Meaning of uphold in English

uphold

/ʌpˈhəʊld/ us

/ʌpˈhoʊld/

upheld | upheld

to defend or keep a principle or law, or to say that a decision that has already been made, especially a legal one, is correct:

As a police officer you are expected to uphold the law whether you agree with it or not.

Judge Davis upheld the county court's decision.

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The government has promised to uphold the principles of democracy.
We will endeavour to uphold the high educational standards which have become associated with this institution.
The freedom of the press must be upheld.
A committed socialist, he upheld the rights of the voiceless and the underprivileged.
The court is said to be upholding its decision.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Backing, supporting & defending

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upholder

(Definition of uphold from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

uphold | American Dictionary

uphold

verb [ T ]

/ˈʌpˈhoʊld/

past tense and past participle upheld us/ʌpˈheld/

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to defend or maintain a principle or law, or to state that a decision that has already been made, esp. a legal one, is correct:

The Supreme Court upheld California’s term limit measure.

(Definition of uphold from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

uphold | Business English

uphold

verb [ T ]

LAW

/ʌpˈhəʊld/ us

upheld | upheld

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to state that a decision which has already been made, especially a legal one, is correct:

uphold a decision/ruling/appeal The court is said to be upholding its decision.

to keep or defend a principle or law:

When he took office he swore to uphold the laws of the land.

The decision by the court upholds the right of rural Alaskans to subsistence hunt and fish on most waters in Alaska.

upholder

noun [ C ] uk/ʌpˈhəʊldər/ us/-ˈhoʊldɚ/

Our country's reputation as an upholder of standards of freedom and decency is being questioned.

(Definition of uphold from the Cambridge Business English Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

Examples of uphold

uphold

To suggest otherwise is to uphold a doctrine that supports significant violations of patients' rights.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Dramatically increasing repression in this way reflected the monarchy's determination to have provincial elites uphold royal authority.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Timing may vary dramatically between performers or stylistic schools, depending on the aesthetics upheld by the guru.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

To be modern is to adopt reason and progress and to uphold the belief that epistemological certainty is attainable.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Such clarity in upholding accepted boundaries suggests an appreciation, if not an interaction, with the natural world that sits stoically within the prevailing utilitarian tradition.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

They got their share of the proceedings in the process but in effect actively upheld an unequal political and economic system.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The state court had upheld the livestock classification on the grounds that it was well-known that sheep, unlike cattle, damaged pasture land.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The public good was easy to uphold when you counted yourself as one of the best and first.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

When they do, it is most often to uphold and defend the canons of medical ethics.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

This creates a duty to train professionals who understand and uphold the duty to regulate their colleagues internally.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

When it could not, the existence of property that was the subject of the suit was invoked to uphold the claims of temple dancing girls.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

In many cases, the commitment to upholding the value of equal membership may be invoked to explain the diversity of need-oriented distributive arrangements.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

I take it that upholding equal membership in communal provision requires the formation of distributive practices in different institutional sub-domains.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The disparity produces cognitive dissonance, particularly among younger adults who are the most likely to uphold the ideal notions of elder care.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Negative thoughts related to past deeds, such as disappointing a loved one or failing to uphold a responsibility, are relatively common.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

What is the pronunciation of uphold?

What is the pronunciation of upheld?

Translations of uphold

in Chinese (Traditional)

支援，維護，贊成（尤指法律上的決議）…

Meaning of uphold in English

Related word

uphold | American Dictionary

uphold | Business English

upholder

Examples of uphold

Translations of uphold

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