Concept
Lawyer
Overview
A lawyer is a person who is qualified to offer advice about the law, draft legal documents, or represent individuals in legal matters.
The exact nature of a lawyer's work varies depending on the legal jurisdiction and the legal system, as well as the lawyer's area of practice. In many jurisdictions, the legal profession is divided into various branches — including barristers, solicitors, conveyancers, notaries, canon lawyer — who perform different tasks related to the law.
Historically, the role of lawyers can be traced back to ancient civilizations such as Greece and Rome.
Depending on the country, the education required to become a lawyer can range from completing an undergraduate law degree to undergoing postgraduate education and professional training. In many jurisdictions, passing a bar examination is also necessary before one can practice law.
Working as a lawyer generally involves the practical application of abstract legal theories and knowledge to solve specific problems. Some lawyers also work primarily in upholding the rule of law, human rights, and the interests of the legal profession.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Lawyer is discussed.
LAWYER.—By no means, he is no more than a private person who has given his opinion in a great volume which nobody reads, but then your advocate quotes him, the judges take it upon his credit, so there’s your cause gained in a trice. CLIENT.—What! do you tell me the opinion of this Judge Charondas passes current for a law? LAWYER.—But there is one devilish bad circumstance attends us. Turnet and Brodeau are both…
Voltaire, The Works of Voltaire, Vol. IV of XLIII. Romances, Vol. III of III, and A Treatise on Toleration.
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; opens on it
How should I do otherwise knowing so well how the Government had always been able to retain this power through the instrumentality of lawyers. It is perfectly true that it is the lawyers of to-day who are leading us, who are fighting the country's battles, but when it comes to a matter of action against the Government, when it comes to a matter of paralysing the activity of the Government I know that the Government…
Mahatma Gandhi, Freedom's Battle Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; opens on it
As for the philosophers, they make imaginary laws for imaginary commonwealths, and their discourses are as the stars, which give little light because they are so high. For the lawyers, they write according to the states where they live what is received law, and not what ought to be law; for the wisdom of a law-maker is one, and of a lawyer is another. For there are in nature certain fountains of justice whence all…
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning
states what it is; names the idea; opens on it
It is within my knowledge that they are glad when men have disputes. Petty pleaders actually manufacture them. Their touts, like so many leeches, suck the blood of the poor people. Lawyers are men who have little to do. Lazy people, in order to indulge in luxuries, take up such professions. This is a true statement. Any other argument is a mere pretension. It is the lawyers who have discovered that theirs is an…
Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Home Rule
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it
For in private actions the decisions in the most important cases appear to me to depend a great deal on the acuteness of the lawyers. For they are constantly present, and are taken into counsel; and they supply weapons to able advocates whenever they have recourse to their professional wisdom. In all those judicial proceedings then, in which the words "according to good faith" are added, or even those words, "as…
Marcus Tullius Cicero, The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Volume 4
names the idea
Philosophers who discussed Lawyer
- Kwame Anthony Appiah
- Pierre Jean Georges Cabanis
- Antoine Arnauld
- Montesquieu
- Cicero
- Morris Raphael Cohen
- Robert C. Solomon
- Sylvain Maréchal
- Leonard Nelson
- Józef Maria Hoene-Wroński
- Nicholas St. John Green
- Carlos Cossio
Related ideas
- Executive (government)
- French language
- Greece
- Athens
- Stanford University Press
- Hadrian
- Italy
- India
- Intellectual property
- Satires (Juvenal)
- Jurisprudence
- Byzantine Empire
- South Africa
- Trade union
- London
- Harvard University
- Middle Ages
- American English
- Law
- Macau
- Tacitus
- Dutch language
- North America
- Netherlands
Place in the tradition
Part of British philosophy.