An interesting question. Here we get asked the difference between a lawyer, a solicitor and a barrister.
As a matter of simple definition 'lawyer' could include someone who has a degree in law, or who is an academic lawyer, I suppose, as well as being an inclusive term for the attorney and the advocate.
Do you have a requirement in any state of the USA that advocates in the higher courts must have some qualification above that of the ordinary professional lawyer who prepares cases? If not, as I believe, then presumably 'advocate' only means an attorney who chooses to practice advocacy in the courts as their specialty and serves only to distinguish them from the ones who spend all day in the office .
Here 'attorney', in history, meant a legal practitioner entitled to conduct litigation in lower courts as distinct from counsel. The word now only survives in the title attorney-general and for a person appointed under a power of attorney, the legal power to act in another's stead and with the full powers of that person.
The solicitor is the person in the office. Solicitors prepare cases and have no right to act as advocates in the highest courts except in certain procedural matters. Barristers ('counsel') are the people in the wigs ! They are also , at the same time, specialists in specific areas of law to whom solicitors refer difficult questions and cases for advice ('counsel's opinion'). The two have the same educational qualifications and basic training but the final stages and exams differ and they are governed by completely different professional bodies and rules.
'Lawyer' is the term for both professions. It is also, sometimes, a term of abuse by counsel of solicitors. 'A lawyer's or 'a solicitor's' point is one which has no merit but which is sufficiently beguiling to appear good to a solicitor.
