or supporting; work of advocating; intercession.

The act of advocating or pleading; plea; advocacy. [Archaic] The holy Jesus . . . sits in heaven in a perpetual advocation for us. Jer. Taylor.

A counter-statement of facts in a course of pleadings; a confutation of what the other party has alleged; a responsive declaration by a witness in reply to a question. In Equity, it is the usual form of defense to the complainant's charges in his bill. Bouvier.

To make an abstract or abridgment of; to shorten; as, to brief pleadings.

The end or close of a pleading, e.g., the formal ending of an indictment, "against the peace," etc.

nfession may be explained or rebutted. Wharton. Confession and avoidance (Law), a mode of pleading in which the party confesses the facts as stated by his adversary, but alleges some new matter by way of avoiding the legal effect claimed for them. Mozley & W. Confession of faith, a formulary containing the articles of…

th from; as, we can not depart from our rules; to depart from a title or defense in legal pleading. If the plan of the convention be found to depart from republican principles. Madison.

The desertion by a party to any pleading of the ground taken by him in his last antecedent pleading, and the adoption of another. Bouvier.

ults, or disabilities to perform what was covenanted. Milton. Chatham refused to see him, pleading his disability. Bancroft.

That technical interruption of the proceedings in pleading in an action, which follows where a defendant does not answer the whole of the plaintiff's declaration, and the plaintiff omits to take judgment for the part unanswered. Wharton's Law Dict. Burrill.

One who draws pleadings or other writings.

Used in entreaty; pleading. [R.] "Entreative phrase." A. Brewer.

Controversial. [Archaic] A specimen of admirable special pleading in the court of eristic logic. Coleridge.

charge to a jury; or as to lapse of time, or scandal, impertinence, or insufficiency in a pleading; also, as in conveyancing, a clause by which the grantor excepts something before granted. Burrill.

ing, releasing, and the like; acquittal; release; absolution; justification; extenuation. Pleading so wisely in excuse of it. Shak.

ctice of making trivial distinctions. The ancient hairsplitting technicalities of special pleading. Charles Sumner.