Benchslap

noun, verb, slang

noun, verb, slang ·Uncommon ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A judicial ruling or opinion that is harsh or humiliating towards a particular party, attorney, or lower court opinion. slang

    "2012, Mark V. Holmes, United States Tax Court, Tigers Eye Trading, LLC v. Commissioner (dissenting), 138 T.C. No. 6, p. 211. Of all the routines in judicial gymnastics, few have a higher degree of difficulty than the reverse benchslap, and we're trying for a combination double with our Opinion today."

Verb
  1. 1
    To issue a judicial ruling or opinion that is harsh or humiliating towards a particular party, attorney, or lower court opinion. slang

Example

More examples

"2012, Mark V. Holmes, United States Tax Court, Tigers Eye Trading, LLC v. Commissioner (dissenting), 138 T.C. No. 6, p. 211. Of all the routines in judicial gymnastics, few have a higher degree of difficulty than the reverse benchslap, and we're trying for a combination double with our Opinion today."

Etymology

Blend of bench + bitch slap.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.