Some NC Counties are “Legal Deserts”

Large sections of North Carolina are legal deserts, where the number of lawyers is far below the national average.

In South Carolina, the disparity is even greater. 

The result: in many counties in the Carolinas, people’s legal needs – whether it’s having a will prepared or getting a divorce – are being underserved, according to the ABA 2020 Profile of the Legal Profession.

“There are more than 1.3 million lawyers in the United States, but they are not evenly distributed among the 50 states, or even within the states,” the report says. “There are more than 3,100 counties and county equivalents in the US, and 54 of them have no lawyers. Another 182 have only one or two lawyers. Many are parts of legal deserts – large areas where residents have to travel far to find a lawyer for routine matters.”

Read the ABA 2020 Profile of the Legal Profession here.

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It’s no surprise that large population centers – big cities and metro areas – have lots of lawyers. New York City, for example, has 117,000 lawyers for a population of more than 8 million. Manhattan alone has 95,000 lawyers. 

Nationally, there are approximately four lawyers per 1,000 residents, according to the ABA report. But in densely populated areas the ratio is higher (in New York City, it’s 14 per 1,000), and in other parts of the country, particularly in the south and Midwest, the ratio is much lower.

To compile its statistics, the ABA drew on lawyer numbers from each state’s licensing authority. Overall, 40 percent of all counties and county-equivalents in the United States – 1,272 of 3,141 – have less than one lawyer per 1,000 residents 

North Carolina’s population (as of 2019) was 10,488,084. There are 24,253 lawyers in the state, which averages out to 2.3 lawyers per 1,000 people.

South Carolina’s population was 5,148, 714, with 10,798 lawyers for an average of 2.1 lawyers per 1,000 people.

NC Lawyer Numbers by County

Here are the number of lawyers by county in North Carolina. (Note: these numbers were taken from the ABA Profile. They have not been independently verified or correlated with the NC State Bar statistics. The exact numbers have likely changed since the ABA compiled its report.)

• Alamance 212
• Alexander 19
• Alleghany 9
• Anson 17
• Ashe 21
• Avery 19
• Beaufort 66
• Bertie 10
• Bladen 29
• Brunswick 151
• Buncombe 745
• Burke 76
• Cabarrus 237
• Caldwell 47
• Camden 2
• Carteret 124
• Caswell 14
• Catawba 197
• Chatham 94
• Cherokee 31
• Chowan 17
• Clay 12
• Cleveland 84
• Columbus 62
• Craven 188
• Cumberland 385
• Currituck 16
• Dare 88
• Davidson 112
• Davie 45
• Duplin 30
• Durham 1,411
• Edgecombe 53
• Forsyth 1,223
• Franklin 51
• Gaston 287
• Gates 2
• Graham 6
• Granville 161
• Greene 6
• Guilford 1,326
• Guilford-High Point 175
• Halifax 42
• Harnett 100
• Haywood 91
• Henderson 140
• Hertford 30
• Hoke 33
• Hyde 5
• Iredell 249
• Jackson 72
• Johnston 182
• Jones 5
• Lee 73
• Lenoir 59
• Lincoln 70
• Macon 37
• Madison 17
• Martin 14
• McDowell 43
• Mecklenburg 5,634
• Mitchell 13
• Montgomery 14
• Moore 165
• Nash 126
• New Hanover 812
• Northampton 11
• Onslow 146
• Orange 869
• Pamlico 11
• Pasquotank 59
• Pender 55
• Perquimans 7
• Person 40
• Pitt 286
• Polk 23
• Randolph 108
• Richmond 47
• Robeson 119
• Rockingham 69
• Rowan 148
• Rutherford 45
• Sampson 43
• Scotland 24
• Stanly 56
• Stokes 30
• Surry 74
• Swain 19
• Transylvania 40
• Tyrrell 2
• Union 246
• Vance 38
• Wake 5,947
• Warren 11
• Washington 4
• Watauga 103
• Wayne 105
• Wilkes 65
• Wilson 104
• Yadkin 28
• Yancey 18

Jay Reeves is author of The Most Powerful Attorney in the World. He practiced law in North Carolina and South Carolina. Now he writes and speaks at CLEs, keynotes and in-firm presentations on lawyer professionalism and well-being. He runs Your Law Life LLC, a training and consulting company that helps lawyers add purpose, profits and peace of mind to their practices. Contact jay@yourlawlife.com or 919-619-2441.