briefless

comparative more briefless · superlative most briefless

1. lawLacking briefs (clients)

   No one can accuse the Unionist Party of seeking to make indecent capital out of the folly, the misfortunes and the scandals which have become the chief stock-in-trade of latter-day Radicalism since the great historic Party fell under the auspices of barristers— briefed and briefless.

   1913 June, L. J. Maxse, “The End of the Asquith Legend”, in The National Review, volume 61, number 364, page 684

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   Consequently a briefless barrister who is totally without connexion, as it is delicately phrased, which means who has no attorney blood in him, who has not married an attorney's daughter, and who has no rich relations who bring grist to the attorney mill, cannot hope by any change of administration to become a briefed barrister.

   1849 November, “The Avatar of Attorneyism”, in Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country, volume 40, page 572

   As an advocate he had no success, for after walking the floor of the Parliament House, as it is called in Edinburgh, along with other briefed and briefless advocates, and securing only one case, which brought him four guineas, he abandoned that practice and settled down seriously to his true life work of literature.

   1899 June 10, H. B. Baildon, “Robert Louis Stevenson: Essayist, Novelist and Poet”, in The Living Age, volume 221, number 2866, page 683

2. Not wearing briefs