Lawyer or Attorney
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Term
Main definition
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As commonly used in the United States, the terms "lawyer" and "attorney are completely interchangeable, but there is a big difference. As formally used in the United States, all attorneys are lawyers, but not all lawyers are attorneys. The attorney holds a professional license to practice but a lawyer may hold no licenses at all. A lawyer is someone who is educated in the law. Attorneys become lawyers when they graduate from law school. If they choose to practice law as a profession, one of the essential steps involved in becoming an attorney is sitting for the bar exam. A lawyer must pass the bar exam to be eligible to practice law within a specific state. State bar associations consider it very important to differentiate their members as licensed attorneys.
