A person with a J.D. is a “doctor” is the sense that they have a terminal professional degree that says “doctorate” on it, but you’re right, it’s not really the same. I mean, we’re talking about an educational track where you get your doctorate before you get your masters. The more PhD-ish degree is “Doctor of the Science of Jurisprudence” or J.S.D, which is the terminal academic law degree. The J.S.D. does require a dissertation and all that other PhD stuff. It has a few other names as well, which I can’t remember offhand.
My take on it is that it’s not so much technically improper to call a J.D. holder “doctor” as it is the J.D. looks like a tool if he answers to doctor. It’s just not done. No attorney I know refers to themselves or other attorneys as “doctor,” except jokingly in private. Even in law school the instructors were “professor so-and-so,” not doctor. So I have a doctorate of sorts, but don’t bother to call me doctor. In court it’s “counselor,” out of court “prav” is fine.
I don’t have a doctorate but I just wanted to chime in and throw some props to my uncle who has two.
They fondly call him Dr. Doctor.
Here’s the list of his creds from the website.
Uh, he was in college for 11 or 12 years and then internships followed.
And they would be wrong. A Ph.D. typically takes more time than an M.D., not less. Furthermore, since it requires both mastery of one’s field and an original contribution to that field, I stand by my assertion that it involves greater scope. (Note: I’m not saying that medical degrees are easy to get. Not at all. I merely say that anyone who thinks that a Ph.D. requires less time and study than an M.D. is woefully misinformed.)
Well, as others have already pointed out, the term “doctor” originally referred to Ph.D.'s or their equivalents, as evidenced by its etymology. This term was simply co-opted by the medical community. So if a lawyer does not consider a Ph.D. to be a real doctor, then that person is simply misinformed.
I acknowledge the hard work that goes into obtaining a J.D., as well as the intelligence of those who manage to obtain that degree. However, I agree with pravnik, who says that other law degrees (e.g. the J.S.D.) are more properly equivalent to a Ph.D. For this reason, I do not think that the J.D. is comparable to a Ph.D., even though I admite the intelligence and tenacity of those who pursued that route.
When we had our law school graduation, Georgia State decided that we wouldn’t be “hooded” on stage like the “real” doctorates - we would “walk” with our hoods already on. Those of us who had written for Law Review decided that we really didn’t like that idea very much, and our professors were a bit put out by it also. So we had our own “hooding” ceremony the night before the main graduation, and most of us skipped the (long) main graduation ceremony.
Our property law professor, who had a wonderful warped sense of humor, greeted us as we assembled for the hooding ceremony and handed each of us a 3x5 card with instructions to write our name on one side and a quote on the other, with the promise that if we didn’t provide one he would provide one for us. Fearing what he would come up with, we all came up with something spur of the moment. My favorite:
Some graduated Magna cum Laude
Some graduated Summa cum Laude
I graduated, Thank You, Lawd!
I don’t know if that’s true. I know many M.D.s in training and many Ph.D.s - everyone understands the difference in preparation. Yes, earning an M.D. is fucking difficult and time consuming, absolutely. But it is a professional degree, as is a J.D. The terminal degree in medicine is the Ph.D., which entails the same preparation and original research and dissertation that a Ph.D. in ancient language, engineering, education, or sociology does. By custom we call M.D.s doctors and that works fine for everyone. I mean, once I earn my degree, I’m not going to respond when people yell, “Is there a doctor in the house?” I know what they mean.
It’s regrettable, but just goes to show that higher education != intelligence, if you’re encountering people who discount others because they think their degree was “harder” to obtain. They’re also demonstrating an astonishing lack of exposure to the world around them - I’m at a university, as I imagine a majority of Ph.D. students are, and I run into J.D.s, M.A.s, M.F.A.s, etc. all the time… and I actually talk to them! Normal conversations will make it pretty clear that these folks are undertaking extremely difficult work in earning a degree. You’ll get no argument from me, and I hope any truly educated person either, on that point.
I have a PhD in Slavic historical linguistics. I was at a party once and someone asked me what I was studying. I foolishly told her. She expressed surprise to learn that there was such a subject. So I said, yeah, languages change over time, you know, like how Shakespearean English is different from the English we speak? And she said that she’d never read any Shakespeare. At that point it was all Uncomfortable Silence and edging slowly away from each other.
After that I told people I studied “Russian”, which was about 5% of the truth. Although that didn’t deter one person from insisting that my language skills would help her on her expedition to Turkey. Er, no!
Increasingly, grad programs are offering parellel or standalone applied doctorates (or “professional doctorates”) that entail a three-year program of study, with no dissertation. Moreover, some of these programs waive the master’s degree as a prerequisite.
