In less than two months, COVID-19 has killed more than 40,000 Americans and upended our economy. It has stoked fear and generated a debilitating uncertainty, causing tremendous stress and anxiety. And it seems unlikely simply to go away in the near future.

For students graduating this spring, traditional ceremonies celebrating their achievements have been canceled or postponed. For law students, graduation was the penultimate step in the path to becoming a lawyer. After graduation, nearly all begin studying for the July bar exam — except this year.

Eleven jurisdictions and counting have postponed July bar examinations, including New York and Massachusetts. Others appear ready to do so soon. The Texas Supreme Court has indicated that it will decide whether to proceed with the July bar examination by May 6. I urge the Supreme Court to adopt a limited diploma privilege for this year's bar applicants.

The diploma privilege allows a graduate of a law school to practice law without taking and passing a bar examination. It has been the predominant method of licensing lawyers in Wisconsin for more than a century. Although the diploma privilege was once the majority rule among the states, Wisconsin is now joined (in part) only by New Hampshire.

The ostensible reason for the death of the diploma privilege is the claim that successfully passing the bar exam demonstrates competence to practice law. That claim is belied both by the record in Wisconsin and the absence of any sound empirical evidence. The 2018-19 Wisconsin lawyer regulation report found 21% of grievances were for lack of diligence; just 4% were for incompetence. Wisconsin lawyers do not have a reputation for incompetent work, and its lawyer regulation system does not cover up lawyer misbehavior.

The test of competence in the July 2020 Texas bar examination is evenly divided between tests of knowledge of Texas law and of "general" law. Forty percent of the Texas bar applicant's score is based on the Multistate Bar Examination (MBE). The MBE is a 200-question, multiple-choice examination testing students in seven basic subjects over a six-hour period (that's 1.8 minutes per question). However, 25 questions are unscored, for future possible use. That means that the applicant's knowledge of each subject is tested in just 25 questions. To do "well" on the MBE ordinarily means answering correctly two-thirds of the questions. Thus, an applicant can get one-third wrong and still be in sound position to pass the Texas bar exam.

Moreover, the MBE tests students on knowledge of things that are not actually law. The best-known example is that the MBE tests an applicant's knowledge of criminal law in part on the common law of crimes and the Model Penal Code, neither of which is "law." The July 2020 exam will likely test applicants in some very small way on Texas evidence. The MBE also tests applicant about their knowledge of evidence, but only knowledge of the Federal Rules of Evidence, applicable only in federal courts.

The continuing threat of COVID-19 makes it highly unlikely the July bar examination will occur on time. At present, experts lack knowledge of the transmission rates of the coronavirus and the role of presymptomatic and asymptomatic carriers in spreading the disease. States are facing significant testing difficulties, and we lack even basic information concerning who has it and who has had it. We appear many months away from a vaccine.

The Supreme Court might choose to move the bar examination to September, as the owner of the MBE, the National Conference of Bar Examiners, is suggesting. But some scientists studying viruses believe the second wave of COVID-19 will take place then.

Thus, although moving to a September date might work, it might also be a fool's errand. No one knows with any degree of certainty.

What is worse for those intent on taking the July 2020 Texas bar examination is a prior decision of the Texas Supreme Court to adopt the Uniform Bar Examination (UBE) for the next test dates in February 2021. Canceling the July 2020 examination and moving applicants to 2021 would cause them great harm in terms of entry into the profession and anxiety in studying for a very different bar examination. And the UBE does not test examinees on any state's law, including Texas law.

Instead of delaying entry, a limited diploma privilege for the applicants planning on taking the July bar examination may both permit law graduates the opportunity to begin their professional lives without delay (and much uncertainty) and protect the interests of the public. In fact, Utah has already done so.

A diploma privilege should be granted provisionally: a recipient of the privilege must attach herself to a member of the bar and complete 500 hours of legal work under supervision within a four- to six-month period. The mentor would certify successful completion of these hours to the Board of Law Examiners for the provisional license to become permanent. An applicant's failure would require him to take the succeeding Texas bar examination.

Five hundred hours of work under supervision is significant but not foolproof. But a suboptimal solution is better than no solution. We live in times in which the least worst option should be acknowledged as our best option.

Michael Ariens is a professor of law at the St. Mary's University School of Law. He has extensively studied the history and role of the bar exam. The opinions expressed here are his alone.