The Ed.D. thing is so varied. Some programs only offer the Ed.D. as a terminal degree… and others offer a Ph.D. and Ed.D. track, with the Ed.D. being the “professional doctorate.” Which means you have to look at someone’s CV before determining which one it is. Of course, some people don’t, so you have to have your advisor write caustic letters when you’re applying for grants that explicitly state “Ph.D. candidates only.”
In fairness, I believe the first institutions to grant doctorates in education in the US granted Ed.D.s. Some institutions have a real hard time changing with the times, especially when they think they’re the center of the academic world.
Not that this situation applies to me or anything…
Even if we grant that to be true, that only makes these situations exceptions to the general rule. I see no reason why one should harp on these exceptions, while simultaneously ignoring the blanket claim that the M.D. takes up more time (and require greater scope) than the Ph.D. degree.
Yes, it’s there. I wasn’t talking about the Ed.D., though. I was talking about the Ph.D., so the existence of the Ed.D. isn’t relevant to what I was saying.
Ph.D. in Musicology (2006). Specializing in American classical music, diss. on a 20th century American opera based on a Shakespeare play. Additional interests: film and television music. Words + music + stuff on a stage/screen. Interdisciplinary whatnot and soforth.
Presently going out of my mind with boredom at my library job, which pays the bills and has great benefits, but is not quite as mentally stimulating as researching and writing…
Way back a half century or so ago, most US law schools gave their graduates the LL.B. degree (Bachelor of Laws). This stemmed from back earlier when law schools did not require a separate undergraduate bachelors degree befofe admission.
Eventually, some bright lawyer recognized that in federal government employment, someone with a doctoral-level degree was paid more than someone with merely a bachelors. The law schools were convinced that it was not preposterous to award a J.D. (Juris Doctor) degree to students who had completed a three-year post-bachelors program (as a bachelors was pretty much required for admission by then), so they switched the degree they awarded from the LL.B. to the J.D. They also permitted their LL.B. graduates to “trade in” their LL.B. for a J.D. if they wanted.
Even though law school graduates were now awarded “doctoral” degrees, the profession had the unusual situation where it was mostly the new graduates who had doctoral-level degrees and the more experienced lawyers (and judges) who had “mere” bachelors, so there was virtually no movement to start calling J.D. law graduates “doctor.”
Also, in addition the LL.B. (now J.D.) degree, there are “graduate” law degrees awarded by some American law schools: LL.M. (Master of Laws) and S.J.D. or J.S.D. (Doctor of Juridical Science). The S.J.D./J.S.D. degree is a research degree, considered in equivalent to the Ph.D. in other fields. Once more there is the odd inversion where the initial degree is doctoral level and the advanced degree is a masters, but nobody worries about that.
Internationally, in many Continental European (particularly German-influenced) countries, practicing lawyers will have doctoral degrees and be referred to professionally as Doctor. In many other countries, universities commonly have undergraduate programs in law leading to the LL.B. degree, with graduate programs for LL.M. and LL.D. (doctor of laws) degrees. Often the LL.B. graduates will not become practicing lawyers in the same way that, say, biology graduates will not become biologists, though each may work in related fields.
In short, in the U.S., most lawyers have a doctoral-level degree (though we realize that it is sort of a doctoral-lite degree), but are not referred to professionally as “doctor” (unless possessing another doctoral degree or unrestrained pretentiousness).
I think that the problem people have with JDs as doctors is that the definition of doctor (from dictionary.com):
" A person, especially a physician, dentist, or veterinarian, trained in the healing arts and licensed to practice.
A person who has earned the highest academic degree awarded by a college or university in a specified discipline.
A person awarded an honorary degree by a college or university."
Leaving aside the bogusness of number 2…
Since there is a PhD in law, the JD is not the highest degree in that specified discipline. For medicine, it’s the MD. For research, it’s the PhD. There’s no higher. Thus, doctor.
All the above. I have a private practice (started a year ago, doing quite well). I am also a consultant at the local VA, where I do compensation and pension evals, which are mostly clinical evals of those claiming PTSD. I also consult for a large health and wellness program that has a research component. Finally, I teach a course in Theories of Personality.
My background is that I got my PhD in social psychology, then taught for 8 years before returning to respecialize in clinical. Two years of coursework, an internship and a post doc later, I was a clinician. I then worked in two rehab hospitals with medically-ill patients (mostly newly acquired spinal cord injuries) . Finally last year I decided to move and bust out on my own. I LOVE it.
The more PhD-ish degree is “Doctor of the Science of Jurisprudence” or J.S.D, which is the terminal academic law degree. The J.S.D. does require a dissertation and all that other PhD stuff. It has a few other names as well, which I can’t remember offhand.